Best Psychology Databases
-
APA PsycInfo This link opens in a new windowThis database provides access to psychology journals, books, and dissertations. It is THE source for starting any psychology research project. Coverage is from 1887 to the present.
-
APA PsycBooks This link opens in a new windowThis database provides access to book chapters published by the American Psychological Association (APA). It includes both important historical texts and current titles.
-
APA PsycArticles This link opens in a new windowThis database provides access to journals published by the American Psychological Association (APA) and two other publishers. Most journals are covered from volume one to the present.
-
PubMed This link opens in a new windowThis database includes MEDLINE and indexes and abstracts articles, books, and multimedias on topics such as microbiology, health care, nutrition, pharmacology, and environmental health from 1966 to present.
-
Biological Abstracts This link opens in a new windowThis database provides summaries for articles related to life sciences such as biology, clinical studies, biochemistry, pharmacology and zoology. Coverage from 1980 to present.
-
Google Scholar This link opens in a new windowUse Google Scholar to discover scholarly literature, including peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, preprints, abstracts, and technical reports from all broad areas of research. Some content will be freely available on the web; most will only be accessible by subscription. This restricted link allows current University students, faculty, and staff to access the full text of licensed resources to which the University subscribes. Click on the "Find it @ SCU" links to see if the University has the article through its institutional database and e-journal subscriptions.
Different Types of Databases
- Connected Papers
This site shows how articles are related to one another. You can enter the title of an article and then create a graph based upon references that articles share. The About page offers a good, brief explanation of how the algorithm works. You will need to create a free account to use this site.
- Semantic Scholar
This website includes a vast number of academic papers. It functions in a similar manner to library databases and Google Scholar for searching scholarly articles.
Search Techniques
Searching databases for journal articles is a bit more challenging than using tools such as Google Scholar. The good news is that you have a lot more control over how you design your search. This also means you should get better, more targeted results. A search for the question: Does exercise help teenage smokers change their behaviors? could look like this.
You can use an asterisk at the end of a word to retrieve various endings. For example, adolescen* will retrieve adolescent and adolescence.
Other search tips that are useful in searching APA PsycInfo, APA PsycArticles, and APA PsycBooks:
- Age Groups: Some age groups (e.g., teens) are easy to define in a search, but the age groups feature will be a life saver for other groups (e.g., middle age).
- Methodology: The most useful choices are:
- Empirical Study - reports the results of original research
- Literature Review - see if someone has already examined your topic. This can save time and also provide guidance on how to write a literature review.
- Thesaurus: If you are not sure about what terms to use, the APA Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms is very helpful.
If the full-text of an article is not available in the database, click on the Find It @ SCU Libraries link to see if it's available elsewhere. If not, you can request the article via Interlibrary Loan. This is a free service and you will usually get the article in 1-2 business days. Never pay a publisher for an article!