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This page is intended to assist you in performing research
on all manner of psychological topics.
Performing Research
Literature Searches
Taking Notes Keeping
a Research Log
PsycInfo
Help with Research at GMU Electronic
Journals and Periodicals
Psych Resources on the Internet
Evaluating
Internet Sources
Performing Research
Whether you are writing a research paper or a laboratory
report, performing research is one of the most important and
time-consuming steps. Many people feel lost when it comes
to finding information on their topic and do not know where
to look. In their book Writing For Psychology,
Thaiss and Sanford suggest the following places to look for
information on your topic:
- Recent reviews
- Research indexes and databases
Once you have found a source, how do you extract the information
that you need? Here are some tips from Thaiss and Sanford:
- Read the abstracts. Since abstracts are brief summaries
of articles, they provide a quick way of ascertaining whether
or not the article is relevant to your research.
- Read at least part of the article. Read the parts of the
introduction that deal with the hypothesis of the study
and the parts of the discussion that report the conclusions.
You may also want to read portions of the procedure.
- Before you photocopy an article, skim through it to make
sure it is relevant to your topic.
- Develop a spreadsheet that includes the reference, the
purpose of the study, the type of design used in the study,
results, and conclusions, comments on the differences between
the study and previous research, and any ideas that you
are trying to develop in your paper.
- Always record citations. This will save you a lot of time
and effort later on when you write your References
section.
Links
Library Research
in Psychology: Finding It Easily, American Psychological Association
Psychology
Related Library Resources, University of Missouri-Rolla Library
Psychology
Research Resource Guide, Tulane
University
Doing
Research, Encyclopedia of Psychology
Psychology
Resources, San Diego State University
Psychology
Research Guide, College of Charleston
Psychology
Research Guide, Boston College Libraries
Psychology
Library Research Guide, MIT Libraries
PsychZone
Research Guide
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Literature Searches
Performing a literature search is one of the most important
abilities involved with research. Many students find the process
of literature searching to be daunting and frustrating, but
it doesn't have to be. When using an electronic or online
search engine, many students complain that they "cannot
find anything" on their topic. Many times, the problem
is not that there is no information on their topic, but it
is that they are not using the right search terms.
Clarifying Your Search Terms and Concepts
Dr. Adam Winsler, a professor at GMU, gives the following
advice for performing a literature search on PsycINFO, or
any other database.
On a piece of paper make 3 columns. In each column put a
different concept related to your research topic. For example,
if you were doing a paper on "Medication for children with
ADHD in preschool." The first column would be concept one,
"ADHD". The second column would be for your second concept,
"preschool", and column three would be for your third concept,
"medication." After you have labeled your three columns, try
to think of many other ways to say each of your concepts.
For example, under ADHD you could put "hyperactivity", "hyperactive",
"ADD", etc. Under preschool you could put "children", "young
child", "toddler", etc. Under medication you could put "Ritalin",
"medication", "drugs", etc. After you have thought of all
the ways to say your three concepts, perform a search for
every combination of concepts between your three columns.
For instance, you could do a search for "hyperactive and toddler",
or "ADD, young child, and Ritalin". After you try each 2 and
3-way combination, look in the abstracts and titles of the
articles that you find to see if other researchers are giving
these topics a different name. If so, write those names down
in your columns. Continue with this process of searching and
elaborating on your concepts, and you will be more successful
at locating a wider breadth of research.
Another Helpful Tip
When using PsycINFO to perform a search, Dr. Winsler advises
students to "uncheck" the box on the first page of PsycINFO
that says "Map Term to Subject Heading." By deselecting
this box, you can perform your search without automatically
being referred to the confusing PsycINFO index.
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Taking Notes
The ability to take good notes is important when performing
research in any field. Here are some good websites with tips
for developing good note-taking skills.
Note-take
effectively, OWL Online Writing Lab, Purdue University
Taking
Notes, Allen and Unwin e-Study Centre
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Keeping a Research Log
In their book Writing for Psychology,
Thaiss and Sanford describe a useful technique for organizing
the research process through the use of what they call a "reading
response log."
Tips for keeping a research log:
- Date every entry with the month, day and year. You should
even date additions to previous entries.
- Whenever you are citing information from a specific book
or article, make sure you cite the source accurately. This
will save time later.
Questions to ask when reviewing literature and previous research:
- How would I summarize this information for someone who
hasn't read it?
- What aspects of this work are important or interesting
to me?
- How can I simplify the language and technical jargon used
in this work to make it understandable to others?
- Is this author credible?
- How do these findings compare to other entries in the
log?
- What were the hypotheses, methods, and findings of earlier
studies?
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PsycINFO
PsycINFO is an online database for psychological literature
and abstracts maintained by the American
Psychological Association. It is a very extensive database
and if you are a George Mason University student, you can
access the database online for free by going to http://ers2000.gmu.edu/sql/subdb.php?Education_&_Psychology
Once you are on this page, if you are on campus, you can
simply scroll down the page and click on the PsycINFO icon.
If you are off campus, you must scroll down to PsycINFO
and click on "EZ off-campus access." Then enter your
student id number and click on "PsycINFO" from the
lists of databases.
Links
About PsycINFO
PsycINFO Demonstration
PsycINFO
Tutorial, University of Washington
Another good resources is the Social
Sciences Citation Index (SSCI). The SSCI operates differently
than most databases. Rather than entering a topic and searching
for abstracts pertaining to that topic, you enter a known
article and the database searches for any other articles that
use the entered article as a citation. This is particularly
valuable in psychology research, as it allows one to find
many articles pertaining to a certain type of research question
or methodology without having to state a specific subject
or topic. In many cases this database can bring to light useful
information that would be very difficult to locate in a normal
database.
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Help with Research
at GMU
The George Mason University library provides a variety of
free help on topics involved with performing research such
as library classes, online library tutorials, and library
research guides. For more information on these resources,
or to ask a question regarding the GMU library, go to http://library.gmu.edu/research/
Sarah Sheehan is a GMU librarian who can help with psychology
research related questions. You can contact her through email
at ssheehan@fen1.gmu.edu
For an excellent online web library tutorial go to http://library.gmu.edu/training/webtut/titlescreen.html
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Electronic Journals
and Periodicals
There are a wealth of electronic journals and periodicals
available on the Internet. Using these online journals and
periodicals can be time saving and convenient.
Links
Electronic
Journals and Periodicals (Very Extensive List), Hanover College
Psychology Department
Psychological Journal
Search, Mental Help.net
APA Journals
Journals
and Other Electronic Publications, Langara College Psychology
Department
An Index
of More Than 1,500 Psychology and Social Science Journals
Online
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Psych Resources
on the Internet
The Internet can be a very useful resource for information
and for performing research. Here are some very extensive
Websites for psychology research resources on the Internet.
Internet
Resources in Psychology, George Mason University
The SOSIG Psychology
Gateway
OPAL Online
Psychology Article Listing
Psychology
Internet Resources, Adelaide University Library
Online
Research in Psychology, The Union Institute Research Engine
Search
Engines for Research in Psychology, Langara
College Psychology Department
Library Research
in Psychology
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Evaluating Internet
Sources
Although there is a wealth of excellent information available
on the Internet and the Web, not all of it is reliable enough
to be included in an academic paper. While surfing the Internet,
one can inadvertently stumble across a lot of questionable
material and outright garbage. It is important to keep in
mind, especially as you are writing your paper, that not all
of the information you find on the Internet is factual or
reliable. Here are some good sites that provide tips to help
you evaluate Internet sources and information.
Evaluating
Web Resources, Wolfgram Memorial Library
Web
Evaluation Criteria, New Mexico State University Library
Guidelines
for Internet Resource Evaluation and Selection, by Gregory
F. Pratt, Patrick Flannery and Cassandra L. D. Perkins
Evaluation
of Internet Source, Purdue University Online Writing Labs
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