Author: Marié Roux (Page 8 of 13)

Did you know that your ORCID iD is all about being connected? Many researchers create their iDs in order to apply for funding at the NRF or to submit a paper for publication. But you can do so much more. ORCID is all about the importance of being connected, either to your Stellenbosch University identity, to the databases where your articles are indexed, to funders, publishers, organisations, and so on. In this blog post, we will explore some of the different types of “connectedness” which are very important for you as a researcher.

Connect to the Stellenbosch University integration

We would like to encourage you to connect your ORCID ID to your StellenboschUniversity identity.
Please follow this link and follow the steps below.

• First sign in to the SU portal
• You will be directed to the “Manage your researcher identities” page
• Click on the “Connect” button under ORCID
• If you already have an ORCID ID you will be able to sign in and authorise SU to view and update your ORCID profile
• If you don’t have an ID yet, click on “Register now”, complete the form and authorise SU to view and update your profile, all in one step!
• We encourage you to use your @sun.ac.za email address to register.

Read more about this aspect in a previous blog post.

Connect to your Scopus Author iD

Option 1: Link your ORCID iD from Scopus Author ID

1. Go to Scopus Author search
2. Search by your name and “Stellenbosch University” in the Affiliation field
3. Click on your name in the results list to open your profile page. (Please note that you won’t find an Author ID if you don’t have works already indexed by Scopus)
4. If you do have an Author ID, select “Connect to ORCID”
6. Follow the steps to associate your Scopus author profile with your ORCID record

Option 2: Linking Scopus Author ID from ORCID

1. Log in to ORCID
2. In the Works section, select ‘Add works’ and then ‘Search & link’
3. Select Scopus Elsevier from the list and click on authorise
4. Follow the steps to associate your Scopus profile and works with ORCID

Connect to ResearcherID on Web of Science

Connect to Crossref

It is very important to connect your ORCID iD to the database Crossref, because it will then automatically update your ORCID record as soon as you publish a new online article associated with a DOI. Read more here about this great feature.

 Get help

Enquiries: Marié Roux or Kirchner van Deventer

Read more about ORCID and its connectedness in this article: Connected Research

Special Collections is a unique space in the Stellenbosch University Library where we focus on research, preservation, and accessibility of unique research material. The division house three sections, in the main library 1) Africana, 2) Manuscript section and 3) Rare books. The Music Library’s Special Collections is called the Documentation Centre for Music (DOMUS).

Researchers from all faculties are welcome to make use of the research sources in Special Collections.  To make optimal use of this collection researchers are requested to make an appointment by sending an e-mail to jsgspes@sun.ac.za. Special Collections is a closed collection. Books in this collection are searchable in the library catalogue and you are able to use the material, but you will not be able to borrow it. As preservation is one of the primary goals, clients will be requested to handle material with care, using a book cradle to support the books, wearing gloves, and no photocopies can be made.

Africana consists of a collection of valuable books, pamphlets, maps, pictorial works, and other material on sub-Saharan Africa, with a specific focus on the political, economic, and social history of South Africa, the Western Cape and the Stellenbosch district.  Books published from 1600 until 2022 form part of this collections.

Rare Books is a treasure trove of curiosities. A collection of valuable, unique, and sometimes irreplaceable books on a variety of subjects, including art, the sciences, religion, history, literature, and popular culture. This collection houses first- and special editions, signed copies and unique binding of printed material dating back from 1490 to the present.

Manuscript Section houses more than 461 document collections of individuals or organisations covering categories like the music, architecture, art, literature, political, social, and economic history of South Africa and, specifically, from the Western Cape. Finding aids to the indexes of the document collections and examples of documents are available on SUNDigital.

Documentation Centre for Music (DOMUS) is housed in the Music Library and consists of information on special music collections in South Africa aimed at stimulating music research on South African materials in South Africa and internationally.

For more information, researchers can visit the Special Collections library guides at:

Special Collections

Directory of South African Music Collections

Author: Marieta Buys

Did you know that the Library has three different repositories?

SUNScholar  – Stellenbosch University’s institutional research repository

SUNScholar might be the most well-known of our repositories. Since the inception of SUNScholar and its predecessor, Electronic Theses & Dissertations (ETD),  the items in SUNScholar have grown steadily to reach a substantial number of 29 500 full-text items in 2021.  The entire process of submission, evaluation, verification and acceptance takes place online.  The ingest of new data into SUNScholar is partly due to the biannual graduation ceremonies, the SU research report and authors’ self-archived published articles.  Self-archiving of published articles gives authors the opportunity to disseminate their research more widely, as SUNScholar has established itself as an accredited institutional repository.

In total SUNScholar had 461 735 visits and 158 470 items downloaded. In the graph below it is interesting to see from which continents it is mostly visited.

SUNDigital – Digital Collections

SUNDigital has also been around for a number of years, but might not be as well-known as SUNScholar. A wealth of interesting original manuscripts, maps and photographs have been digitised to form collections within SUNDigital. The total number of items in this digital heritage repository is 15 896 (2021). The repository usage is high at 51 983 times visited, and 37 051 downloads in total.

SUNScholarData  –  Stellenbosch University’s research data repository

The new kid on the block is SUNScholarData. Since its inception in 2019, a growing number of depositors have contributed to the datasets housed in this repository, including linked PLoS datasets. The use of this repository is also growing with 5 034 views and 3 078 downloads in 2021.

Enquiries: Paulette Talliard and Samuel Simango

Samuel Simango, Manager of Research Data Services, attended the Mortenson Center Associates Program recently. The following is his feedback on his time spent at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign:

The Mortenson Center Associates Program is a unique non-degree professional development programme for librarians from outside the United States. The programme is run by the Mortenson Center for International Library Programs which is located at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. The 2022 Mortenson Center Associates Program took place between 25^th May – 21^st June. The theme for this year was Smart and Smarter: Leadership and Innovation in Libraries. The activities of the programme comprised seminars, workshops, tours, and various tasks.

The programme’s content was wide-ranging and touched on multiple areas relating to library and information services. To a certain degree, it represents a deep dive into the Library and Information Service at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. However, this was blended with perspectives from several other divisions of the University, such as the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning, Siebel Center for Design, as well as the Campus Instructional Facility. Furthermore, the associates were also provided with broader exposure to several other institutions, including the Urbana Free Library, Harold Washington Branch Chicago Public Library, University of Chicago Library, Ohio State University Library, Pritzker Military Museum and Library, Online Computer Library Center (OCLC), Westerville Public Library, Arthur Public Library, Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Illinois State Library.

There were no specific tracts for the different types of librarians. As such all librarians attending the programme were exposed to a broad range of library environments. The idea was to provide associates with exposure rather than pigeonholing them to the types of libraries in which they happen to work. The Mortenson Center Associates Program probably represents the single greatest transfer of knowledge in the library sector in the world – primarily due to the manner in which it facilitates knowledge acquisition. After attending this programme one certainly comes out with a better understanding and appreciation of libraries.

Samuel (third from the right at the back) with the other librarians who attended the programme, and some of the presenters

The free version of the Dimensions database is a powerful tool to search for publications, data sets, clinical trials and many more. Dimensions covers millions of research publications connected by more than 1.6 billion citations, supporting grants, datasets, clinical trials, patents and policy documents. It boasts to be the world’s largest linked research information dataset.  Read more here.

They have worked together with the Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS) to integrate their VOSViewer tool into Dimensions. VOSviewer is a software tool for constructing and visualising bibliometric networks which may include citations, bibliographic coupling, co-citations, or co-authorship relations. VOSviewer Online has been fully integrated and added as a visualisation option in the Analytical views panel for all versions of Dimensions. Initially, it is only available in the Researchers Analytical View for publications. The following two types of analyses are available —co-authorship analysis and citation analysis.

Co-authorship analysis

With this fairly new feature you can now easily identify key patterns in bibliometric data. Try it out and contact us if you need any assistance.

Contact: Marié Roux

Day 5: Bridging uncharted waters

The last day of Library Research Week 2022 started out with a workshop on how to improve your impact as a researcher. Marié Roux, Manager of the Library’s division for Research Impact Services, took the participants through the steps on how to improve the online visibility of their research and why this is important. She explained why it is important to create unique author IDs (ORCID, Google Scholar, etc.), populate their profiles on academic network sites (ResearchGate) and showcase their research on social media (LinkedIn, Twitter). The last part of the workshop was about how to monitor your impact as an author with databases such as Web of Science, Scopus, scite, Dimensions and Altmetric.

Samuel Simango, the Manager for Research Data Services then presented a  session on how to handle sensitive research data. This was an excellent workshop where he explained the SU research data governance framework and shared information on secure storage of sensitive research data and the de-identification thereof. The session ended with some data sharing principles which should be adhered to when you work with sensitive data.

The week ended on a high note with a session by Wiley on the topic of the recent Read and Publish Open Access Agreement that has been implemented. The two presenters, Janice Rimbault and Fabio DiBello, took the participants through the author workflow of how to submit a manuscript to a Wiley hybrid journal and get the APC covered through this agreement. This was a valuable practical look at how this works and we will definitely be able to re-use the recording when authors need to know more about the workflow.

Siviwe Bangani, the Director for Research Services, then concluded the week by giving thanks to all presenters and participants.

Author: Marié Roux

Day 3: Navigating the new

The day started with a session on Mixed Methods by Dr Ilse Eigelaar-Meets. Her lively presentation was well received. She started off by discussing two key philosophical concerns, ontology and epistemology, touching on the three ontological arguments and the three epistemological approaches. A definition of mixed methods and a discussion on the types of mixed methods research designs followed.

The next session was presented by Prof Martin Kidd, the Director of the Centre for Statistical Consultation, on Statistics in your research. He discussed the phases of a project: planning, execution, data capturing, data analysis and reporting. The participants asked very relevant questions and a few enquiries about how and where the Centre can be contacted for help. This was a very important and relevant session.

The afternoon sessions were presented by Ms Claire Deakin from SAGE and Dr Bronwyne Coetzee from the Department of Psychology.  Ms Deakin gave an eye-opening presentation on two interactive research tools of Sage Research Methods Online with features for Project planning and Methods maps.  This allows researchers to narrow their searches depending on the research process.

Project Planner in Sage Research Methods Online

Dr Coetzee gave a riveting presentation on the qualitative data analysis software, ATLAS.ti.  The featured functions allow for data management, coding of data, groupings, sub-groups and hierarchies.  The programme allows for the interaction of various file types, and collaboration with other researchers. It is also integrated with statistical analysis programmes and reference manager tools.

The phases of qualitative analysis

Day 4: Traversing the tides

The takeaway from the first session on Research ethics and responsible research conduct within Social Science research, presented by Clarissa Robertson, Division for Research Development:

It is important to note that applying for research ethics is not all about ticking the boxes, but having the understanding that ethics comes first in all research. Research ethics is about credibility, responsibility, and transparency and can also be regarded as a roadmap. Researchers can regard the Research Ethics Committees as their partners in the research process.

The session  Checking your similarity index with Turnitin, presented by  Morris Samuel, Centre for Teaching and Learning:

Morris gave an overview of Turnitin. It is important to note that Turnitin does not check for plagiarism, it only checks for similarities against other publications within Turnitin. Students should always consult with their lecturers or supervisors regarding their similarity index scores for clarification. Students are encouraged to make use of the Turnitin sandbox link provided by the Library.

Authors: Paulette Talliard, Marleen van Wyk and Yusuf Ras

The Launch and panel discussion

The launch of Library Research Week 2022 was held in a hybrid format on 16 May 2022. Ms Ellen Tise, Senior Director of the Library and Information Service, opened the event and explained Library Research Week as one of the flagship programmes of the Library through which we seek to contribute to the University’s strategic theme Research for Impact.  “Our vision is to see this regarded as a prime forum through which partners from other academic support units and faculties are invited to share knowledge in order to impart and further develop the skills of researchers”, added Ms Tise. Thereafter Professor Eugene Cloete, Vice-Rector: Research, Innovation and Postgraduate Studies, officially opened the event and explained that the research journey has challenges. Those who succeed are often those who anticipate the challenges, gather all the necessary tools and are set for the final destination.

The highlight of the launch event was a panel discussion about research ethics, expertly facilitated by Professor Carolissen from the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. The panellists were Dr Marilize Burger, from the Medicine and Health Sciences Faculty, Ms Katlego Mthelebofu, a lecturer at the Faculty of Law , Mr Jerall Toi from the University’s Information Governance Office and  Ms Clarissa Robertson from SU’s Division for Research Development (DRD). The panellists were able to respond to all relevant questions from the facilitator and the audience.  Audience members showed a lot of appreciation for the panel discussion as reflected by the engagement levels of both the virtual and in-person delegates.

Panellists (From left to right): Jerall Toi, Prof Ronelle Carolissen, Clarissa Robertson and Katlego Mthelebofu. Dr Marelize Burger attended online.

Day 1: Rigging the ropes

The theme for Tuesday 17 May, ‘Rigging the ropes’ included lively and interactive sessions on search strategies (Enhance your search strategies: Google and Google Scholar), proposal writing (Do’s and Don’ts of proposal writing) and literature reviews. Pepler Head gave guidance to efficiently search Google and Google Scholar and how effective searching can narrow results considerably. Firstly, he explained how text is indexed in Google before he proceeded to provide search tips. Selene Delport focused on nutshell writing or micro writing, where the focus is on writing smaller sections of text which are later expanded. By means of an initial practical exercise consisting of three questions related to the topic content, the relevance of the topic and the aim of the research, attendees were asked to relate these questions to their own research and to write them in one sentence. Examples from the audience were used to illustrate the structuring of a research question. This presentation concluded with helpful steps for writing a hypothesis. Practical steps for writing a literature review were offered by Elizabeth Moll-Willard. She first explained the role and function of a literature review before she offered steps for writing a literature review. These steps include selecting a topic, searching the literature (creating a search strategy and managing literature), evaluating the literature and writing the review.

All in all a day of very practical information for postgraduate students and researchers!

Recordings of these webinars will be made available via the Library’s YouTube channel later on. Those who have registered for the webinars will all receive the recordings by email.

Authors: Siviwe Bangani and Santie de Jongh

SUNScholar is the University’s institutional repository.  It hosts theses, dissertations and published articles.  Situated in the Digital Scholarship department, helpful staff assists with nominations for graduation, the submission of theses and dissertations, and the self-archiving of published articles.

SUNScholar is divided per faculty and then per department, so for easy viewing you can go directly to the department and find completed theses and dissertations.

According to the Ranking Web of Repositories, SUNScholar is ranked 221^st out of 3751 institutional repositories around the world, hosting over 20 700 items or records, all freely accessible.

Herewith is a graph to show the visits and downloads from SUNScholar over time.

For more information go to the SUNScholar library webpage.

SUNScholar: https://scholar.sun.ac.za/

Contact: scholar@sun.ac.za

Guided by the University’s pursuit of research excellence and relevance, the Library and Information Service provides a variety of services to support postgraduate students, academic staff, researchers, and postdoctoral fellows at each stage of the research lifecycle.

The Library and Information Service has signed agreements with several publishers that make it easier for SU researchers to publish open access (OA) with these publishers, and in some cases to even publish OA without paying any article processing charge (APC). Many of these agreements have been negotiated by the South African National Library and Information Consortium (SANLiC), of which Stellenbosch University (SU) is a member.

Open access (OA) is the practice of providing unrestricted access normally associated with publisher copyright agreements via the Internet to peer-reviewed scholarly journal articles, theses and dissertations, and scholarly monographs and chapters in books. Access is immediate, online and freely available to the end user.

For more information about the open access agreements that have been signed please visit the link to access the open access publishing libguide.