Sociology 121 - Baker

Finding Journal Articles

To find journal articles on a particular topic, use any of the databases available on the FLITE Web site. These databases provide access to thousands of scholarly journals and the articles published in them.

For sociology topics, these databases are probably your best bets:

• Social Science Abstracts - Of the two recommended databases for sociology topics, this one has more in it. It's not just limited to sociology articles, either--other disciplines like psychology, anthropology and political science are included as well. (This is a plus if you're doing anything even a little bit interdisciplinary!)
  Note: If you need a peer-reviewed article, check the checkbox for that on the search screen.
  
  
• Sociology (Sage Journals Online) - This database covers 35 peer-reviewed journals offering over 28,000 full text articles. This diverse collection of journals includes a wide range of sociology related topics including race, gender, sports, theory, culture, research and methods, family, children, and sexuality.

Suggestions to retrieve better results:

• Combine key phrases with AND or OR.
• In Social Science Abstracts, limit your results to only articles from peer-reviewed journals.

Finding articles when there's no Full-Text link

The Find-It links (also known as SFX or Check For Available Full Text links) will tell you if FLITE has access to an article, and link you to the article if we do.
Click here for a video tutorial on how to use Find-It links.

How do you know if it's scholarly?

Not 100% confident as to what peer review is? Take 5 minutes and watch this.

All the journals in Sociology (Sage Full-Text) are peer reviewed. Not all of the journals in Social Science Abstracts are. The easiest solution is to search only peer-reviewed journals in Social Science Abstracts, but if you've already found an article and you don't know how to tell whether it's from a scholarly journal, check out our online tutorials on how to find out:

• Learn to use Ulrich's Periodicals Directory to find out if the journal is peer reviewed.
• Learn to use Google to find out if a journal is peer reviewed.

Finding a specific article

If you know a specific article that you want, but aren't sure what database it might be in, you can use the Citation Linker on the Journals tab of the FLITE homepage.

Click here for a video tutorial on locating and using the Citation Linker.

Finding Books or Journal Articles in Print

To find print journals or books, search the library catalog. If you want your results to show only journals (not books or dvds or anything else), use the link that says FSU Periodicals in the gray box labeled Location. You will have to scroll down to see this box.

Need help searching the library catalog? Learn how here.

Note: FLITE is reorganizing where things are shelved, this summer. For the early part of the summer, that affects access to print copies of journals. Eventually they'll all end up on the second floor (even the ones that used to be downstairs). In the mean time, if you're looking for a print article and can't find it, ask a librarian to help you track it down!

There are photocopiers in FLITE if you wish to make copies of articles you need for your classes.

If FLITE Doesn't Own What You Need

If you're looking for a book FLITE doesn't own, you can request it through MeLCat. It usually takes 3 - 5 business days for the book to arrive.

If you're looking for an article FLITE doesn't own, you can request it through Interlibrary Loan. We'll e-mail you when it comes in, usually within a week of your ordering it.

Note: An item requested via interlibrary loan could possibly take up to 20 days to get here. Plan ahead if you think you might need this service!

Contact: Emily Mitchell / Email / Phone: 231-591-3730 / Office: FLITE 140F

Don't forget, you are welcome to come to the Oval Information Desk and ask for help any time. You can also call us 231-591-3602, chat with us, or sign up for a one-on-one appointment.

Last update: February 15, 2010