Research Resources - Poverty: Country Research Project | Fall '25

AI Guidelines/Tips:

As part of your initial research, you may use ChatGPT to generate a list of factors leading to poverty in your country. Remember that AI tools do not always contain accurate information; you must do your due diligence as a researcher to confirm the data and evidence that your question generates. Ask ChatGPT to show you a list of references/sources, and then head to those sites to read the information for yourself. Be mindful that bias in your original question can also lead to bias in the results.
You must cite your query, and can use Noodletools to help you. After creating your project in Noodletools, select "new source", from a website, then select "AI Response/Output". The prompt should contain the original question you asked ChatGPT. You may also cite follow-up responses.

Using Wikipedia: Wikipedia can be a valuable background source, and there will most likely be topic pages that focus specifically on poverty in your country (i.e. Poverty in the Democratic Republic of Congo). Though you cannot cite Wikipedia directly in a paper/project, look with a critical eye at the references listed at the end of each article for the possibility of discovering more scholarly, reputable resources.
Keyword Searches: As you read, start a short list of keywords that embody your topic(s). What factors play into poverty in your country? Use these words as you begin to search for more complex material. When searching the sources listed below, focus on keywords! Take your country name and add a clarifying term, like Mozambique AND environment.

Get to Know Your Country

Country Overviews and Reports:

BBC News: Country Profiles
The BBC offers guides to the politics, economics, culture, and history of a number of nations. Their records include country-specific audio and video clips from the BBC Archives.
CIA World Factbook
Information on the history, people, government, economy, geography, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues for 267 world entities. To find your country, look for Countries → search alphabetically by country name. This will provide facts but not analysis. BEGIN HERE!

Columbia International Affairs Online (CIAO)
Search for your country in the search bar, and refine results using the filters on the left. Look at results filtered by Content Type → Country Data and Maps.
Encyclopaedia Britannica Online
Scroll down to find Research Tools → Select The World Factbook → find your country within the list
Gale in Context: Global Issues
From the home page, select Browse Issues → Find your country on the alphabetical list of topics. Results are organized visually by source type. Look for the WHO profile and search carefully!

Human Rights Watch: 2024 World Report
HRW's Annual review of human rights around the globe. Explore or browse by country.
The Borgen Project: Global Poverty 101
A nonprofit organization that addresses issues of global poverty and hungry. Use the "Issues" tab in the site's main navigation to explore various facets of global poverty.

Statistical Resources:

Statista
Go to Reports → select Country Reports → Search for your country in the search bar, or use the filter dropdown menu for Regions/Countries. Additional information for most countries is available under Politics and Society Reports.

United Nation's Human Development Report
Access and explore human development data for 193 countries and territories worldwide.
Our World in Data: Poverty
Data, visualizations and writing relating to global poverty.
Poverty and Inequality Platform: World Bank
Search country profiles (middle of the page) to find information on a specific country. Poverty and Equity Briefs are two-page country summaries that provide an overview of recent developments in poverty reduction, along with the latest data of key development indicators.

Further Your Understanding

Bunn Library's Online Resources offer credible, trustworthy information, including a trove of articles that provide scholarly analysis of a topic. TO SEARCH: focus on keywords! Such as “Haiti” AND “poverty” or “Sudan conflict”

Academic Databases:

Gale in Context: Global Issues
Offers international viewpoints on a broad spectrum of global issues, topics, and current events. Featured are hundreds of continuously updated issue and country portals that bring together a variety of specially selected, highly relevant sources for analysis of social, political, military, economic, environmental, health, and cultural issues.
Google Scholar
Google Scholar is a free search engine that allows users to search for academic content (such academic papers, dissertations, theses, and case law) across the web, including content owned by Bunn Library. Results with full-text access will have a link in the column to the left of the title.
JSTOR
This full-text database contains a broad range of scholarly journals in the arts, sciences, humanities, and social sciences. The JSTOR mission is unique in that it creates a permanent, digitized archive of the selected titles.
ProQuest
A very large collection of periodicals covering a broad range of subject areas. ProQuest includes four basic databases: Platinum Periodicals, ProQuest Newspapers, Reference, and The Historical New York Times. The New York Times collection is complete back to 1851.

Websites:

Poverty: World Bank Group
The World Bank Group uses the latest data, evidence, and analysis to help countries develop policies to effectively tackle poverty and improve people's lives.
World Poverty Clock
The World Poverty Clock provides real-time estimates until 2030 for almost every country in the world. It monitors progress against Ending Extreme Poverty.