Psychology Resources
at the Henry G. Bennett Memorial Library
Books on Psychology and counseling fall into two main numbers in the Dewey Decimal classification: 150's and 610-620.
Reference Works

Handbooks Encyclopedias and Dictionaries Test Evaluation Guides

 

How to Find Articles in Magazines and Journals
A magazine or journal is something that is published periodically, and so in libraries they are called periodicals. A magazine is a periodical that can be published daily, weekly, or monthly. Magazines usually contain fairly short articles written in a style of writing that is easy to understand. There are usually lots or advertising in a magazine. A journal, however, contains the results of research or experiments done. Usually in a journal article there is data presented about a research project, and the language can be quite technical, and there are few advertisements.

Unlike books, the contents of journals are not available in the SE library catalog. So where are they located? They are located in magazine and journal indexes. Magazine and journal indexes assign a subject to each article in each journal indexed in the magazine and journal index. Until the 1990's most magazine and journal indexes were in paper, now they are almost all on the Internet. Some of these journal indexes on the Internet index popular magazines, other scholarly, while others are devoted to one subject area, NO Journal Index indexes every journal that is published, so they are selective.

HOW TO FIND ARTICLES IN JOURNALS, MAGAZINES

Step 1: Look in a Periodical Index

A periodical index is a publication that indexes the content of periodicals. There are many different periodical indexes, some general and some subject specific. One thing needs to be made clear: There is not any periodical index that indexes every single periodical being published today. So each index is selective in what periodicals it indexes. Periodical indexes tend to index the most important or most popular or most respected or well known periodicals.

PAPER PERIODICAL INDEXES

For many years periodical indexes were published in paper, like a book. They would usually come out every few months with an update, and then come out at the end of the year with an annual cumulation. Paper periodical indexes are cumbersome to use and take some take to look at every year, but they can contain information on many valuable articles written sometimes years ago, and paper indexes are valuable places to search for topics in music, drama, art, literature and history.

Basement International Index
basement Social Sciences and Humanities Index
Basement

Humanities Index
Basement

Social Sciences Index
Basement

Art Index

Basement Poole's Index to Periodical Literature
Basement Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature

ONLINE PERIODICAL INDEXES

In the 1980's many Paper Periodical Indexes became digitized and now most periodical indexes are online on the Internet. In this form they can still be called indexes, but they are usually referred to as DATABASES.

Why use online databases?

There is a disadvantage to online databases for those who are researching topics in history or literature

EBSCOhost
EBSCOHost is a series of databases that are packaged by EBSCO. It is the vendor that has been the state database since July 2001. The list of databases on EBSCOHost follows:

Academic Search Elite
Communication & Mass Media Complete
PsycARTICLES
PsychINFO
Topic Search
Business Source Elite
ERIC
Health Source:Nursing/Academic Edition
MEDLINE
 Professional Development Collection 
Clinical Pharmacology
Newspaper Source
MasterFILE Premier
 MAS Ultra School Edition 
Health Source: Consumer Edition
Middle Search Plus
 Primary Search 
Funk & Wagnalls New Encyclopedia 
EBSCO Animals
Descriptions of databases are from EBSCOHost descriptions and info online. Go to EBSCOHost online from the Electronic Resources Page at http://www.se.edu/lib/electres.htm and then select EBSCOHost and then look at the descriptions of each database, and also click on More Information.

FIRSTSEARCH

FirstSearch is a service provided by OCLC. It is a collection of databases on many topics that is accessed through the Internet. FirstSearch contains the following databases:

Location: SE Library homepage at http://www.se.edu/lib/electres.htm
Access: Anywhere on Campus. Off campus access requires an authorization number and password

List of Databases

Article First
Clase Periodica
Electronic Collections Online
ERIC
GPO Monthly Catalog
Medline
MLA Bibliography
H.W. Wilson Select Full Text
WorldCat
Descriptions of databases above are from FirstSearch information online. Go to FirstSearch online from the Electronic Resources Page at http://www.se.edu/lib/electres.htm and then select FirstSearch and then click on List All Databases. Click on the i button for more information on each database.

Where the Databases are located
These databases are all to be found on the SE Library's Electronic Resources Page at: http://www.se.edu/lib/electres.htm

What EBSCOHost and FirstSearch are
The word EBSCOhost or FirstSearch to the right of the database name in the table above indicates the name of the database vendor where you can find these databases. If you look at the list of links on the ELectronic Resources page, you will see the links organized by the type of database that they are. You will find EBSCOhost and FirstSearch under the listing of databases called Periodical Databases. When you go down the list, you will see at least two links for both EBSCOhost and FirstSearch. The first link is for those that are on the SE campus. Click on that link, and you will be taken to the list of databases under EBSCOhost or FirstSearch. The second link is the off campus link. This link is necessary to use if you are off of the SE Campus. This link takes you to a page where you will be asked to type in a userid or authorization number, and a password. The userid or authorization number and password to gain access to EBSCOhost and FirstSearch is available at the SE Library Reference Desk, and also is on the proxy server.

What the Electronic Resources Page looks like on the SE Library's Webpage. You can see the links to EBSCOhost and FirstSearch

Step 2: Check to see if the article is available online Full-Text

(the steps from here on pertain only to online databases)

Databases have changed much in the last ten years. it used to be that databases contained only the citation (information needed to find the article) and sometimes a summary, or abstract of the article. Starting about ten years ago, database vendors began to offer some articles in full-text, that means that the entire article was available online, making it unnecessary to find the article in a library. Now there are fewer databases that offer no titles in full-text, and so after doing research in one of SE's databases, check to see if the article that you are interested is available full-text. There will be a link that say something like this: HTML full text, or PDF full text. When you click on the link, you are presented with the full-text of the article, and you are finished. What if the full-text of the article is not available in the database that you are searching? If that is the case, then we move onto Step Three

Step 3: Check to see if the article is available online Full-Text in another database


If you can't find an article full-text in one database, then look to see what other databases have a journal title available full-text. You do that by checking another database called A-to-Z A-to-Z is located at: http://atoz.ebsco.com/home.asp?id=seosu, or you can also get to A-to-Z from the electronic resources page at: http://www.se.edu/lib/electres.htm. A-to-Z is a list of journals that are available full-text, either in an online database that we subscribe to or available in the library in paper in the basement on in microform.

Step 4: Check to see if the the SE Library has the journal in paper


The library subscribes to almost one thousand journals, magazines, and newspapers. In many cases the journal article that you want is located in a journal that we have downstairs in the basement, or on microform. How do you check to see if the library has a journal? By checking A-to-Z, or checking a copy of the SE Library's Periodicals Holding List http://www.se.edu/lib/perhold.htm
These journals, magazines in the next table are those that can be considered primary sources, because they all contain content that was written at the time of the event.

Step 5: Use InterLibrary Loan to obtain the article from another college library that has the journal that you want


If you have determined that you cannot locate a journal article full-text on any online database, AND the SE library does not have the journal that the article is in, then what do you do? Give up? You can, but if the article is an important one for your research, you would still like to get it, right? There is one last way for you to get a copy of this article. You can obtain a copy of an article from almost any journal by using a service called Interlibrary Loan. Interlibrary Loan (ILL) is a service that the SE Library provides to students where you can ask (through us) another library that has the journal title that you want . The process of doing this is simple.

1. Obtain an Interlibrary loan form from the circulation desk or go to an online InterLibrary Loan form at: http://www.se.edu/lib/illjournalreq.htm for a journal article and http://www.se.edu/lib/illbookreq.htm for Interlibrary loaning a book. 2. Fill out the form, take note that those fields of the form that have an asterisk in front of them are required fields that are needed to send the information via e-mail. Click submit after filling out the form. 3. The process of receiving something from InterLibrary loan takes about 4 days to two weeks, so if InterLibrary Loans are needed,

Current Psychology Journals in Paper Copy in the SE Library
PSYCHOLOGY RESOURCES ON THE INTERNET

Internet Resources by Subject: Psychology
http://www.se.edu/lib/subpsy.htm

This site contains links to many useful psychological and counseling resources on the Internet

Internet Resources by Subject: Careers
http://www.se.edu/lib/subpsy.htm

This site contains links to many useful careers on the Internet
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Last Updated: June 24, 2008