No, I have not spell it wrong, DYOR is the acronym that our lecturer gives to the sentence: Do your own research.
This is one of the first ‘lessons’ I have learned as soon as I arrived at university. In fact it is essential throughout all our course to do our own research if we don’t understand something, but also when we need to write an essay which definitely need to have evidence.
For many of us, before coming to university research meant: google. Anything you need, there is google, maybe you can’t remember how to pronounce a word, google it, or maybe you don’t remember the capital of a country, well google it.
Google is some kind of motto for the millennial and it is also the answer to any of our questions/problems.
Well at university this motto need to change. In fact included in our tuition fee here at Brookes, we have all kind of databases we can use as our research tools. For example BusinessSourceComplete is very useful to find journals, whereas Mintel is used to know more about consumer lifestyle information and general marketing research. Moreover we also have Warc, World Research Centre and Passport, international markets, economic reports and so on.
I found this picture on Google (I should not be saying that after writing this blog post, however for images it is still allowed). I really think this can summarise the importance of doing our own research in a university environment:
oppoRtunity: research is an opportunity to discover something new.
idEa: during our researches most of our ideas develop, for example the one used to write an essay, but also the ideas that we cite from others writers.
earningS: well, in the university we don’t talk about money, but marks. In fact a good evidence, in text and reference list can definitely allows your mark to rise.
devElopment and growtH: when researching we develop new ideas and different point of view, this mean we do not only develop from an academic point of view, but also from a personal one. In fact, in my opinion, since I started the university I am more critical when giving information and when listening.
innovAtion: we need to know what has already happened to innovate or build something new.
expeRience: reasearching is all about getting experience in a particular field.
Curiosity: I personally found it hard to start searching at the begging, because it was not something I was used to, but now I am feel that I am starting to be more and more curious about new topics.
Have you find this blog post interesting? What about your personal experience with DYOR?
Life is made up of challenges 