How do I create keywords?

When writing a paper, we need to include half a dozen or so keywords that summarise the themes, methodologies and contexts which our research has encompassed. Determining keywords is one of the last jobs to be done when writing a research paper, along with finalising the conclusions chapter, writing the abstract, and confirming the final version of the paper's title.

It always pays to check articles written in our field and on the topic which have been published by the journal we are aiming at, examining the keywords those authors have used. Then we can also use those.

If we find ourselves in the lucky position of having keyword allocation to spare, we should consider adding closely related words and phrases. This will enable readers looking for similar topics will find our paper.

While keywords are usually very short phrases of 1-3 words, if we are going to be writing for an academic journal, we need to check their style guide for their rules. Some journals will allow quite specific phrases; others will only allow general keywords. Checking ahead of time will help ensure we do not waste effort.

And, like the conclusions, the abstract, and the title, the keywords too should contain no surprises. There should be a flow and a fit to all these elements. Clickbait need not apply.

A very useful tool in this area is the Palgrave-Macmillan master list of keywords, which can be found here (n.d.). The list may spark ideas if we are suffering from a lack of inspiration.

Further, a very useful video created by TCFEX LLC (n.d.) exploring this topic:

I hope you find these resources useful.

Sam

References:

Palgrave-Macmillan (n.d.). Journal of International Business Studies Keywords List. https://resource-cms.springernature.com/springer-cms/rest/v1/content/13353650/data/v1

Punch, K. F. (2016). Developing Effective Research Proposals (3rd ed.). Sage Publishing Ltd.

TCFEX LLC (n.d.). Writing a Thesis, Paper or Research Project - Lecture 2: Emerald & John Wiley. https://www.udemy.com/write-a-high-quality-thesis-or-artice-using-research-tools/learn/lecture/1911450

read more "How do I create keywords?"

SurveyMonkey word cloud

This year, SurveyMonkey introduced a word cloud feature that helps researchers to see any similarity in the text responses to open-ended survey questions.

What is more, it is easy to use. Simply go to a text question you want to analyse this way, then click on the tab immediately after the "Responses (xxx)" tab that says "Word cloud". You can adjust colour, frequency etc, then export the resulting cloud as a .png file, save it on your survey dashboard, or both.

We need at least five survey results to be able to generate a word cloud. SurveyMonkey's word cloud algorithm automatically excludes a number of words which are unlikely to be useful in our results:

a, about, above, after, again, against, all, am, an, and, any, are, aren't, as, at, be, because, been, before, being, below, between, both, but, by, can, can't, cannot, com, could, couldn't, did, didn't, do, does, doesn't, doing, don't, down, during, each, else, ever, few, for, from, further, get, had, hadn't, has, hasn't, have, haven't, having, he, he'd, he'll, he's, her, here, here's, hers, herself, him, himself, his, how, how's, http, I, I'd, I'll, I'm, I've, if, in, into, is, isn't, it, it's, its, itself, just, k, let's, like, me, more, most, mustn't, my, myself, no, nor, not, of, off, on, once, only, or, other, ought, our, ours, ourselves, out, over, own, r, same, shall, shan't, she, she'd, she'll, she's, should, shouldn't, so, some, such, than, that, that's, the, their, theirs, them, themselves, then, there, there's, these, they, they'd, they'll, they're, they've, this, those, through, to, too, under, until, up, very, was, wasn't, we, we'd, we'll, we're, we've, were, weren't, what, what's, when, when's, where, where's, which, while, who, who's, whom, why, why's, with, won't, would, wouldn't, www, you, you'd, you'll, you're, you've, your, yours, yourself, yourselves.

Once we have created the word cloud, we simply save it, choose the format, then we can download it. While I am sure at higher levels the functionality will be much more whizzy-do, it is not bad at the bottom end either :-D


Sam

• Reference: SurveyMonkey (15 January 2019). Help Centre: Word Cloud. Retrieved from https://help.surveymonkey.com/articles/en_US/kb/Word-Cloud or https://help.surveymonkey.com/articles/en_US/kb/Analyzing-Text-Responses

read more "SurveyMonkey word cloud"

Blogger keyword search made simple

I discovered by accident today how I can limit a Blogger blog search to just the keywords. It has taken me a number of years to sort this out, of course, and I stumbled upon it entirely by accident.

The accident was in trying to provide a list of all my live blog posts which contained a particular keyword. I tried a few things like "label: [keyword]" and "tag: [keyword]" in the search box, but this didn't work. I think it only showed up items which contained the keyword AND the same in the text itself. Not necessarily a win.

However, in one of the posts which came up in one of my attempts, I clicked the keyword in the keyword list below that post. This returned me a search only on that keyword. Then I sorted by date, to get the list in date order. Yay! I had it!

But better still, I noticed that my blog's URL now had an extra stage: /label/[keyword].

So a keyword search is even simpler than that. All we have to do is to key "/label/[keyword]" onto the end of our blog address, and lo! We will have our keyword search anytime we want it. If this is a keyword phrase, we also key the gap between the words.

Who knew it would be so easy? I have a new shiny Blogger tool!


Sam

read more "Blogger keyword search made simple"