Subject Guides
Guide Contents
PsycInfo Training
APA offers training on PsycInfo: Search Help and Training
Webinars are periodically offered throughout the semester. All campus users are welcome to attend the sessions for librarians and students/faculty. If the webinar content is tailored for a specific interface, our campus uses PsycInfo on the EBSCO platform.
PsycInfo
The database PsycInfo is the primary database for researching topics in the field of psychology. PsycInfo provides abstracts and citations to scholarly literature in the psychological, social, behavioral, and health sciences. Citations are included from the early 1800s to the present.
The database is updated weekly, so your search results today may look different next week. If you see a resource you might want to use, save the citation information, or download the article.
Search Box
The boolean operators AND, OR, and NOT can be used to create powerful searches. If you combine terms with AND, you will retrieve records that contain both of your terms. If you combine terms with NOT, such as "therapy NOT art", you will retrieve sources that have to do with therapy but not art therapy. Combining terms with OR is usually done when you are looking for synonyms, such as "art OR draw OR paint".
The dropdown menu to the right of the search boxes allows you to search for terms in specific record fields. "Select a Field (optional)" will search the entire record for your terms. If you search by "AB Abstract" or "SU Subjects" you will get less results that are probably more relevant to your topic.
Search options under the search box allow you to limit your search by such factors as: Publication Year, Population Group, Methodology, Language, and Age Groups. Visit the APA website for a list of searchable methodologies (http://www.apa.org/pubs/databases/training/method-values.aspx)
Tip! If you are looking for a term that could have multiple spellings, use use a wildcard (?) or (#) or truncation (*) device.
| Search Term | Finds |
| sm?th | smith, smyth (single character) |
| colo#r | colour, color (with or without extra character) |
| ad* | added, adult, adopt |
| seasonal * disorder | seasonal affective disorder, |
| seasonal and non seasonal disorder, | |
| seasonal... disorder |
Search Results
At the top of your results list you will see the number of results retrieved for your search. In this case it is 856.
Below that, you can Refine your results by search limiters such as Publication Date, Source Types, Subject, Age, and Methodology.
Record View
If the article title looks like something you might want for your literature review, read the Abstract before reading the whole 15 to 20 page article, or requesting the article from another library.
Indexing is a feature of library databases that allow for more powerful search capabilities. You can search using limiters and subjects, as well as thesaurus terms.
There is a Cite feature in PsycInfo that will put the citation information into the citation style you choose, however, it is not entirely accurate. If you use this feature, be sure to become familiar with your citation style and check it.
The Export function allows you to export a citation to your bibliographic management software.
The Email function will send the pdf to your email as an attachment.
If the fulltext is not available in PsycInfo you can use the Get It! button to check if the content is available in one of the other 200+ databases and print journals to which we subscribe.
The Cited References section has a link to view the article's references allowing you to see where the authors' research came from. The Times Cited in This Database feature allows you to view the artcles that have cited that article, allowing you to see where the research is heading. Both of these features can help build a picture of where the research has come from and the directions it is going.
