Psychology Subject Guide
Getting Started
When refining a research topic in psychology, it often helps to consult some of the standard reference works before searching for books and journal articles. A good article in a specialized encyclopedia can give you the necessary background you need to get started and can help suggest keywords or other avenues of research.
You can look for relevant sources in the reference book collection on the first floor, near the circulation desk, generally in the BF section. You can also ask me or the librarian at the Reference Desk for assistance in finding appropriate reference sources.
Finding Books
Searching
Searching TIGER by keyword or subject is often the fastest way to find books about your topic.
For books that we don’t own here at Colorado College, or books that are checked out or otherwise unavailable, use Prospector - Colorado Unified Catalog . You’ll find books (and CDs, DVDs, etc.) in libraries across Colorado that you can request and have sent to the Tutt Library circulation desk where you can check them out.
For books not available in TIGER or Prospector, you can request through Interlibrary Loan via WorldCat .
Please ask a librarian if you need help with TIGER, Prospector, or WorldCat.
Browsing
Books about psychology are assigned call numbers that begin with:
- BF Psychology
- Q General Science
- R Medicine
Finding Articles
There are a number of databases to consult for articles on mathematics topics. For empirical articles, you may want to start with PsycInfo; for more general articles, Medline, General Science Abstracts or Academic Search Premier are good databases to try.
Complete list of databases for psychology
- Annual Reviews
- Coverage: 1990's - current
- Online access to 20 Annual Reviews series covering biomedical sciences, physical sciences, and social sciences.
- Encyclopedia Of Life Sciences
- Coverage: varies
- Features signed, peer-reviewed entries covering cell, molecular, and structural biology, microbiology, genetics, neuroscience, and plant science.
- Encyclopedia Of Pain
- Coverage: N/A
- A guide to the understanding of the broad, multi-faceted and complex topic of pain.
- History Of Science, Technology And Medicine
- An international bibliography for the history of science, technology and medicine, reflecting the influence of these fields on society and culture from prehistory to the present. Includes journal articles, conference proceedings, books, book reviews and dissertations.
- MEDLINE
- Coverage: 1965 - current
- Journals published internationally, covering all areas of medicine. *Password required for full text. Contact Reference Desk x6662.
- PsycARTICLES
- Coverage: 1988 - current
- Full text articles on current issues in psychology, general psychology, and specialized, basic, applied, clinical and theoretical research in psychology, covering journals published by the American Psychological Association and other allied organizations. NOTE: You can search both PsycINFO and PsycARTICLES at the same time. Contact Reference Desk x6662.
- PsycINFO
- Coverage: 1887 - current
- Comprehensive international database of psychology. Covers the academic, research, and practice literature in psychology. NOTE: You can search both PsycINFO and PsycARTICLES at the same time. Contact Reference Desk x6662.
- PubMed
- Coverage: varies
- PubMed, a service of the National Library of Medicine, includes over 14 million citations for biomedical articles back to the 1950's. It is the public version of Medline and links to many sites providing full text articles and other related resources.
- ScienceDirect
- Coverage: varies
- Full-text articles online from Elsevier and Academic Press journals. Summary information about articles from all other Elsevier titles and some other publishers. Coverage includes all science areas and many social sciences and humanities areas.
- Web Of Knowledge
- Coverage: 1900 - current
- Citation-based searching in all disciplines. Includes Science Citation Index (1900-present), Social Sciences Citation Index (1900-present), and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975-present).
- Web Of Science
- Coverage: 1900 - current
- Citation-based searching in all disciplines. Includes Science Citation Index (1900-present), Social Sciences Citation Index (1900-present), and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975-present).