|
PSYCHINFO TUTORIAL with special thanks to Deborah Keller, former Social Sciences Librarian at Muhlenberg.
I. Browsing in PsycInfo With "browsing" you are sitting down at PSYCHINFO for the first time with your general topic idea. Your goal is to just poke around and "see what is out there" and, most likely, to refine your interests on the basis of the abstracts you read. Leave yourself an hour or two for this. *Click on each screen shot to see a larger and more clear image. Use your browser's "back" button to return to the tutorial. If the image quality is poor and you are using MS Internet Explorer, hold your mouse over the image and see if an orange sunset picture square appears. If so, click the sunset to enlarge the image to full size.
From the library homepage, follow the path: Finding articles
Choose an issue within one of the broad research questions raised in your personality psychology reader. Write down all the words that come to mind that seem to best describe what you are interested in. Go back through your list and replace any slang or informal language with more formal language. These are the keywords that you are going to use to begin the browsing phase of your research.
It is important to know that, unlike internet search engines, PSYCHINFO does not sort your search results by relevance. Thus, a really useful article might be 50th on the list or 7,000th. You can use several different kinds of strategies to make sense of this large group of results (remember, we are "browsing" to learn more about a topic).
Repeat this browsing process for each search term that you feel is relevant. As you are browsing, make sure to take some notes. Write down some of the key words and subject terms that you ran across frequently or ones that seemed to best describe the topic that interests you. Write down the name of an author whose name comes up frequently and/or whose work interests you. Print out, write down, or put in your "folder" the citation of articles that you might want to consult later. Be very selective though--you are taking notes to perhaps save time later, not actually "searching" at this point.
Your goal in browsing was simply to "get a feel" for what was out there. Now that you are familiar with some of the terminology and maybe even have a better idea of what you want to research, your goal is to get more specific. Do this at a separate session from the browsing to give your brain a break, and leave yourself an hour or so. For example, let's say that after browsing, I have decided I'm interested in "social phobia." My interest still remains the causes of the phobia in kids, but I've learned that I specifically care about generalized social phobia. To more specifically narrow my search to these articles, I'll need to start combining terms.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Using the Thesaurus But what if I'm not getting results I can use and I can't think of another term to use? PSYCHINFO offers a built-in thesaurus which can help you find out what word a researcher would use..... For example, I'll often have students want to do research on something like "values" and tell me that they either found too many records to search or no records at all. If you use the thesaurus, you can see how many other terms there are (each with their own list of related terms) other than just "values".... This use of the thesaurus is extremely helpful in many circumstances. For example, researchers are just as likely to use the word "affect" as they are to use its synonym - "mood." You should consider using the thesaurus for your major search terms at some point just to be sure you aren't missing anything. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Setting Search Limits What if I hadn't gotten a nice number of 99 in my above search? What if I'd gotten 600 -- too many to scroll through titles even? Remember the options you learned above: try other terms, use the thesaurus, look for terms in more specific parts of the record (e.g., subject, abstract, title). Be sure to just change one thing at a time so you can figure out what isn't working if something goes wrong. EbsoHost now offers a set of hyperlinks along the top and side of your search results screen. In this way you can choose a subset of your results to explore (e.g., journal articles only, more specific topics). Also, you might consider using the limits feature. Use this feature sparingly and note that the vendor (EbscoHost) may have a very different idea what some category terms mean than we do. You can find the limits on the opening screen of the Advanced Search. Notice all the different options: references available, publication type, etc. Full-text Assuming you have started searching for your sources in a timely fashion (i.e., you have time to wait a week or two for interlibrary loan (I.L.L.) articles, my strong advice is to NEVER limit your search to full-text only articles. You will severely limit your results if you do so. While more and more articles are available full-text, MANY of your best resources may not be available on-line. In other words, you may actually have to go into the stacks at the library and get an actual book and do some photocopying. Additionally, I strongly suggest you NEVER limit your search to only articles available in Trexler. Our library has an impressive collection of key journals available (273 at last count). However, we are a small college and can't afford to subscribe to all of the 2,500+ psychology journals in existence. The quality of your paper will be determined in large part by the quality of your sources. Don't handicap yourself by overlooking sources you may have to obtain via I.L.L. Useful Limits to Use Sparingly So what limits are useful? Language is a safe bet (see below). You can click on the box to immediately limit it to English. Or, if you are fluent in a second language, choose from the list provided (hold down the "control" key to select more than one language). Really though, language alone will only be marginally helpful in narrowing your search results because many psych articles are in English. "Publication Type" may be another useful way to limit your results. You can choose multiple entries using the "control" key. This is especially helpful if you want to choose everything except the many dissertation hits you will get from your search. (Dissertations are the projects people do to get their Ph.D.'s. In most instances, you will be unable to obtain a dissertation quickly enough to help you with your paper. Often professors will advise against relying on a dissertation for a prospective source if you are doing a project that must be completed within a single semester.) Alternatively, perhaps your professor has indicated that you have to find an empirical journal article. You can click on several things to limit to that type of result (e.g., journal & peer reviewed journal). Do not limit yourself to too few resources, however. Again, always use this feature sparingly. Be aware that "scholarly (peer-reviewed) articles" is often a good limiter, but it will leave out potentially valuable book chapters and invited articles. In general, you should always try your search without limiters first, and you should do multiple searches. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Question: "What if I am getting too few citations with my searches?"
First, review the browsing and searching options discussed above. Also, be sure you are trying one search term at a time and making sure each individual term is a good one. The most common mistake for PSYCHINFO rookies is to put in 3 or 4 search terms all at once and then declare there "are no articles" on their topic.
If you can find just one article that seems close to what you want - use that article's search terms or reference list (see below) to help you find older articles on the same topic
A similar strategy is to click on the link titled "Times Cited in this Database." That link isn't 100% accurate or always there, but if it is available, it is a good way to find newer articles that refer to your one relevant article.
Before declaring your close, personal relationship with PSYCHINFO over, you need to be sure you have explored all that is out there. Look over the sources you have and see if anything seems to be missing. For example, are they all older references (e.g., pre-1980's)? Then be sure to specifically look for more current resources - you may or may not find any depending on the trends in research. Is there a specific author who appears to publish a lot on this topic? Did you conduct a search looking at all of that author's publications? Did you conduct different searches that, in total, cover all your search terms? If you started to get the same articles repeatedly, that is a good sign that you have searched all there is to search. When you have a developed your specific hypothesis (and if you are required to have a unique hypothesis) - be sure to return to PSYCHINFO to be sure that it hasn't already been addressed by another researcher. Once you start obtaining and reading the articles you find, another way of double-checking your work is following the paper trail that the authors have left for you. Look over the articles you have found (and obtained via full-text, the shelves in Trexler or via I.L.L.-- see below). Are there relevant papers cited in the introductions of articles that you are using?
IV. Physically Retrieving your Articles You must read the actual articles. Do not write a paper based on abstracts alone. Professors will be able to tell if you do that as your paper will probably be too shallow and vague. Journal articles can be challenging to read. Ask your professor for help, or click on this link for advice on reading journal articles. Once you identify the journal articles that you want to read, they may be found in several places. 1. Trexler Library in print form 2. On-line in full text 3. Requested via Interlibrary Loan (ILL) 4. Drive to a nearby library (e.g, Lehigh University). To find out if Trexler owns a print copy of the journal and/or to see if you might be able to get a copy of the article full-text, first go to the library homepage and select "Finding Articles" and "Journal Locator" and type in your title. You'll have noticed that EbsoHost also provides information about the availability of each article with the citation information from PSYCHINFO. For example, the Journal of Personality (issues from 1945-2002) are available in full -text form via Academic Search Premiere (go back to the library homepage, search for articles, and this time choose Academic Search Premiere as your database instead of PSYCHINFO). Issues from 1949-present of that same journal are also on the shelves of Trexler. The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology is only available in print form at Trexler. The Journal of Personality Assessment is only available in full-test form via Academic Search Premiere (issues from 1975-2002 only). If Trexler has a copy of the article on its shelves:
Journal articles that are not owned by the
Library or accessible through online databases can be ordered through
Interlibrary Loan. Follow the path Finding Articles
|
¨ Psychology Department Home ¨ College Home Page ¨ Website Problems? Contact wolfe@muhlenberg.edu |