Category: Learning

IBIS World – Comprehensive industry-market research database

WordPress User [abc27] Learning Leave a comment

Are you looking for UK data about a particular industry? 

We subscribe to a comprehensive resource called IBIS World.  There are nearly 13,000 industry reports online, which are all easily searchable. 

Each industry has its own report which is broken down into the following chapters; 

  • At a glance 
  • Performance 
  • Products and Markets 
  • Geographic Breakdown 
  • Competitive Forces 
  • Companies 
  • External Environment 
  • Financial Benchmarks 

Whether you’re looking for the average wage for that industry or trying to find out the key markets.  The information is presented in manageable sections and with clear downloadable graphics. 

Example of a chart from IBIS World

There’s a useful ‘At a glance’ summary for each UK industry, providing a snapshot of the revenue, a SWOT analysis and a detailed Executive Summary. 

IBIS World is available on and off campus 24/7 and the reports can be downloaded in full or by chapter.  Don’t forget, if  you use the IBIS world data in your assignments, to acknowledge this.  Further help is available in our Referencing and Plagiarism Guide: https://libguides.aber.ac.uk/c.php?g=676952&p=5122582  

For any further help with this resource contact librarians@aber.ac.uk  

AberSkills. Your skills hub

WordPress User [abc27] Help & advice, Information Skills, Learning, Research Leave a comment

Do you want to develop your academic writing skills, learn about using the library and its resources, get to grips with referencing, or improve your employability skills?

Good news! These topics and more are covered in the Semester 1 AberSkills programme, which is available for free for all students at Aberystwyth University.

AberSkills Workshops take place throughout the academic year and are a mixture of face to face and online sessions. Most sessions are offered in both Welsh and English.

All workshops are listed on the AberSkills website. Take a look to see what’s available and book your place in a click.

If you miss a session and want to catch-up, academic skills and library workshop teaching materials for 2023-2024 are available on Blackboard under Organisations. 2024-2025 workshop teaching materials will be uploaded soon after the session.

AI and the Library – Week One. Our New Guide and Blog Post Series

WordPress User [abc27] Help & advice, Information Skills, Learning Leave a comment

Your Subject Librarian team have been hard at work over the “summer” (seriously, did it ever stop raining?) to bring you a newly updated AI Guide which outlines how you can use AI to get the best out of the library’s resources.

AI and the Library

Screenshot from the new AI and the Library LibGuide

The Guide offers advice on:

  • How you might use AI.
  • Some of the AI tools that might be useful for you.
  • The benefits of using AI over traditional search engines.
  • The appropriate and ethical use of AI tools.
  • Effective prompt building.
  • Some of the potential risks of using AI (including issues around copyright infringement, bias, and data protection).
  • The impact of AI on academic integrity.

Links to the Guide can be found here:

As a companion to the Guide, we are going to offer a series of blog posts which will look at the advice given in the guide in more detail and offer some practical tips for using AI.

Here’s a sneak peek of what you can expect in the coming weeks:

  • Reviews of AI tools.
  • Practical advice on effective prompt building.
  • Developing smart keyword searches.
  • Discovering resources related to your area of study.
  • Evaluating AI outputs by applying the CRAAP test.
  • The risks of using AI.

We hope that you will find our Guide and the series of blog posts useful. It is important to stress that you must follow the guidelines on the use of AI issued by your department (where available).

Protecting your research: avoiding publication scams 

WordPress User [ssg] Help & advice, Information Skills, Learning, Research Leave a comment

Journal hijacking and fraudulent journal sites are becoming an increasing problem for journal authors, publishers and readers. Publishing scams aim to exploit researchers, promising quick publication but charging excessive publication fees. These sites can often be a clone of an established journal, set up to extract fees from unsuspecting authors. 

Publishers are becoming more increasingly aware of the problem and have taken steps to combat this new trend. Scopus academic database had 67 hijacked journals on its database by 2023 (Challenges posed by hijacked journals in Scopus – Abalkina – 2024 – Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology – Wiley Online Library ) To help alleviate this problem, Scopus removed URLs to all journal homepages that it indexes, although the problem persists (Retraction Watch, 2023 Elsevier’s Scopus deletes journal links following revelations of hijacked indexed journals – Retraction Watch) 

Many authors and readers are unaware of this practice and the following resources might be useful to consider. 

Evaluating journals: 

 
Support from your library: 

 
Contact us: librarians@aber.ac.uk