Background information can help you learn more about your topic and develop your research question and approach.
Common examples of background information sources are dictionaries, encyclopedias, bibliographies, and other reference sources that help give you a general overview of a topic. You may find these sources by searching our library catalog or through a library database.
Background information usually adds one or more of the following benefits to your research process:
For best results, seek background information early in the research process. That way, you can use what you learn about foundational concepts to make changes to your research question or plan for next steps.
Background information sources may contain information on many topics from multiple disciplines. You're probably already familiar with one source for general background information, Wikipedia.
To find this type of background information through UH Libraries, try searching one of the databases below with keywords related to your research question.
Some background information sources are less general and instead cover a variety of topics related to a specific person or time period. These types of background information sources tend to be more detailed than the general sources described above.
To look for books or ebooks of background information on your topic, try searching keywords associated with your research topic in the library's catalog, specifying the search term as a subject, rather than title. The following are examples of some of what you'll find: