What is grey literature?
The term grey literature refers to published and unpublished research, such as reports, government documents, and presentations which you can find simply through Google!
Grey literature is often the best source of up-to-date research as you don’t have to wait for it to go through the publication process. Grey literature usually is not found on the library website or in databases.
Grey literature does not go through the same peer-review process as journal articles. However, it can still be a reliable resource for you to use. Just make sure that you evaluate grey literature before using it.
How to find grey literature?
Grey literature can be tricky to find. To save time and search effectively, we recommended you plan your search.
Steps:
- Decide what type of grey literature you need
- Choose the best place to search
- Search for the main concepts as keywords
Google advanced search
Google's Advanced Search makes it easy to find grey literature.
For example, we want to find Australian government reports on volunteers in the palliative care sector
Steps:
- Type the keywords palliative care and volunteers into the search bar
- In site or domain, type in .gov.au (this limits results to only Australian Government sources)
- Under file type, choose PDF (most reports by governments and organisations are PDF)
- Then select search
TIP: If you don't find what you want in Google try another option such as specialised databases.
Additional Google Searching Tips
In the site or domain field, you can also narrow your results to:
- .org for organisation sources
- .edu for educational sources
By putting .au after the site or domain (e.g. .edu.au) your search will only return Australian educational sources.