Master of Counselling
Locating Journal Articles
Tools For Accessing the Journal Literature
The journal literature is one of the best sources of current scholarly information. There are many ways to access this
literature, including searching your favourite access tools, saving the parameters of searches you would like
to perform frequently, and signing up for regular notification of new content published in particular journals relevant
to your areas of research interest.
You can find the main tools (e.g., indexes and databases) for accessing the journal literature on the Library's homepage, under Databases By Subject, By Title, and By Type. Before we look at some of the core and related journal literature tools in the area of counselling, let's review the main types of tools available.
- Bibliographic index - These databases index the journal literature but do not contain
the full-text of articles. Some, like PsycINFO and ERIC, provide abstracts which briefly describe
the subject matter of articles to help you determine whether they are relevant to your search. You can
find out if an article is available at the University of Lethbridge by clicking the
button. You will be provided with a results
page that will look something like this.
Your "find full text" results page will provide links to the Library catalogue or other sources of the
article if available, and will also provide a link to Interlibrary Loan Request in the event that the article is
not available locally and you would like the Library to try to obtain it elsewhere on your
behalf. - Full-text index - These databases hold the full text of specified runs of volumes for included journals. In some cases only selected volumes of a journal are available in full text. For instance, the full text database Psychology & Behavioral Sciences Collection contains the journal American Journal of Psychotherapy which began publication with v. 1, 1947, but full text coverage is available only from v. 29, 1975.
- Partial full-text index - These databases index journal literature and provide full text for specified runs of volumes for some, but not all, indexed journals. To obtain needed articles not available locally, use the Interlibrary Loan Request link in your "find full text" results page, or complete the appropriate interlibrary loan request form.
Here are some of the important tools that index the counselling journal literature. All of them are bibliographic indexes that also contain some full text.
- PsycINFO - The key access tool for scholarly literature in the psychological, social, behavioral, and health sciences. Relevant to psychologists, students, and professionals in related fields such as psychiatry, counselling, management, sociology, nursing, pharmacology, anthropology, business, education, neuroscience, law, medicine, and social work. Indexes international journals, book chapters, books, technical reports, and dissertations. Indexes more than 2,400 journals, most of which are peer-reviewed. Coverage is from 1887 to the present and includes detailed abstracts.
- ERIC - The premier source of information on education research and practice. Most of the counselling literature indexed in ERIC pertains to school counselling. Indexes journals, books, conferences, theses, dissertations, reports and other education-related materials from a variety of sources, including scholarly organizations, professional associations, research centers, policy organizations, university presses, the U.S. Department of Education and other federal, state and local agencies. Includes indexing for more than 1,000 education journals. Covers the field in the English language from 1966 to the present.
- Medline - The authoritative source for research information in medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine and other allied health sciences including counselling. Indexes about 5,000 of the world's leading medical, biomedical, health sciences, and other scholarly journals covering topics related to medicine and health care.
Searching journal indexes and databases is similar to searching library catalogues, in the sense that keywords can be a good way to start searching for information on an unfamiliar topic, but that you also should consider other approaches (see the Basic Searching Techniques section of this tutorial). Try different variations of words, word endings, and word combinations because search tools are not all indexed the same way. If you hit on a particular set of search terms that produces good results, try reusing it elsewhere. Help pages often reveal useful search tips.
Retrieving the full text is often your next step after identifying some articles that seem relevant. Most journal indexes give you the options of printing, saving, or emailing yourself the citation and/or full text document. Choose the option that best suits you. If you have configured your desktop workspace as recommended in this tutorial, then saving citation information and your full text articles, and making notes about the articles will be easy and will keep them organized for future use while writing your paper or compiling your reference list or bibliography. This will reduce the likelihood of having to retrace your steps to find missing information later on. When the full text is not available in the U of L Library's collections, you may wish to use interlibrary loans to request a copy of the article, which will be emailed to you if your request is filled.
Practice Exercise
Practice moving from one journal index to another using variant search terms and techniques. This will help you discover for yourself the many search options and variations that exist among different journal indexes and full text databases. Start with PsycINFO. Choose a topic that is interesting to you and do a keyword search. Find a journal article that looks interesting and relevant. Display the Complete Record describing the article, and identify the Subject Headings in the record that seem relevant to your topic. These Subject Headings are examples of controlled vocabulary, and play a similar role to that of subject headings in library catalogues. Try searching for the same topic in Medline. How are the retrieved articles in PsycINFO and Medline alike and different? Does Medline use controlled vocabulary, and if so, what is it called? Which index produced better results on your search topic, and why?
Discussion Questions
- Under what circumstances might you use PsycINFO to research a counselling topic? ERIC?
- If the full-text is not contained in the search tool you are using, how do you go about requesting it?
Additional Sources of Guidance
Maintained by Rumi Graham
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