Literature Searching Beyond PubMed
(CINAHL, PsycINFO, SocAbstracts)
Min-Lin Fang, MLIS
Agenda
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Database Selection
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Development of Search Strategies
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CINAHL, PsycINFO, SocAbstract Searching
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Search Demos
Sep 2007
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Online Tutorials
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Sep 2007
CSA PsycINFO, SocAbstracts online tutorials
http://wwwmd3.csa.com/tutorials/advsearch.html
CINAHL, Basic and Advanced
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Developing Search Strategies
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Sep 2007
Formulate a question.
Break your question into multiple concepts.
Locate the appropriate MeSH (indexed
term) for each concept.
Run the search using AND, OR, NOT
Apply limit options (date, language, age,
publication type, gender), major headings
and subheadings
Modify your search strategies and rerun
your search.
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Why Indexed Term?
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MeSH terms (indexed terms) are an efficient way to find
articles on “concepts” where authors may use different words
to discuss the same ideas.
Using Indexed Terms (Thesaurus) improves precision and
accuracy of subject searching.
Keyword search (title, MeSH, abstract) may not retrieve
relevant articles.
Example: physical therapy
“Storytelling as therapy: implications for medicine.”
Abstract: Storytelling is an art developed during the
beginning of human history, probably to teach the wisdom of
generations past, including basic mental and physical health
principles…
Sep 2007
5
Additional Databases
Go to the Databases List
(http://www.library.ucsf.edu/db/) on GALEN
to access a specific database.
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CINAHL
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PsycINFO, psychological literature
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SocAbstracts, social sciences literature
Sep 2007
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PsycINFO
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Sep 2007
Produced by the American Psychological
Association (APA)
Available through the CSA Illumina
interface at the University of California,
along with PsycArticles and Psychology:
Sage Full-Text.
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Coverage
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Sep 2007
Includes over 1,800 professional
journals, chapters, books, reports,
theses and dissertations, published
internationally.
Also includes more than 8 million cited
references in 185,000 journal articles,
books, and book chapters.
Covers citations from 1806 to the
present, with approximately 60,000 new
records added yearly.
Updates weekly
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Subject Coverage
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Major areas of coverage include:
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Sep 2007
Applied psychology
Communication systems
Developmental psychology
Educational psychology
Experimental human and animal psychology
Personality
Psychological and physical disorders
Physiological psychology and neuroscience
Professional personnel and issues
Psychometrics and statistics
Social psychology
Social processes and issues
Sports psychology and leisure
Treatment and prevention
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PsycARTICLES
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Sep 2007
Full-text access to articles from journals
published by the APA, the APA Educational
Publishing Foundation, the Canadian
Psychological Association, and Hogrefe & Huber.
Most of the 58 APA journals included in
PsycARTICLES now go back to volume 1, issue 1.
Journal articles covering from 1986-present.
Full-text coverage of book chapters from 2000present
Journals in this database also indexed in
PsycINFO with access to citations and abstracts
only.
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Psychology: a Sage Full-text
Collection
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Sep 2007
Includes the full text of 35 journals published by SAGE
and participating societies.
Subject Coverage: Applied Psychology, Assessment,
Child Development, Clinical Psychology, Cognitive
Psychology, Counseling Psychology, Cross-Cultural
Psychology, Cultural Psychology, Developmental
Psychology, Educational Psychology, Environmental
Psychology, Family Studies, Group Work,
Industrial/Organizational Psychology, Language
Acquisition, Latin American Studies, Learning
Disabilities, Measurement, Neuropsychology,
Personality, Philosophical Psychology, Psychiatry,
Psychology of Diversity, School Psychology, Social
Psychology, and Sociology of Race and Ethnicity.
Each bibliographic record in the Collection links to the
appropriate full-text in PDF format.
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Social Science Databases
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Sep 2007
Multiple databases can be searched at
once via the CSA Illumina interface.
While PsycInfo, PsycArticles and
Psychology: Sage Full-Text are the
primary databases for psychological
literature, relevant citations may also be
found via Sociological Abstracts,
Communication Abstracts, and ERIC.
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Search Exercises
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Sep 2007
Is American Journal of Psychology
available electronically at the UCSF
library?
Eating disorders in adolescents
Recent review articles on interventions
for sleep deprivation
Socio cultural influences on adolescents’
body image
Family caregiving burden in patients
with heart failure
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More…
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Class evaluation
Library Tours
QuickSearch
Personal Consultation:
Contact Min-Lin Fang for personal
consultation.
Email: fang@library.ucsf.edu
Phone: 415-476-3397
Sep 2007
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