Communication: Public Relations

What's going on here in this guide? (5m)

Samples of keyword searches
Library databases work with keywords only -so spelling counts!
(note: edit and choose your own! OR change to a different database and try them)
"public relations"
AND
"case study" OR "case studies"

"public relations"
AND
sports OR football OR hockey OR skiing OR baseball OR soccer
(filtering to scholarly articles only)

"public relations"
(filtering to books from the last 3 years only)

also Try these keywords and mix in your own:

"Public relations" OR "Strategic communication"

Reputation OR "brand awareness" OR "corporate social responsibility"

ethical OR responsible OR recognizability OR credibility

Influencer OR journalist OR stakeholder OR constituency OR public

"Media relations" OR "community relations"

How do I get full text for free?

Watch this mercifully short video on
Inter Library Loan
(and as always, e-mail dale.larsen@utah.edu for help)

Library research for public relations cases is evidence based:

In the 1970s, Ford Motor Company sold a vehicle that appealed to the public, but had an engineering flaw.  When doing evidence based research, how do we include the voices of the company, members of the public, auto safety lobbying groups, mainstream and politicized news outlets, legislators, etc. etc.?  HERE'S A SAMPLE...

CONTEXT: A case study on Ford’s mishandling of public communication found that other companies very successfully dealt with similar PR disasters by: acting quickly to reassess policies, holding people accountable for their actions and sending leadership throughout the company to apologize. The article goes on to say,
QUOTE “The perceived wisdom, even 30 or more years later, is that Ford… put profit before making an inexpensive modification that would have saved lives and prevented suffering. Ford failed in having the basic facts of the case understood…”
CITATION: Businesses back from the brink. (2006). Strategic Direction, 22(2), 25–27. https://doi.org/10.1108/02580540610644096

Panel of images above are from the following:
Rich, M. (2021, August 4). Whatever happened to the Ford Pinto? MotorBiscuit. https://www.motorbiscuit.com/whatever-happened-to-the-ford-pinto/
Dowie, M. (1977, September). Pinto madness. Mother Jones. https://www.motherjones.com/politics/1977/09/pinto-madness/
The Center for Auto Safety. (n.d.). Ford Pinto fuel tank. https://www.autosafety.org/ford-pinto-fuel-tank/

if you had the role of public relations in the instance above, which of the stakeholders/constituency would you talk to first?  What would your next strategic point be? What would your final goals address? How would the company look 5 years onward in public opinion?

Note: The flaming vehicle cartoon element of the figure above was created by ChatGPT on September 15, 2025.

Trends, Ideas, Keywords, General Searching
​Library Catalog (advanced search)
Academic Search Ultimate (A big mash of many disciplines)

Communication & Mass Media Complete
Film and Television Literature Index
Modern Language Association (MLA) International Bibliography

Business & Marketing
NexisUNI "source type" > "industry & trade press"
Business Source Premiere
IBIS World

Non-Profit & Social Sciences
PAIS (public policy from around the world)
Sociological Abstracts (One of Dale's fav's: societies, cultures, values identities)
Candid (foundations information -very limited data, but you can put in a keyword like "violence" and get mission statements)
PsycINFO (psychology, but with many applications in social sciences)
 

Advanced -sort by # of times cited video -how do I use these again?
Scopus  
Web of Science 

In the context of PR Cases & Campaigns…

Students will learn to effectively and efficiently use an academic library website in cooperation with open web and AI sites

Students will learn library resource and keyword search strategies for academic research

Students will learn the main ideas and framework of a scholarly article, how to find them at an academic library, and how to quickly interpret the main points each article makes

SEARCHING FOR EVIDENCE ON HOW YOUR INTENDED AUDIENCE FEELS...
suggestion: in the advanced search, put the main product/service of the organization in the "title" -and in the next line, look for keywords related to audience analysis (I kind of took it too far?)
example: 
autos OR automobiles OR cars OR suv
AND
demographics OR values OR behavior OR attitudes OR feelings OR gender OR education OR lifestyle OR beliefs OR motivations OR aspirations OR sentiment OR perceptions
 

OR TRY LOOKING AT A SPECIFIC POPULATION

"gen z" OR "generation z" OR zoomers OR "post-millenials"
AND
values OR "consumer behavior" OR attitudes OR feelings OR lifestyle OR beliefs OR motivations OR aspirations OR sentiment OR perceptions OR trends