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Susan Turkel, Outreach and Information Technology Librarian (BMC)

Sections:

Finding scholarly journal articles
Requesting materials through Interlibrary Loan
Setting up email alerts
Citing your sources
Getting help from a librarian!

Related Subjects:

Databases A-Z:

Other:

PSYC 352 : Dev. of Symbolic Thought (BMC)

Finding scholarly journal articles:

PsycINFO

Provider: CSA

The best starting point for finding scholarly resources in psychology, including journal articles, books, and book chapters. Covers 1887-present.

Set some limits so that you don’t get citations in Portuguese, or dissertations, in your results list. To retrieve recent journal articles in English:

Find the Limited to: line of checkboxes on the main search screen.
Click the following boxes: Journal Articles Only and English Only. You can change the date range to only include the last decade or so.

Other useful limits:

Scroll all the way down to the section of the page labelled PsycINFO Indexes & Limits
If you wish, select an age group from the scrolling list. Select the most specific group that meets your needs. You can also pick Childhood -- that includes all the more specific ages between birth and 12 years old.
You may also wish to search by Methodology (options include Empirical Study, Literature Review, and more).
Any search you run now will include these limits, unless you clear them.

To limit your search to specific journals:

Enter the journal name in one of the search boxes at the top of the screen, and change the dropdown menu on that line to Journal Name, JN=

Tips for selecting search terms:

Click Search Tools, then Thesaurus to determine the “descriptors” (subject headings) used in this database for your concept. Search for terms, click the checkboxes next to the terms you want to search, and then click Search Marked near the top of that window. [NB: This limits your search to the Descriptors field.]
Find an article you like, and note its descriptors. You can run a new search using the best descriptors.
Try several synonyms, connected with OR, to find the maximum number of articles on your topic. (Example: teenagers OR adolescents)
If you have a term with several possible endings, use an asterisk to stand for the different endings. (Example: child* = child, children, childhood, etc.)
If you are getting too many results, search for your terms in the Title, TI=, Abstract, AB=, or Descriptors, DE= fields instead of the default, Keywords, KW=.

For maximum power and flexibility:

Conduct a search on each concept separately (e.g., do one search for journal title, a separate search for one main concept, and another search for another main concept). You can then mix and match results sets by going to Search History (near the top right-hand corner of the screen): check the boxes and combine using AND to find the overlap.

Use the FindIt! button to see if the article is available online, in print, or if you'll need to request it via Interlibrary Loan.

Web of science

Provider: ISI

Provides access to the Social Sciences Citation Index and the Science Citation Index. Search for scholarly articles in any discipline, or for articles that cite a known author or work. Coverage varies.

Tips:

Conduct a simple search from the main screen, then sort results by "Times Cited" to find popular or influential pieces.
Click an article title to get to the full information screen for that article. You can see the article's references and the articles that cite that article.
Click "Related Articles" to find those that share citations with the current one; this is useful for new/current articles that haven't been cited yet.
To find articles that cite an older article, click Cited Reference Search and follow the screens. It's best to put less information rather than more, as citations are often inexact.

ProQuest Research Library

Provider: ProQuest

Provides citations and full-text magazine and journal articles in a wide variety of disciplines, both scholarly and popular in scope. Covers 1971-present.

Requesting materials through Interlibrary Loan:

Interlibrary Loan & E-ZBorrow

Use this page to request materials from other libraries.

Tips:

If Haverford or Swarthmore have a journal article you need, you can use Tripod to request the specific volume be sent over. This might be faster than using the ILL form, in some cases.
E-ZBorrow is always faster than ILL, so check E-ZBorrow first if you are looking for a book or a book chapter. WorldCat can give you a list of libraries that own an item; check that list for PA academic libraries or Rutgers.
When making E-ZBorrow requests, choose a copy held by a close-by library. But don't type any notes into the search request form; this will slow down processing.
If you have an unusual need, feel free to contact the Interlibrary Loan librarian. She is happy to talk with students in person to help fill their requests.

Setting up email alerts:

ProQuest Research Library offers a great tool for getting alerts when new articles come out meeting your search criteria. Once you've created a successful search, click "Set Up Alert" at the top of the screen. Select the frequency of alert emails and enter your email address.

PsycInfo offers alerts as well. The process for setting up alerts involves creating a "My Research" account, which allows you to save preferred searches and to receive emails when new articles enter the system that match your search criteria. To set up alerts, click Please log in to My Research near the top of the CSA Illumina screen and follow the instructions.

Web of Science has a good alert system. You can set up an alert for new articles that cite a given article or author, for tables of contents of specified journals, for articles using specified keywords in title/abstract, etc. To set up an alert, conduct your search, click Search History, then "Save History/Create Alert." Follow the instructions on the screen.

Citing your sources:

If you plan to use ENDNOTE WEB for this class (or any class), you will need to create your own account. Go to the Endnote Web site and register as a new user. You will need to create a password, and then you will be able to access your stored citations whenever you log in to the site. Select APA 5th for the Bibliographic Style.

For step-by-step instructions go to The Using Endnote Web with Psychology Databases page.

APA Formatting and Style Guide

Created by the Writing Lab at Purdue University, this web site provides concise information on APA Guidelines, writing guidelines and citation & bibliography examples.

Citation Builder

Use this tool to build a citation to a book, article, chapter, website, or personal interview, in several major citation formats: APA, MLA, and CBE/CSE. (From the NCSU Libraries.)

Publication manual of the American Psychological Association.

Publisher: Washington, DC : American Psychological Association, c2001.

Ask at the Canaday Library Reference Desk.

Getting help from a librarian!

If you need help: ASK A LIBRARIAN!!! Please come see us and we will help you with your research. Canaday Library Reference Desk Hours:

    Mon-Wed 10am-noon/1-5pm/7-9pm

    Thu-Fri      10am-noon/1-5pm

    Sat-Sun   1-5pm

Reference Desk telephone: (610)526-5279

Ask a Librarian - Fill in the form, give us your email address, and we will answer within 24 hours!