APA PsycNet Quick RefeReNce Guide | PAGe 1
APA PsycNet Quick Reference Guide
ABOUT THIS GUIDE
Access APA PsycNet through your library’s webpage. If you need assistance, contact your librarian. This
quick reference guide will demonstrate how to search APA PsycInfo
®
on the APA PsycNet platform in
Advanced Search mode. APA PsycInfo
®
is an electronic bibliographic database that provides abstracts and
citations for scholarly literature in the behavioral and social sciences. It contains a rich, interdisciplinary
backfile that includes 4.8 million records.
Select the Advanced Search link to get started.
SEARCH BASICS
1. Boolean Operators (AND, OR, and NOT): Combine search terms to narrow (“AND”) or broaden
(“OR”) results. Use “NOT” to exclude records from retrieval.
2. Phrases (“”): Enclose phrases in quotation marks if you want to find results in that exact order.
For example, searching “perceived stress scale” will not retrieve “stress scale,” “scale of perceived
stress,” or any other variation. It will retrieve only “perceived stress scale.”
3. Truncation (*): The * replaces any number of characters. For example, therap* finds therapy,
therapies, therapist, therapists, therapeutic, therapeutically, etc.
ORNOT OR NOT
A
N
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DEFINITIONS OF SELECT FIELDS
Any Field: automatically searches all fields, except for cited references
Keywords: searches the Keywords field, which contains the natural language terms describing
documents’ content as well as the Index Terms and Title fields
Abstract: a brief summary of the article
Affiliation: institutional affiliation of authors
Index Terms: controlled vocabulary from The APA Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms
®
Tests & Measures: lists the criteria used in the methodology of a study
Grant/Sponsorship: the source(s) of grants, sponsorship, and funding for the research orstudy
TITLE SEARCH
Enter the title or the word(s) you want contained in the title in the search box. Select Title from the
drop-down menu. For example, typing “psychotherapy” will return results with psychotherapy in the titles.
If you know the complete title, such as “Principles for facilitating agency in psychotherapy,” you may enter
the full title in the search box. Title searches the title of a specific record, often an article or book chapter.
Journal Title and Book Title are their own separate fields.
JOURNAL SEARCH
Enter the journal title or the word(s) you want contained in the title into the search box and select
Journal Title from the drop-down menu.
For example, searching for “American Psychologist” will yield a list of all citations from the journal entitled
American Psychologist.
Helpful hint: if you are unsure of which journal to select, click Journal Lookup for the complete
JournalIndex.
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INDEX TERMS
Index Terms are taken from the APA’s Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms
®
. This is the controlled
vocabulary for the database to help you find precise and relevant results.
The Thesaurus was updated in 2020 with 102 new postable or “preferred” terms, and expanded
terminology to reflect evolving research areas.
Type an index term into the search box and select Index Terms from the drop-down menu; for example,
“obsessive compulsive disorder.”
Helpful hint: If you are unsure if a term is an index term you can look it up in the online Thesaurus. Click
on APA THESAURUS in the main navigation bar. You can access the Thesaurus of Psychological Index
Terms by clicking on the APA THESAURUS link.
You can search a term or use the alphabet navigation to browse the Thesaurus.
KEYWORD SEARCH
Search three fields at once for broad concepts. Keywords searches the Title, Index Terms, and Keywords
fields simultaneously.
Enter the term(s) into the search box and select Keywords from the drop-down menu. For example,
search “seasonality.” This will retrieve records with “seasonality” as a keyword.
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FILTERS
The image to the right shows available options to focus
your search.
Age Group: limit your search to the age of participants in
a research study (this applies to humans)
Supplemental Material: indicates material separate from
the source document
APA PsycInfo Classification: Classification Codes
represent general areas of psychology which are used to classify each document. You can find the
classification codes here: www.apa.org/pubs/databases/training/class-codes.aspx
Document Type: limit your search to specific document types, such as bibliography, editorial, review, etc.
Methodology: limit your search to the methodology used in a research study, such as clinical case study,
literature review, meta-analysis, etc.
Population Group: limit your search to the group of participants in a research study (human, animal,
female, male, etc.)
RECORD DISPLAY
The record displays a wealth of bibliographic data, including the Title, Author(s), Author Contact
Information, Abstract, Publication Source, Publisher, ISSN, Language, Keywords, Digital Object Identifier,
and much more.
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MY LIST
You will be prompted to sign in or create your My APA account. Add items of interest to your folder by
checking the box to the left of the title and then clicking on the “ ” (Add To My List) icon.
MANAGE SEARCHES
On the Search Results page, you can manage your search by setting up an email alert ( ) or an RSS feed
( ), creating a Permalink ( ), and editing ( ) or saving ( ) your search strategy.
MY PSYCNET
Click the My PsycNet tab to create a free personalized area.
My PsycNet allows you to create and edit a user profile, save searches, and set up alerts. It also stores
APA PsycNet and APA PsycNet Direct purchases.
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RECENT SEARCHES
Click the Recent Searches link to combine recent searches with AND, OR, or NOT Booleon operators.
You have the full range of search actions available here as well.
CITED REFERENCES
The Cited References search allows you to find works that cite a particular author or publication.
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TRAINING AND SEARCH HELP
Find search tips and tools from APA training experts:
www.apa.org/pubs/databases/training
View database tutorials on the APA Publishing Training YouTube page:
www.youtube.com/APAPublishingTraining
Register for a free webinar led by an APA training specialist:
www.apa.org/pubs/databases/training/webinars
Contact Customer Engagement for training and search help at [email protected].
Follow us on social media for the latest updates:
www.facebook.com/APAdatabases
www.linkedin.com/showcase/americanpsychologicalassociationpublishing
www.twitter.com/apa_databases
08/2020
APA PsycNet Quick RefeReNce Guide | PAGe 7