Fields in This Database: Authors and Institutions · Titles and Publishing Information · Subjects · Abstract · Issue Numbering · Codes
Searching Thesaurus or Keywords
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Database Description: PsycINFO provides abstracts and citations to the scholarly literature in the behavioral sciences and mental health. The database includes material of relevance to psychologists and professionals in psychology and related fields such as psychiatry, management, business, education, social science, neuroscience, law, medicine, and social work. PsycINFO covers journal articles, book chapters, books, dissertations, and technical reports.
Journal coverage includes international material selected from more than 1900 periodicals written in over 24 languages. Current chapter and book coverage includes worldwide English-language material published from 1987-present. Over 60,000 references are added annually through weekly updates. PsycINFO journal list.
Historic PsycINFO: At OhioLINK, Historic PsycINFO (1806-1966) is separate from the contemporary database. Historic records do not contain controlled index terms or certain other indexing fields, such as Age Groups or Methodology.
Historic PsycINFO contains citations and abstracts from Psychological Abstracts (1927-1966), Psychological Bulletin (1921-1926), American Journal of Psychology (1887–1966), all APA journals back to their first issues, Psychological Index (1894-1935), and Classic Books in Psychology of the 20th Century and Harvard Book List, 1840–1971.
More information about PsycINFO from the APA.
PRODUCED BY: The American
Psychological Association.
DATES COVERED: From 1967.
UPDATES: Weekly.
HISTORIC PSYCINFO: 1806-1966.
Searching Thesaurus or Keywords: PsycINFO has three special options on its search form:
| Option | When to use | Example |
| Thesaurus | Search your word or phrase in the PsycINFO thesaurus. | learning – finds thesaurus terms beginning with the word "learning" |
| Keywords | Search your word or phrase everywhere in the database, except for cited references. | spatial language – finds the exact phrase "spatial language" anywhere, except for cited references; that is, (spacial language)..cit. |
| Keywords plus cited references | Search your word or phrase everywhere in the database, including cited references. Use this option for field-qualified searches, like those shown in this document. |
spatial language – finds the exact
phrase "spatial language" anywhere, including cited
references
(myles and simpson).au. – finds Myles and Simpson as co-authors (ashby same 2004).cit. – finds articles that cite an article by Ashby published in 2004 s3 not s4 – combines your previous search sets; finds documents that are in set 3 but not in set 4 |
Fields in This Database
| LABEL | NAME | EXAMPLES |
| .AU. | AUTHOR |
haugtvedt.au.
(maltby john).au. |
| .AF. | AUTHOR AFFILIATION | brewer.au. and (ohio state).af. |
| .AUB. | BOOK AUTHOR | (brock timothy).aub. |
| .CNF. | CONFERENCE | (biological rhythms).cnf. |
| .CO. | CORPORATE NAME (INSTITUTION) | (public health service).co. |
AUTHOR (.AU.): Author names are given with surname first. All words and initials are indexed. Authors are identified as they appear in the journal article or book. Some publications use only first and middle initials and surname; others use first name, middle initial, and surname etc. Take these variations into account when searching for specific authors.
AUTHOR AFFILIATION (.AF.): Author's institutional affiliation.
BOOK AUTHOR (.AUB.): Authors of the "parent" book in which a chapter appears.
CONFERENCE (.CNF.): Name and other information about a conference at which the content of the document was presented.
CORPORATE NAME (.CO.): Institutions responsible for the creation of the publication.
TITLES and PUBLISHING INFORMATION
| LABEL | NAME | EXAMPLES |
| .TI. | TITLE | (elaboration likelihood model).ti. |
| .TT. | TRANSLATED TITLE | (therapeutic passion).tt. |
| .JN. | JOURNAL TITLE | (journal of experimental psychology).jn. |
| .CIT. | CITED REFERENCE | (bower same clapper same 1994).cit. |
| .REV. | REVIEW OF | (spatial language).rev. |
| .SIT. | SPECIAL ISSUE TITLE | (situated cognition).sit. |
| .PUBN. | PUBLISHER | psychoneuroimmunology and wiley.pubn. |
| .CP. | COUNTRY OF PUBLICATION | television and india.cp. |
| .BKTI. | BOOK TITLE | (affect, cognition and stereotyping).bkti. |
| .SE. | SERIES TITLE | counterpoints.se. |
TITLE (.TI.): Title of article, chapter, or book. TI may be a non-English title.
TRANSLATED TITLE (.TT.): English-language translation of the article title.
JOURNAL TITLE (.JN.): Title of the serial publication, such as the journal in which the article appears. JN often includes ampersands (&) instead of the word "and."
CITED REFERENCE (.CIT.): Authors, titles, and source information for articles or books cited by this article. Search CIT to find articles that cite particular authors or a particular article or book. Your search can consist of author words, title words, date, journal, etc. When searching multiple words, use the "same" operator to specify that those words belong to the same cited reference.
This database contains many cited references. Plain keyword searches may retrieve irrelevant records because of the authors, titles, etc. within the cited references. To enhance the precision of plain keyword searching, a special option was added to this database to search keywords everywhere except cited references. See Searching Thesaurus or Keywords.
REVIEW OF (.REV.): Title of book or software being reviewed. Search REV to find all reviews of an item.
SPECIAL ISSUE TITLE (.SIT.): Special issue title of the journal in which the article appears. Often preceded by the text "Special Issue" or related terminology.
PUBLISHER (.PUBN.): Name of publisher of the journal, book, or chapter. For books and chapters, one or two publishers and locations may be given.
COUNTRY OF PUBLICATION (.CP.): Country of publication of the journal, book, or chapter.
BOOK TITLE (.BKTI.): Title of the "parent" book a selected chapter is from. Searching BKTI retrieves records for individual chapters from a book. To find a citation for the entire book itself, search TI.
SERIES (.SE.): For books and book chapters, the name of the series in which the book was published.
| LABEL | NAME | EXAMPLES |
| .SU. | SUBJECT (Index Terms) |
imitation.su.
(forensic psychology).su. |
| .MAJ. | MAJOR SUBJECT | apraxia.maj. |
| .ID. | IDENTIFIER (Keywords) |
persuasion.id.
(consumer research).id. |
SUBJECT (.SU.): Subject headings assigned from the Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms. With the SU qualifier, you may search either individual words or phrases. SU encompasses both major and minor index terms. Major index terms describe an important topic or central focus of the article or document. Minor index terms describe a concept addressed in the article or document, but which is not a primary or central focus. In the PsycINFO record display, major index terms are preceded by an asterisk *.
MAJOR SUBJECT (.MAJ.): Subject heading or index term which describes an important topic or central focus of the article or document. Using MAJ, you may search either complete phrases or individual words.
IDENTIFIER or KEYWORD (.ID.): Non-controlled vocabulary, or key concepts, used to the describe the content of the article or document. These terms include new words or phrases that may be in popular use but are not in the official Thesaurus. Identifiers also may be names of people, places, or organizations discussed in the article or document.
Additional subject fields are defined in the PsycINFO database, but are intended for system use. People are unlikely to use these fields for searching:
SUBJECT THESAURUS (.SUT.): This field is defined for system use when retrieving subjects through the thesaurus.
MAJOR DESCRIPTOR (.MAJT.): This field is defined for system use when retrieving records through "focus" in the thesaurus.
| LABEL | NAME | EXAMPLES |
| .AB. | ABSTRACT | (dramamine or dimenhydrinate).ab. |
ABSTRACT (.AB.): Omit stopwords when searching AB.
| LABEL | NAME | EXAMPLES |
| .YR. | YEAR | ethical behavior and 2004.yr. |
| .MO. | MONTH | (nature neuroscience).jn. and 2005.yr. and feb.mo. |
| .VO. | VOLUME | (consumer research).jn. and 32.vo. |
| .NO. | NUMBER | (experimental psychology).jn. and 134.vo. and 2.no. |
| .PG. | ARTICLE PAGINATION | (communication disorders).jn. and 453$.pg. |
YEAR (.YR.): The year of publication of the article or document.
MONTH (.MO.): The month or season of publication of the article or document. The month is usually given as a 3-letter code (Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec). Seasons are usually given as Win, Spr, Sum, Fal.
VOLUME (.VO.): The volume of the journal in which the article appeared.
NUMBER (.NO.): The number of the issue in which the article appeared.
ARTICLE PAGINATION (.PG.): If you remember the starting page of an article but not the full citation, searching with PG might be useful. Enter the starting page and the truncation symbol $.
| LABEL | NAME | EXAMPLES |
| .AN. | ACCESSION NUMBER | 2003-10511-002.an. |
| .AGED. | AGE GROUP | (sleep disorders).su. and childhood.aged. |
| .AGE. | AGE GROUP CODE | (sleep disorders).su. and 100.age. |
| .AUMD. | AUXILIARY MATERIAL | language development and video.aumd. |
| .AUM. | AUXILIARY MATERIAL CODE | language development and 2000.aum. |
| .CC. | CLASSIFICATION CODE | success and 2360.cc. |
| .CCD. | CLASSIFICATION CODE TEXT | success and motivation.ccd. |
| .DT. | DOCUMENT TYPE | chambers and wang and erratum.dt. |
| .ISBN. | ISBN | 0805811494.isbn. |
| .IS. | ISSN | bias and 0022-4545.is. |
| .LA. | LANGUAGE | imagination.su. and russian.la. |
| .MTHD. | METHODOLOGY | acculturation and case.mthd. |
| .MTH. | METHODOLOGY CODE | acculturation and 0200.mth. |
| .LOC. | POPULATION LOCATION | performance and germany.loc. |
| .POPD. | POPULATION GROUP | motivation.su. and male.popd. |
| .POP. | POPULATION GROUP CODE | motivation.su. and 30.pop. |
| .AT. | PUBLICATION TYPE | delinquency and female and dissertation.at. |
| .BT. | PUBLICATION TYPE, Book Type | mediation and handbook.bt. |
| .PT. | PUBLICATION TYPE, Details | hypnosis and smoking and peer.pt. |
| .AUDD. | TARGET AUDIENCE | child development and general.audd. |
| .AUD. | TARGET AUDIENCE CODE | child development and gp.aud. |
| .INS. | TESTS, MEASURES, INSTRUMENTATION | wechsler.ins. |
ACCESSION NUMBER (.AN.): Record control number assigned by database producer; unique to each record in the database. Searching by AN is a method for returning directly to a record that you have retrieved previously.
AGE GROUP (.AGED.) and CODE (.AGE.): Specific population age groups related to the content of the document. AGED is the age group description from the following list, and AGE is the code.
100 – Childhood (birth-12 yrs)
120 – Neonatal (birth-1 mo.)
140 – Infancy (2-23 mos.)
160 – Preschool Age (2-5 yrs.)
180 – School Age (6-12 yrs)
200 – Adolescence (13-17 yrs)
300 – Adulthood (18 yrs & older)
320 – Young Adulthood (18-29 yrs)
340 – Thirties (30-39 yrs)
360 – Middle Age (40-64 yrs)
380 – Aged (65 yrs & older)
390 – Very Old (85 yrs & older)
AUXILIARY MATERIAL (.AUMD.) and CODE (AUM.): Accompanying material included with the publication. AUMD is the auxiliary material from the following list, and AUM is the code.
0200 – 3-D Modeling Images
0600 – Appendixes
0800 – Audio
1000 – Data Sets
1100 – DVD/CD
1600 – Tables and Figures
1800 – Web Sites
2000 – Video
2200 – Work Book/Study Guide
2400 – Other
CLASSIFICATION CODE (.CC.) and TEXT (.CCD.): A system of 4-digit codes that describe the broad areas and sub-fields of the field of psychology. CC is the classification code of the primary subject matter of the document, and CCD is the textual equivalent. Complete list of codes.
DOCUMENT TYPE (.DT.): Identifies special types of content:
Bibliography
Column/Opinion
Comment/Reply
Editorial
Encyclopedia Entry
Erratum/Correction
Letter
Obituary
Original Chapter
Original Journal Article
Publication Information (announcements, editorial information, etc. about the journal itself)
Reprinted Chapter
Reprinted Journal Article
Review (review of book, video, software, website, etc.)
ISBN (.ISBN.): International Standard Book Number of the book.
ISSN (.IS.): International Standard Serial Number of the journal.
LANGUAGE (.LA.): To search for a particular language or to limit your search to a language, use the language name spelled out.
METHODOLOGY (.MTHD.) and CODE (.MTH.):
0200 – Clinical Case Study
0400 – Empirical Study
0410 – Experimental Replication
0430 – Followup Study
0450 – Longitudinal Study
0451 – Prospective Study
0453 – Retrospective Study
0800 – Literature Review
1200 – Meta Analysis
1400 – Nonclinical Case Study
1600 – Qualitative Study
1800 – Quantitative Study
2000 – Treatment Outcome/Clinical Trial
POPULATION LOCATION (.LOC.): Country name of the location of the relevant population. May contain multiple locations.
POPULATION GROUP (.POPD.) and CODE (.POP.): Description of the specific populations involved. POPD is the population group from the following list, and POP is the code.
10 – Human
20 – Animal
30 – Male
40 – Female
50 – Inpatient
60 – Outpatient
PUBLICATION TYPE (.AT.): Primary description of the type of publication in which the document was published.
Journal
Book
Dissertation Abstract
Electronic Collection
Encyclopedia
PUBLICATION TYPE, Book Type (.BT.): Certain books are further described by a special book type:
Conference Proceedings
Handbook/Manual
Reference Book
Textbook/Study Guide
PUBLICATION TYPE, Details (.PT.): Certain books and articles are further described by these details:
Authored Book
Edited Book
Peer Reviewed Journal
TARGET AUDIENCE (.AUDD.) and CODE (.AUD.): The audience for which the document or article is written, if clearly specified by the author. AUDD is the target audience from the following list, and AUD is the 2-letter code.
GP – General Public
JU – Juvenile
PS – Psychology: Professional and Research
TESTS, MEASURES, INSTRUMENTATION (.INS.): Names of published tests and measurements used by a study.
August 2006
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