Dan Chaney™ Presents
PsycINFO
Dan Chaney
Humanities and Social Sciences
Sigmund Freud Wannabe
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
What is PsycINFO?
• PsycINFO is a database produced by the
American Psychological Association
(APA), which indexes and abstracts the
literature of psychology.
• It is the electronic version of the print
Psychological Abstracts (which was exiled
to the stacks several years ago.)
• PsycINFO includes information not just
about psychology, per se, but also
includes references to the the
psychological aspects of related
disciplines such as medicine, psychiatry,
nursing, sociology, education,
pharmacology, physiology, linguistics,
anthropology, business and law.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Sigmund Freud – The
Father of Psychoanalysis
“Sometimes a cigar is
just a cigar.”
PsycINFO Coverage
• PsycINFO contains 2.4 million
records (as of September 2007)
and summaries of journal
articles, book chapters, books,
dissertations and technical
reports, all in the field of
psychology.
• 161,000 records added in 2006.
• Updated weekly.
• PsycINFO advertises that it adds
up to 25% more citations than
Psychological Abstracts.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
PsycINFO Coverage Criteria
Journals must:
 Be peer-reviewed
 Have an identifiable sponsoring body,
editor, and editorial board
 Contain original submissions
 Adhere to a minimum publication
schedule
 Contain all standard bibliographic
elements
 Identify an archive where paper
copies will be held
 Be assigned an ISSN
Book Chapters and Books must:
 Be published in English
 Have psychological relevance
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
PsycINFO Journal Coverage
• Journal coverage in PsycINFO begins in
1887 (the “birth” of psychology.)
• Includes international material selected
from more than 2,150 periodicals in
over 35 languages.
• PsycINFO comprehensively covers
1,099 journals cover to cover. 237 other
journals have every article covered.
• The remainder of the articles in the
database are indexed based on the
relevance to psychology.
• 98% of the journals in PsycINFO are
peer-reviewed.
• Journal records account for 78% of the
database.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
PsycINFO Book Coverage
• Chapters from authored
and edited books = 7% of
database
• Authored and edited books
= 4% of database
• English-language,
published worldwide
• Selected if scholarly,
professional, or researchbased; all with
psychological relevance
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Dissertations and Other
Secondary Publications
• Selected from Dissertation
Abstracts International (A
and B)
• 11% of database
• Abstracts in dissertation
records starting 1995
• Selected on basis of
classification in DAI in
sections with psychological
relevance
• University, government
reports = 1% of database
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Geographical Coverage
• Publications from
more than 49
countries
• Journals in more
than 27 languages
• Non-English titles in
Roman alphabets
included 1978–
present
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
PsycINFO Abstracts
• 1995 to present,
virtually 100% of
records have abstracts
(0.007% no abstracts)
• For non-dissertation
documents added
from 1967 to present,
99.2% contain
abstracts
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Thesaurus of Psychological Index
Terms
• 8th edition (1997) on
Reference (Call Number:
025.3315 T413 1997).
• 7,000 controlled terms and
cross references.
• Hierarchical, alphabetical,
and subject arrangement.
• Uses major and minor
terms.
• There is also an online,
searchable thesaurus in
PsycINFO.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
PsycINFO Classification
System
• Devised by the APA, consists of 22 major categories and
135 subcategories.
• Each PsycINFO record is assigned one or two classifications.
• The classification codes themselves also serve as the Table
of Contents for Psychological Abstracts, PsycINFO's main
print product.
• NOTE: This classification code system was designed to
describe the content of the PsycINFO database, not the
field of psychology.
• You can view the classification scheme at
http://www.apa.org/psycinfo/about/classcodes.html
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Cited References
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Comprehensive cited references appear in
PsycINFO records for journal articles,
books, and book chapters starting in
2001, with some references appearing as
early as 1987 (mainly APA journals). All
published references are included in the
PsycINFO record, except those not referring
to publications, in non-Roman alphabets, or
those that cause the character limit of
PsycINFO records to be exceeded (99,999
characters). The references appear in APAstyle format.
Overall, 26 million references from nearly
640,000 journal articles, books, and book
chapters as of September 2007.
More information at:
www.apa.org/psycinfo/about/citedrefs.html
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Historic References
PsycINFO contains the following historical
reference works:
• Psychological Abstracts 1927–1966
• Psychological Bulletin 1921–1926
• American Journal of Psychology 1887–1966
• All APA journals back to first issue of
publication
• Psychological Index (1894–1935), citations to
English language journals only.
• Classic Books in Psychology of the 20th
Century and the Harvard Book List, 1840–1971
• All records published in Psychological Abstracts
are now in PsycINFO
• More than 335,000 historic records in PsycINFO
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Note About the Old Stuff
Pre-1967 records differ from
records included post-1967.
• No controlled vocabulary
(descriptor) field
• Key Concepts field may
contain descriptor terms, but
they are not controlled
• Other indexing fields, such as
Age Groups, and
Form/Content Type are not
present
• Classifications are broad only
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
The Basics (EBSCOhost)
• Boolean Operators: and,
or, not
• Truncation = * (after the
first three letters)
• Wild Cards = ? (only for
one character)
• Word Proximity (any order)
= Nn, where n is the
number of words between
terms.
• Word Proximity (exact
order) = Wn, where n is
the number of words
between terms.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
PsycINFO Search Basics
• In most cases there are several
different ways you can perform some
basic searches.
• You could enter Author names or
Journal Names from the Search
screen (use the drop down menus).
• Or you could enter a direct search,
such as AU Hershey, at the keyword
search box. PsycINFO will adjust
automatically.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
PsycINFO Fields
• PsycINFO has fields which classify research in many
different ways. We can use this knowledge to search the
database better.
• Here is APA’s guide to field names:
http://www.apa.org/psycinfo/about/fieldguide.html
• For example, you can search by language. English is the
primary language of PsycINFO, so this will not really narrow
the search much. It is useful, however, as many student
researchers cannot read other languages.
• Population Group (who was studied?): Human, Animal,
Female, Male, Inpatient, Outpatient.
• Age Group (how old were those studied?): Childhood,
Adolescence, Adulthood (and all the stages in between.)
• Intended Audience (book/book chapter only): General
Public, Juvenile, Psychology: Professional & Research
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
A Simple Search
• OSU Psychology professor Dr.
Charles Abramson is famous for his
work on invertebrate learning,
particularly regarding bees. (He’s
known for getting bees drunk.)
• You can search for Charles’ research
by author name and subject
(Abramson and bees). This search
gives us 24 hits.
• Has Charles published research that
is not about bees? Sure. 50 citations
(In this search, we need to search by
his complete name: Abramson,
Charles I.)
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
A More Complex Search
• Suppose you are interested in bipolar disorders, but not
schizophrenia. (Note: the search results are as of 10/30/07)
 A keyword search bipolar not schizophrenia gives you 14,074
hits.
 A subject search bipolar not schizophrenia gives you 9,516
hits.
• Suppose you want journal articles, set a limit for Document Type
which gives you 8,800 hits (remember, these are subject
searches.)
• Suppose you want to narrow to articles published in English. Set a
Language limit and you still have 8,066 hits.
• Finally, you can look specifically at children who suffer from a
bipolar disorder but are not schizophrenic by setting an Age Group
limit for Childhood (birth-12 yrs.) This gives you 632 hits.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Fun With Pharmaceuticals
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You’re looking for information about that “feel good” gift of
psychopharmacology, LSD.
If you search LSD as a subject, you get nada. If you search it as a
keyword, you get 1887 hits. (Note: you could immediately search the
online Thesaurus, but hey, who thinks to do that? )
The official name of LSD is Lysergic Acid Diethylamide, which can be
searched as a subject to give you 998 hits (no pun intended – get it –
“hits” LSD?)
If you’re interested in articles which study the effects of LSD on animals,
you can set a limit of Animals to reveal 400 articles.
If you want LSD studies conducted on animals, but not rats, you can “not”
rats as a subject for 150 hits.
If you want LSD studies on dogs (first remove the rats we “notted” in
earlier) , add dogs as a Subject for 11 articles. (Canines is not in the
thesaurus, but dogs is.)
Finally (this is sort of off-topic), there are 10 articles about LSD use in
children from birth to 12 years. (Think about that one.)
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Tests and Measurements
• Can we locate tests and
measurements in PsycINFO?
• Sure… (sometimes)
• Select Test and Measures from the
search drop down, and enter the name
of the measurement.
• Note: this really only covers a
measurement that is used in the
research, not necessarily full-text
availability.
• We could spend an entire Thursday
morning talking about finding tests
and measures (and probably will, but
that’s another Thursday AM )
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Shopaholics Unite!
• Suppose a business student
visits the reference desk
looking for research on why
people buy things online.
• Now, we could put the
student in ABI/Inform or
another business database,
but look at the question we
were asked.
• “Why do people buy things
online?” Why people do
something is a tailor made
PsycINFO question.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Yay!! Shopping Makes Me Giddy!
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If you start searching PsycINFO, it might make sense to choose a
couple of intelligent keywords.
Buying online gives us 6 matches.
Look at the first article. Note the descriptors: in this case, the second
one is “Electronic Commerce” – that sounds like buying online,
doesn’t it?
Electronic Commerce as a subject gives us 262 matches.
Now we need to factor in the “why people buy stuff” angle.
If you get stuck for keywords, try the Thesaurus. Search for
consumers in the Thesaurus.
Notice we have a descriptor “Consumer Behavior” – that sounds like
it might be “why people buy stuff.”
Consumer Behavior as a subject gives us 9184 hits.
When you combine Consumer Behavior and Electronic
Commerce, you are left with 95 hits, which is about where we want
to be.
Lesson: remember the social sciences, including business, are
interdisciplinary (which means they use the research of other
disciplines within their own discipline.)
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Some Fun Searches
On your own, try searching the
following:
• Search Librarians as a subject (58
hits), then add in Human Sex
Differences as a subject (4 hits)
• Machiavellianism is a subject
heading in PsycINFO. Try
combining Machiavellianism with
Librarians.
• For fun, try searching for sildenafil
as a keyword. (make sure to start
from scratch – you won’t find
anything about librarians and
sildenafil…yet.)
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
Tips for Advanced
Researchers
• Graduate students, in particular, have a need for literature
reviews prior to engaging in their dissertations.
• Let’s try and help a graduate student find a literature
review(s) on Tourette Syndrome.
• A keyword search of Tourette Syndrome gives 2085 hits. If
we search Tourette Syndrome as a descriptor, we get 1748
hits.
• Next, let’s refine the search and set a limit for Literature
Review as a Methodology. This gives us 104 hits.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
PsycINFO User’s Guide
There is a PsycINFO User’s Guide on the
OSU Library website at:
http://www.library.okstate.edu/hss/chaney/
psychology/psycinfo.htm
It’s linked under Tutorials as well as being
on the Psychology Academic Department
Gateway.
You could also search the OSU Library
website for the keyword PsycINFO.
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO
A Reminder…
Remember that psychology is
interdisciplinary. You may
want to consult the following
databases for broader
perspective:
• ERIC
• Sociological Abstracts
• PubMed (particularly if
you’re looking for medical
information on the human
brain and structures for
vocalization/speech, etc.)
OSU Library Peer Training: Dan Chaney™ Presents PsycINFO