Skip to Main Content
Accessibility Information

SPT/GST 335 (Campus) Gender & Sport

This guide is a companion to the campus course SPT/GST 335 Gender & Sport (Professor Beth Sheehan).

Research & Data Resources

General Research

Google Scholar 

Google Scholar provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts, and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories, universities, and other web sites. It is a great place for you to begin your research on your topic about women's sports.

Google Scholar Search results have the following options:

  • Citation for the article in 5 formats (including APA, required for this Gender & Sport course) & export to various citation managers including RefWorks which SNHU provides for all their students & employees
  • Click on "Cited by" beneath each result in Google Scholar to see a list of all the articles written more recently that cite that article
  • Google Scholar searches may be narrowed down by date in the left margin of the results list
  • If the full text is available, it will appear as a link to the right of the citation. The link below demonstrates how to connect Google Scholar to the Shapiro Library databases.

Library Databases for Data & Statistics

The following three library databases hold data and statistical information that may be useful for this project.

Statista

The Statista database is useful for locating all kinds of statistical information. For this project, you might try using some of these search terms/phrases:

Or reports from Statista such as this:

Sage Data

Type search terms into the search box. Then narrow results using limiters in the left margin such as Subject (ex: Education) and Terms (ex: undergraduate students). 

USA.gov

This database searches many different government sites (federal, state, local, county, etc.). Add the word "statistics" or "data" to your search if you are seeking hard numbers, as many articles (research studies, web articles, etc.) will also come up. Use this site again when you are conducting research for your literature review.

Here are some sample search phrases to use in usa.gov to find sources for your Gender & Sport project:
This link opens in a new window

Examples of sources found through usa.gov that are potentially useful to this project:

Library Databases for Articles & Information

Multi-Search

Using the Multi-search box on the Shapiro Library home page is a way to start your research off. It searches about 40% of the content that SNHU subscribes to for students/faculty/staff to conduct research all at once. You may type search terms into the box directly below.

 

Subject-Specific Library Databases

In addition to searching in the Multi-search box on the library home page, there are specific databases that would be helpful to search in for information for your project's literature review. Depending on your topic, you may need databases that focus on the business or legal sides of professional women's sports, or advertising/marketing, or the college pipeline, for example.  These databases provide information in multiple formats: books, articles, videos, blogs, reports, charts, images, audio files, data, legal reports/journals/laws, etc.

All the library databases may be accessed by clicking on the A-Z Database List in the Quick Links box on the library home page. Below is a list of databases that may be most helpful to you in your research for this Gender & Sport class.

Examples of resources from the library databases:

Websites

The websites below may offer both data and articles/information on your topic connected to professional women's sports, particularly the WNBA.

Gathering & Analyzing Data

Much of research in the social sciences involves gathering and analyzing data. Generally data gathering/research falls under Quantitative or Qualitative methods.

Quantitative Research

Research involving the collection of data in numerical form for quantitative analysis. The numerical data can be durations, scores, counts of incidents, ratings, or scales. Quantitative data can be collected in either controlled or naturalistic environments, in laboratories or field studies, from special populations or from samples of the general population. The defining factor is that numbers result from the process, whether the initial data collection produced numerical values, or whether non-numerical values were subsequently converted to numbers as part of the analysis process, as in content analysis.

Garwood, J. (Ed.) (2006). The SAGE Dictionary of Social Research Methods. SAGE Publications, Ltd. https://doi.org/10.4135/9780857020116 This link opens in a new window

Qualitative Research

Research that investigates aspects of social life which are not amenable to quantitative measurement. Associated with a variety of theoretical perspectives, qualitative research uses a range of methods to focus on the meanings and interpretation of social phenomena and social processes in the particular contexts in which they occur.

Sumner, M. (Ed.) (2006). The SAGE Dictionary of Social Research Methods. SAGE Publications, Ltd. https://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9780857020116 This link opens in a new window

Gender & Sport Project

The project for this Gender & Sport course will utilize data from a variety of sources. Below are sources to look for particular data on the WNBA, and other women's sports.