Using your laptop in the library...

...is now easier than ever, with new and improved wi-fi connection instructions available from all help points in the library. Electrical sockets are also available at many of our study spaces so that you can plug in easily. If you come across any difficulties, then feel free to use either of the automatic dial phones in Stratford library which take you straight through to the IT Service Desk.

Library opening hours...

...are available from the following webpage: http://www.uel.ac.uk/lls/about/openinghours.htm. During term-time we are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, but during Christmas and other periods (such as the summer) we have different hours, so it's always worth checking the webpage!

New books in the library...

..added to stock during the month of November 2010 can be viewed from this link: November 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

There have been quite a few new additions to library stock over the past month. Notable new titles include the 6th edition of Crain's "Theories of development", the 3rd edition of Merten's "Research and evaluation in education and psychology" and Slife's "Taking sides: clashing views on psychological issues (16th edition)". There are also quite a few new books in the field of educational and child psychology.

New e-books include Harley's "Psychology of language (2nd edition)", Hawkin's "Supervision in the helping professions (3rd edition)" and Howitt's "Introduction to qualitative methods in psychology".

All new books, including ebooks, can be located through the library catalogue.

Keeping up-to-date using Twitter...

...is now easier than ever due to the number of psychology-focused Twitter lists which are emerging. The links below are to just a few of the many lists of the best psychology tweets which are appearing on mashable.com:

• Psychology Now (look at the 'Lists @PsychologyNow is on')
• Psychology News
• Mental Health and Psychology

Child Psychology Research Blog...

...maintained by Nestor Lopez-Duran (Assistant Professor at the University of Michigan) can be found here: Child Psychology Research Blog. It regularly presents some of the latest research and may prove useful for those studying child psychology.

Using the 'refine your results' options in PsycINFO...

...can greatly increase the number and quality of results you find. As an example, let's imagine we are looking for articles about aggressive behaviour in teenage girls. You could try running searches for 'aggressive behaviour and teenage girls' (which currently finds just 12 results), 'aggressive behaviour and adolescent girls' (162 results) and so on. However, to really dig down into PsycINFO you need to make use of the options available to refine your search. In this example, the route to better results is to run a search for 'aggressive behaviour' (which finds over 29000 results) and then refine your search using the 'limiters' which appear to the left of the results list. First, click on 'gender' from the list of limiters and choose 'female'. This reduces your list to around 8000 results, all of which cover aggressive behaviour among females. Next, choose the 'age' limiter and select 'adolescence (13-17)'. This then finds just over 2100 results, all about aggressive behaviour in teenage girls. That's just about 2000 more than your original searches found!

New books in the library...

..added to stock during the month of October 2010 can be viewed from this link: October 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

A mixture of new books, additional copies and e-books this month. Notable new additions to stock include: Carlson's "Physiology of behaviour, 10th edition", the new fourth edition of Jacob's "Psychodynamic counselling in action", David Silverman's "A very short, fairly interesting and reasonably cheap book about qualitative research" and Christopher Chabris' fascinating book "The invisible gorilla: and other ways our intuition deceives us".

We also have various new e-books in stock, all accessible via the library catalogue, so long as you have an up-to-date Athens account. New e-books include: "Psychology of attention, 2nd edition" by Elizabeth Styles, "An introduction to counselling, 4th edition" by McLeod and Ho Law's "The psychology of coaching, mentoring and learning".

EBSCO Academic Search Complete...

…is an excellent source of journal articles, complementing the two main databases for psychology, counselling and coaching (EBSCO PsycINFO and ScienceDirect). Available through EBSCO, the functionality will be very familiar to you if you are an EBSCO PsycINFO user.

The content currently consists of more than 11,500 journals, with 7,400 of them available in full-text. It covers the whole field of academic topics, including a significant number of psychology, counselling and coaching titles. It is particularly worth searching if your area of research is cross-disciplinary. It is also very useful in supplementing PsycINFO and ScienceDirect searches.

Scanned photocopies of journal articles...

…are sometimes added to the library catalogue when the article is on a reading list but we do not stock the journal it was published in. In such cases, the library purchases a ‘copyright-cleared’ photocopy of the article, then scans and uploads it to the library catalogue. You are required to sign in to the library catalogue to view these articles because they are only ‘copyright-cleared’ for UEL students and staff to view.

To see if the library holds a scanned photocopy of an article on your reading list:

1. First check on ‘Find an e-Journal’ (from the ‘e-journals and databases’ page on the library website) to make sure the library does not subscribe to that journal.
2. If the library does not subscribe to the journal, then check for a scanned photocopy by searching for the name of the article on the library catalogue. Tip: search using the standard ‘books and more’ tab, not the articles tab (which is something completely different!).
3. If the article appears, make sure you are signed in to the catalogue (the sign in option is in the top right corner), then click on ‘Details’ below the article. If it says ‘Electronic text: PDF’, then we have a scanned photocopy.
4. Next, click on ‘more details for this item’ and in the window that pops up you should see a link to the PDF copy of the article. Click on this link to open the article.

The invisible web...

…is the part of the Internet that conventional search engines, such as Google, Yahoo! and Bing, simply can’t reach. Also known as the ‘Deep Web’, it can be an excellent source of research. Of course, as with the rest of the web, there can also be some rather dubious information, so it is vitally important that you carefully evaluate how reliable the information may be!

There have recently been some attempts to produce guides to this ‘unsearchable’ part of the web, including: www.completeplanet.com and www.deepwebresearch.info. There has even been an attempt to create a search engine for it: www.incywincy.com.

New look library catalogue...

…now available online and in all UEL libraries. Following various comments about the old look library catalogue – most notably all those annoying pop-up windows! – the software makers have taken notice and redesigned the interface. Over the summer we have upgraded our catalogue to the new interface, which you will hopefully agree is much easier to use.

Among the improvements is an easier to use library account feature where you can check the status of books you have on loan or have requested. You can also change your library PIN and set yourself up for text alerts from the library. To do all of this, click on ‘Sign In’ in the top-right hand corner of the catalogue screen, enter your UEL computer ID and password and then click on ‘My Account’.

New books in the library...

...added to stock during the month of September 2010 can be viewed from this link: September 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

Lots of e-books this month, including "Cognitive psychology" by Quinlan, "Putting psychology in its place" by Richards and "Practical counselling and helping skills" by Nelson-Jones. New books on the library shelves include the 10th edition of "Physiology of behavior" by Carlson, 7th edition of "Health psychology" by Taylor and 15th edition of "Atkinson and Hilgard's introduction to psychology".

All books, including e-books, can be found using the library catalogue.

As the new academic year begins...

…I thought I would summarise the range of help points available from the library. The ‘Ask a Librarian’ service offers live webchat on weekday afternoons and an email response service during other hours and can be accessed from the front page of the library website. If you are a student or member of staff in the School of Psychology, then you are also free to contact me at any point by e-mail or phone call. In addition to this, there are also lots of guides and helpsheets available to read and print from the library website, professionally-staffed enquiry desks in all our libraries and various self-service facilities, such as the 'my account' feature on the library catalogue which allows you to renew your books, place requests, change your PIN and so on. For more information just ask anyone in the library.

Advice on getting more out of PsycINFO...

…is, of course, available from UEL library. Check out the downloadable guide or contact me directly. APA, the people who produce PsycINFO, also offer some support, including some very helpful videos which guide you through some of the main features. They are available to view on YouTube and can be found by either heading to: http://www.youtube.com/user/PsycINFO and choosing the EBSCO videos, or by running a search on YouTube for: EBSCO PsycINFO.

Whether you reference with APA or Harvard…

…depends upon the requirements of your particular course. In the School of Psychology, most modules require you to use APA Style, although some, particularly in the Field of Guidance, Counselling and Coaching, use Harvard Style. Always check your module handbook or with your tutor! 

Whichever of the two referencing styles you are required to use, make sure you check out the new referencing section on the library’s psychology subject page. It contains some pointers to the latest referencing guides, in line with UEL regulations.

New books in the library...

...added to stock during the month of August 2010 can be viewed from this link: August 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

There are quite a few new books in stock this month, including lots of additional copies of existing texts. This is largely because the library received some extra funds to buy more copies of some core texts. Some notable new additions to stock include coaching books such as Jonathan Passmore's "Leadership coaching: working with leaders" and Thornton's "Group and team coaching". We also have some new study skills books, including the brand new 8th edition of the referencing guide, "Cite Them Right" and Stella Cottrell's "Skills for success: personal development planning handbook".

As ever, all new books can be located using the library catalogue.

roar@UEL – the University’s institutional repository...

…is where you can find full-text copies of UEL’s own research output. As the blurb says, “It has been established to facilitate both dissemination and preservation of scholarly work created by members of the University of East London”.

The School of Psychology is well represented with over 100 items currently deposited. Everything in roar@UEL is available to read in full text, completely free of charge, all of which is aimed at achieving wider readership and increased citations for UEL research. For further information, check the repository support pages or contact Rachel Graham, the University’s Research Services Librarian.

Going beyond PsycINFO with ScienceDirect...

... is highly recommended. Although PsycINFO is an excellent source of journal articles, the library also offers access to other databases which cover psychology. ScienceDirect is perhaps the best of these, containing well over 200 psychology journals, with 128 available with immediate full text access. ScienceDirect can be accessed from the A-Z list on the ‘e-journals and databases’ page on the library website.

To search ScienceDirect specifically for articles published in psychology journals, click on the green ‘search’ button to go to the full search screen. After entering your search terms, you should then select ‘psychology’ from the subject listing before running the search. This will restrict your results to articles from psychology journals. If you want to browse the available psychology journals on ScienceDirect, then select ‘psychology’ from the browse section on the ScienceDirect home page.

Accessing the Internet from another university...

...can often be difficult as most universities only allow their own students and staff to log on to their computers and wi-fi network. However, UEL is now a member of EduRoam (‘educational roaming’) which means that if you are visiting another university library, either because it is closer to where you live or because they have a special collection you wish to use, then you should be able to log-in using your UEL username and password.

For further information, including how to take advantage of EduRoam and which universities it works at, check out the UEL EduRoam page.

Improve your PsycINFO searches with the thesaurus...

...which can be accessed by clicking on the ‘thesaurus’ link in the blue bar at the top of the PsycINFO search and results screens. The thesaurus can help improve your searches in two ways. Firstly, it can help suggest alternative terms to search with, much like a traditional thesaurus, and will often suggest broader and narrow terms, too. For example, if you search the thesaurus for amnesia, then it suggests ‘memory disorders’ as a broader term, ‘retrograde amnesia’ as one of several narrower terms, and ‘forgetting’ as a related term. Secondly, it can help identify the ‘correct’ terminology to use to find articles on that topic. For example, if you search the thesaurus for cognitive dysfunction, it tells you to use ‘cognitive impairment’, while if you search for student protest, it tells you to use ‘student activism’. By using the terminology it suggests, you are likely to find better, more focused results because the terminology suggested is the language used by PsycINFO to organise and index all of its articles.

New books in the library...

...added to stock during the month of July 2010 can be viewed from this link: July 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

Lots of new books on this month's list, owing mainly to a one-off piece of additional funding from the new Vice-Chancellor. There are plenty of new editions of books, including the 6th edition of Eysenck's "Cognitive psychology", the 11th edition of Pervin's "Personality: theory and research" and the 3rd edition of Pervin's "Handbook of personality". We have also acquired a reference copy of the four-volume "Handbook of child psychology (6th edition)", edited by William Damon and Richard M. Lerner.

New e-books include: 2nd edition of Maltby's "Personality, individual differences and intelligence", McMahon's "101 coaching strategies and techniques" (also added to stock in hard copy) and Christine Dancey's "Statistics without maths for psychology (4th edition)". For the full list of new books added to stock during July 2010 follow the link above. All items (including e-books) can be located via the library catalogue.

APA 6th edition referencing guides...

...are now available in the library. The brand new 6th edition of APA style for referencing contains some updates over previous editions. We have multiple copies of all the official guides, including the Publication Manual, the Concise Rules of APA Style and some guides on presenting and displaying your finding. Further information is available through the library catalogue - I would suggest running a search for "APA style".

Dissertations and theses from outside the UK...

...can unfortunately be rather tricky to get hold of. Your best bet is to try contacting the author. If you cannot find their contact details (via a web search), then you can try contacting the university department or university library where the author was based at the time they wrote it, as they may be able to put you in touch with the author. Very occasionally, they may even be able to point you towards obtaining a copy!

If you find you reach a dead end in your search, then by all means get in touch with me and I'll see what assistance I can be. However, the library has no direct means of obtaining overseas (i.e. non-UK) dissertations and theses, although we might just be able to offer some advice and support which points you in the right direction. Of course, for UK theses simply head to the British Library's EThOS website.

The History of Psychology Centre...

...has a new website. Provided by the BPS (British Psychological Society) in partnership with several leading organisations, the HoPC website offers a wealth of information on researching the history of psychology. There are also some freely available online resources, including a chronology of psychology in Britain.

Three new journals on PsycARTICLES...

...have been added since the start of 2010. They are:

• GeroPsych: The Journal of Gerontopsychology and Geriatric Psychiatry
• Journal of Personnel Psychology
• Nordic Psychology

A brand new journal, "Psychology of violence", will launch in January 2011 and a special promotional issue is now available on PsycARTICLES.

To access any of these new journals, sign in to PsycARTICLES via EBSCO (follow the 'e-journals and databases' link from the library homepage) and then choose the 'publications' option at the top of the PsycARTICLES search screen. Remember that all PsycARTICLES journals are also automatically added to PsycINFO.

New books in the library...

...added to stock during the month of June 2010 can be viewed from this link: June 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

Not too many books on this month's list, but we do have the new 2nd edition of Rolls' "Classic studies in  psychology". We also have several new e-books, including the 2nd edition of Martha Cottam's "Introduction to political psychology" and Graham Towl's brand new book, "Forensic psychology". All items (including e-books) can be located via the library catalogue.

European Computer Driving Licence (ECDL)...

…is available via the library. We even had a dedicated training room and advisers available at the Docklands Campus Library. It is a widely recognised computer qualification and a valuable addition to your CV in a competitive jobs market. Whether you are a total novice with computers or consider yourself a bit of an expert, the qualification is well worth getting. For more information, check out the library’s ECDL web page.

Vacation access to other university libraries...

…is available through the SCONUL Vacation Access scheme. If you live closer to another university, or would simply like to access another university’s library, then during holiday time it is normally possible to gain access using your student card. Information is available from the following webpage: SCONUL Vacation Access. It is strongly recommended that you telephone the library of the university you wish to visit before going, because arrangements can vary.

A bit of light relief...

…and maybe a few interesting insights, too, are just what's required as the exam season draws to a close. The recently televised BBC Big Personality Test has so far had well over 200,000 participants in its online test. Clearly people enjoy doing these things and ‘finding out’ something about themselves in the process. Well, either that, or they want to ‘confirm’ their own beliefs about themselves e.g. that they really are an extrovert / a hypochondriac / 'conscientious' / 'agreeable' or whatever it might be.

If you enjoy doing these tests (and I must admit to being rather partial myself), then why not check out the following website: TESTdex.com. I have no idea about the scientific basis of these free tests, so wouldn’t recommend using them in your studies, but for a bit of time out, why not give one or two (or three or four!) a go? Who knows, you might even find inspiration in them...

The Library's Research Support Portal...

…has just been launched on our website. Set up by our specialist Research Services Librarian, it gives quick access to all the key information about library services for researchers. Areas featured include: placing interlibrary loans, referencing help (including Endnote), accessing other libraries and how to find further support. It is accessible from here: Research Support Portal.

New books in the library...

...added to stock during the month of May 2010 can be viewed from this link: May 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

With the academic year almost over, book funds were almost fully spent so there are only five books on this month's list, including two e-books. However, having received a small amount of additional funds in recent weeks, next month's list should be rather longer, so keep your eyes peeled for the June list!

Keep up-to-date with the latest research output...

…by subscribing to current awareness services such as Zetoc and TicTOCs. Such services enable you to find out about new articles or conference papers in your area of interest, sometimes within 72 hours of publication! All you need to do is set up an ‘alert’ and whenever something new is published you will be notified by email.

Zetoc is freely available to all members of Higher Education institutions, and is updated on a daily basis using the British Library’s Electronic Table of Contents. It currently contains information taken from 20,000 journals and about 16,000 conference proceedings a year, totalling over 37 million records. It lets you set up an unlimited number of alerts and you can request to be notified when a new issue of a journal is published or, perhaps most usefully, when new articles are published in any journal on a topic of your choice. You can even ask to be notified when a particular author publishes a new article. Zetoc also operates an RSS feed service.

TicTOCs is a similar service to Zetoc, but features about 2,300 journals not in Zetoc (equally Zetoc contains about 17,400 not in TicTOCs – statistics taken from the TicTOCs blog). TicTOCs is completely free to use – you do not need to belong to an HE institution. As well as having some additional journals not featured in Zetoc, it also has the advantage of containing abstracts for some journal articles.

Support for international students...

...is available via the library webpages. Visit the Library and Learning Services International Students webpage for information on what we have to offer. This includes a number of bilingual and multilingual staff and some specially tailored training sessions.

UEL Subject Librarians are only an email, webchat...

…appointment or phone call away. Each of the schools at UEL has a dedicated Subject Librarian – me for the School of Psychology – and you can contact us in a myriad of different ways for help with researching for your coursework and any other library or research-related issue (more information on what we do is available here: Subject Support for staff and students). For example, you might want to pop into any of the three campus libraries and have a chat with whoever is on the enquiry desk. If you aren’t on campus, then you can e-mail or telephone your Subject Librarian - contact details are on our website. You could also use the Ask-a-Librarian service – which operates as an email enquiry service and, between 1-5pm on weekdays during term-time, as a live webchat – or even book a one-to-one appointment with your own Subject Librarian. There really is no excuse not to get in touch!

Getting hold of books and journals we don't stock...

...is made easy with our Inter-Library Loan (ILL) service. Simply sign in to the library catalogue, access your library account and choose to 'Place ILL Request'. We will then try to get hold of a copy for you from another library. This service is available free of charge, although the following limits apply: all second and third year undergraduates are allowed five requests per year, all postgraduates are allowed twenty requests, all staff, researchers and doctoral students are allowed unlimited requests. Further information is available here.

Alternatively, if you search on WorldCat then you can find the nearest library which stocks the book or journal you are looking to get hold of. You can then pay that library a visit, although a SCONUL Access card may be required for access other university libraries.

Better searching in Google...

…can be achieved by using just a few simple search tips. Take the following example: you want to find UK government publications on the future treatment of schizophrenia. While there is no ‘correct’ way of searching for this on Google, I would recommend typing in: 

schizophrenia site:gov.uk OR site:nhs.uk filetype:pdf OR filetype:doc 2011..2025

So what does all that mean?

schizophrenia is the keyword.
site:gov.uk OR site:nhs.uk means that we only want to see results coming from UK government or NHS websites.
filetype:pdf OR filetype:doc means we only want PDF or Word files – the most common format for publications i.e. we don’t want webpages to be returned - we want documents.
2011..2025 is a number range identifying that we want documents which state a date in the future to appear in them (i.e. any date in the range 2011 to 2025).

New books in the library...

...added to stock during the month of April 2010 can be viewed from this link: April 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

Notable additions to stock this month include: "Introduction to forensic psychology (2nd ed.)" by Curt R. Bartol, "Biopsychology (7th edition)" by John Pinel, "Introduction to counselling skills (3rd ed.)" by Richard Nelson-Jones and not forgetting the brand new 4th edition of "Psychology" by Martin, Carlson and Buskist - a core text on many modules.

If you want to borrow any of these titles, then don't forget to check on the library catalogue first to make sure we have copies available. New books are popular and often fly off the shelves straight away! Please let me know if you have questions about any of these new library books.

Background information on key psychology topics...

...is available from the APA Psychology Topics webpage. You can either view the most popular topics (which include: Addictions, Aging, Children, Depression, Eating Disorders and Workplace Issues) or view all the available topics (which include: Autism, Ethics, Personality, Therapy, Trauma and Violence among many others).

Each topic has a very brief description, along with many links to relevant reading and resources, including web pages, journal articles and news stories. It should be said that there is an understandably American bias to many of the resources listed, but as a basic introduction to unfamiliar topic areas it may prove useful.

Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)...

...is a free-to-use online collection of scholarly journals, covering a huge range of subjects. Currently featuring around 5000 full text journals, it is a useful source of articles for research and assignments. Searches can be made for journal titles or individual articles and there is also the option to browse journal titles by subject area (psychology appears as a subset of 'social sciences').

Open access journals are free-to-use, respected sources of academic information and a great way of expanding your research. Don't forget to consult the library's own journal databases first, though. You will find that most of the best journals are only available through the library, so don't forget about PsycINFO and friends!

Theses from UK universities...

…can now be requested online via the British Library’s EThOS service. It currently features over 250,000 UK theses, with many available to access in full text, free of charge. More information about the service is available on the 'About EThOS' webpage.

If you can’t find the thesis you want, simply complete the EThOS request form, and the British Library will try and track down a copy for you. Assuming they find it, they will then digitise it and add it to their free-to-use online collection.

Please note that due to this new means of accessing theses from other universities, we are no longer able to accept Inter-Library Loan requests for theses. The arrival of EThOS means that this service has now been automated, putting library users in the driving seat!

Psychology and the world of Twitter...

…come together in a number of places on the web. Firstly, if you want to follow some of the ‘top’ psychology tweets, then why not check out the current top twenty-five psychology tweets in the world. For an academic analysis of the psychology behind Twitter, Psychology Today published a rather interesting article back in March 2009. More articles can be found using UEL’s journal databases, with a search across Academic Search Complete, PsycINFO and PsycARTICLES for ‘twitter’ finding over 1200 full-text articles from the last two years. Clearly this is becoming a hot topic in academia!

On a more fun note, you can generate a ‘psychological profile’ of any Twitter account using tweetpsych.com. I have no idea what kind of scientific basis the ‘profiles’ have, but it is nonetheless rather entertaining to see how positive, negative, constructive, anxious, money-obsessed, controlling, social etc. an individual Twitter user is relative to other users.

Internet for Psychology...

…is a free-to-use online tutorial aimed specifically at psychology students in UK universities. It is provided by Intute as part of their ‘Virtual Training Suite’. The psychology tutorial can be accessed here.

The tutorial includes information on:

• journal databases and library catalogues
• internet research skills
• psychology conferences
• blogs, podcasts and discussion lists

...and much more. It also features plenty of links to get you started straight away.

e-book demonstrations...

...will be held at the Stratford and Docklands libraries over the next two weeks (12-22nd April 2010). A promotional flyer is available here. Library staff will be on hand to answer any of your questions about e-books and will be demonstrating how to access them. Why not pop along? The sessions in Stratford library with be held on 20th and 22nd April.

EndnoteWeb account registration...

…is now available through an online request form. Previously you had to be on-campus to register for your free EndnoteWeb account. With the new form, we can set up an account for you, wherever you are based. Once registered, you can then use your EndnoteWeb account from anywhere with Internet access. Of course, self-registration is still available on-campus, if you prefer – simply go to www.myendnoteweb.com and choose to sign up for an account. Please be aware that however you register your account, you must login on-campus at least once in a 12 month period to ensure your login remains active.

If you want to use the full desktop version of Endnote from off-campus, then you can purchase a copy at a discounted price. Simply go to www.adept4education.co.uk and login with your Athens password. You should then automatically receive the discount when you purchase the software.

If you require any help and support regarding Endnote, then simply contact your Subject Librarian (if you are based in the School of Psychology then your Subject Librarian is, of course, me, so do get in touch).

The Psychology Testing Centre...

..is operated by the British Psychological Society (BPS) to provide information on psychological tests. Their website provides, among other things, a directory of psychological tests and a searchable database of reviews of tests. There are also various documents, downloads and contact details available through the site.

Please note that UEL Library does not hold any psychological tests. However, guidance on obtaining tests should be available from either the Psychology Help Desk (AE1.44 in the Arthur Edwards building) or from your tutor.

New books in the library...

...added to stock during the month of March 2010 can be viewed from this link: March 2010 new book list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

Notable additions to stock this month include: "Historical and conceptual issues in psychology" by Marc Brysbaert, "Putting psychology in its place (3rd edition)" by Graham Richards and "Psychology of terrorism" by Kruglanski and Victoroff. It is also worth noting that we have just received the brand new 4th edition of "Psychology" by Martin, Carlson and Buskist - a core text on a great many modules. This arrived on the shelves this morning, so just missed making it on the March list.

If you want to borrow any of these titles, then don't forget to check on the library catalogue first to make sure we have copies available. New books are popular and often fly off the shelves straight away! Please let me know if you have questions about any of these new library books.

You said... We did...

…is the section on the library website where we update you on our actions to comments we receive in the library. It has just been updated with the latest information on our responses, so why not check it out. For example:

You said… “The signage is very confusing at Stratford”

We did… “We have produced simpler, bolder signage at Stratford library to help you find your way round”

You said… “I can’t always get in to the library to look at short loan items”

We did… “We have digitised popular articles and chapters to make them available online and we have thousands of eBooks and eJournals”

Reviews of psychology books and films...

...can be found on the PsycCRITIQUES Blog. Maintained by the APA - the same people who are responsible for PsycINFO and PsycARTICLES - it features regular posts commenting on recent book and film reviews in the area of psychology. All posts feature a link to the full text pdf review (which is normally a few pages long). Reviews cover a huge range of psychology related disciplines and can encompass popular releases as well as academic ones. For example, there is a link in a March 2009 post to a four page review of the psychology behind the hit film, 'Slumdog Millionaire'.

Online copyright tutorial...

…for UEL staff has been created by the library and uploaded to the following web address: http://blog.uelconnect.org.uk/llscopyright/. Information is organised into categories including, ‘images’, ‘photocopying and scanning’ and ‘PowerPoint’, among various others. Check out the webpages to make sure you are staying on the right side of the law.

Dissertations and theses held in the library...

...can be searched for via the library catalogue. The university is obliged to keep a copy of all doctoral theses submitted at UEL, and most of these make their way into the library’s collection. The library also holds a very small collection of Masters dissertations. To find either, simply begin your search on the library catalogue with the word ‘thesis’ e.g. thesis health psychology. To view a thesis, you will then need to ask at the library counter and they will fetch it for you.

Please note, that as ‘unpublished works’ it is against Copyright Law to photocopy, take notes from or reference a thesis / dissertation without the author’s prior consent. Unless you contact the author, the thesis / dissertation collection is of most use for seeing what one looks like and how you might approach the layout / formatting of your own thesis or dissertation.

Get more out of Intute...

...with the advanced search options. And don't be put off by the word 'advanced' - it's actually a quicker and easier way of finding high-quality websites for your research and general reading. For example, make your way to Intute - Psychology and click on 'advanced search'. From the advanced search screen, scroll down to 'resource type', deselect 'all resource types' and select 'blogs'. Enter your search (e.g. 'psychology') and click the green search button. This particular example should bring up over 30 blogs dedicated to different fields of psychology.

Other resource types you can choose from include...

• archives
• bibliographic databases
• government publications
• mailing lists and discussion groups
• news
• professional organisations
• reference sources
• statistics

...to name but a few. Go on, give it a go!

Quirky mind stuff...

…is how Professor Richard Wiseman, the popular psychologist, describes the daily posts on his blog. Intriguing photos, puzzles and video clips are added almost every day. Check it out, and be reminded of what weird and wonderful things the human mind is capable of…

Finding journal articles when you have a reference...

…is easy when you know how (but then again, isn’t everything!). Make sure you know how by following the simple steps below.

1) Check UEL’s online journals collection (most of our journals are online).

a) Go to the library catalogue (http://primo.uel.ac.uk), and click on ‘A-Z Journals' (near the top right hand corner).

b) In the window which pops up, type in the name of the journal the article was published in e.g. British Journal of Psychology.

c) If the journal appears in the results list then click on its name. If not, then skip to section 2.

d) The next window tells you the years available online e.g. ‘Available from 1975’. If this covers the year your article was published, then enter the article details (year, volume, issue, start page), and click on 'Go' to be taken to the article online. You may be asked to enter your Athens username and password.

2) Check UEL’s print journals collection (if not online, then we may have the journal in hard copy in the library).

a) Go to the library catalogue (http://primo.uel.ac.uk), and click on ‘Advanced Search’.

b) From the ‘Material Type’ drop-down list, choose ‘Journals’.

c) Enter the name of the journal (not the article) in the search box. Click Go.

d) If the journal appears in the results list, click on its name to open its full catalogue record.

e) Scroll down to the bottom of the catalogue record and click on the link under ‘availability and location’. Check the ‘summary holdings’ in the next window to see what years we hold in hard copy in the library e.g. ‘1904-1974’.

3) Make use of other libraries

If you cannot find the article in either UEL’s online journals collection or print collection, then you will need to make use of other libraries. You can do this by either visiting another library or by checking your eligibility to place an Inter-Library Loan request.

A brand new library building at Stratford campus...

…will be built over the next few years. We are currently at the planning stage and are looking for student input. All students based at Stratford campus should have received an email with a link to a very short survey to complete. If you didn’t receive the email, or deleted it by mistake, then follow the link on the library webpages (in the news section). There is also the opportunity to sign up as part of one of the student focus groups we will be holding. We want your ideas and suggestions on how the new library can best serve you as students, so don’t miss this opportunity to have your say!

Careers in psychology...

...is a website produced by the University of Worcester in a project funded by the Higher Education Academy's Psychology Network. It contains video presentations, each split up into bite-sized chapters, on seven career paths you may wish to follow with your psychology degree. Each video is presented by a practitioner in that area. It is a very accessible website, specifically aimed at students wanting to become a professional psychologist. The seven career paths are: forensic psychologist, occupational psychologist, educational psychologist, health psychologist, counselling psychologist, clinical psychologist and sport & exercise psychologist. It can be access from here: Careers in Psychology.

Teenagers vs. adolescents, counsellors vs. counselors...

...women vs. gender – which would you pick as your search terms?

The words you type in the search box on the library catalogue, PsycINFO, Google or any other search screen can make a huge difference to the results you find. Take the first example: teenagers vs. adolescents. Look them up in a dictionary or thesaurus and you will probably conclude that they are interchangeable and you could use either. However, look them up in PsycINFO and ‘teenagers’ returns less than 5000 results, while ‘adolescents’ returns a staggering 143,000 results. Why? Because ‘adolescents’ is a more academic term than ‘teenagers’ and PsycINFO is a database full of academic research articles. Try the same search on Google and you get the opposite result, with ‘teenagers’ returning more hits. The reason? Google finds web pages, web pages are generally not very ‘academic’ and neither is the word ‘teenagers’. The lesson? Tailor your search terms to the source you are searching.

As for the difference counsellors vs. counselors, it’s a little more simple. The first spelling is British; the second American. Increasingly the difference doesn’t matter when searching. For example, PsycINFO automatically searches for either spelling so returns the same number of results whichever you choose. However, neither Google nor the library catalogue has this facility, so you will need to try both. Then again, if you only want British articles, then perhaps it’s good that they don’t search for the American spelling at the same time...

Finally, women vs. gender – this is an example of when you have little choice but to try them both separately. They have different meanings, but can be used interchangeably or, indeed, differently dependent on the context. You will also need to refer to a thesaurus for further alternatives: female, feminist, equal opportunities…

Use Endnote to store and organise your references...

…and compiling your reference list / bibliography becomes a rather less arduous task. This clever piece of software allows you to export full bibliographic information from a book record on the library catalogue or a journal article in a database into your own personal ‘library’ of references. When it comes to typing up your essay, dissertation, research paper or whatever it is you are writing, you simply place your cursor at the precise point in your write-up where you want the in-text reference to appear, look up the item in your ‘library’ and the reference is added to your document both in-text and in the reference list with all the required information included (author, date, title, place of publication etc.). All you then need to do to format your bibliography is choose the correct referencing style from a list e.g. APA or Harvard or even one of hundreds of publication-specific formats (for publishing in journals).

Two versions of Endnote at available at UEL. Endnote X is the powerful desktop version installed on all PCs on-campus. Endnote Web is a free web-based version with all the main features, which can be used from anywhere either on or off-campus. Please note, however, that you will need to be on-campus to register for an Endnote Web account. More information on both versions is available on the library’s Endnote webpages.

New books in the library...

...added to stock during the month of February 2010 can be viewed from this link: February 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased for stock from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

If you want to borrow any of these titles, then don't forget to check on the library catalogue first to make sure we have copies available. New books are popular and often fly off the shelves straight away! Please let me know if you have questions about any of these new library books.

Finding research which has applied certain tests and measures or methodologies…

…is relatively easy to achieve on PsycINFO. Near the top of the screen in PsycINFO is a link to the database’s indexes. Click on this and then choose an index to browse. For example, you might want to choose ‘methodology’. Enter the name of the methodology you want to browse for (e.g. literature review, systematic review, longitudinal study…), select it from the results list, then add it to your search. In your search box you should now see something that looks like: (ZC "longitudinal study"). Combine this with your search e.g. (ZC "longitudinal study") and social cognition. All search results will then be for research which has applied that particular methodology.

To find research which has applied a particular test or measure, follow the same steps as above, but choose ‘Tests & Measures’ from the list of indexes. It is important to note that this will only find research which has applied the test or measure – it won’t find a copy of the test or measure itself.

PC booking service now available at Stratford and Docklands libraries...

...via the MyPC service. For full information, including how to book, see the MyPC service web page. This new service means that you can ensure a PC will be available for you to use in either Stratford or Docklands library by booking it in advance for a session of up to 2 hours. There are dedicated PCs being used for this service and rest assured that all other PCs are still available for use at any time, in case you haven't arranged a bookable PC in advance.

The British Psychological Society (BPS) Research Digest...

...makes for a fascinating read, no matter which area of psychology you are currently studying or researching. It is presented as a blog, with daily posts presenting a mixture of interesting, informative and sometimes entertaining findings from psychological research around the world. Links for further information, and often to the full research, are provided in all posts. There are also links provided down the sidebars of the blog to: psychology vacancies, other psychology blogs and various special features. You can also set up an RSS feed (as you can with this blog!) to keep you up-to-date with the latest posts. To access the BPS Research Digest, follow this link: http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/.

Automatic renewal of your library books...

...has been active since January. This means that you no longer need to renew books yourself (in person, online, over the phone or however you used to do it). Once you borrow a book you can now effectively keep it indefinitely, unless another user requests it (or your account is blocked for any reason), in which case the book must be returned as soon as possible.

The really important thing to remember is to keep an eye on your emails, because if anyone requests the item then you will need to return it, or risk incurring a fine. You can also opt to set up text alerts, so that you are informed by text message when your book is due back. To set up text alerts, sign in to your library account via the library catalogue and click on the 'text messages' link to enter your mobile phone number. Alternatively, ask about text alerts at any UEL library.

Finding quality websites for your research / assignments...

...is a tricky business. We all know (or hopefully we do!) the perils of using the web for finding reliable academic quality information. Many websites you find through Google, Bing, Dogpile, AltaVista or any of the other mainstream search engines are likely to be of dubious quality. The sites you find may be strewn with careless (or even malicious) mistakes, they may have been written for a particular audience (e.g. people of a certain political persuasion, potential clients for a company and so on), they may be horribly out-of-date and, above all else, all the above may not be at all obvious (seeking information on the 'tree octopus'?: http://zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/). For further advice on sorting out 'good' sites from the 'dubious' ones, pick up a copy of our free guide, 'Evaluation of Web Sites' from any UEL library.

Of course, your primary port of call for quality information should be the library's resources - high-quality academic databases such as PsycINFO, our book stock and so on. However, sometimes the web can be useful for finding other information. So, how do you find reliable, high-quality websites?

The answer is that there are many different ways. And the means I want to highlight today is through 'gateways' or 'directories'. These are alternatives to search engines where instead of searching across the whole web, you are searching across specially selected collections of websites, organised into categories (meaning you can either search or browse through the websites). In the case of Intute, these websites have been selected specifically with UK universities in mind. This means that all the websites you find through Intute have been 'verified' as being of academic quality, and, importantly, won't be primarily American websites (as is often the case with general search engines). Another example is Google Directory. You will need to be a little more careful with this one, but it is a large and growing directory which should give more reliable websites that a standard Google search as all websites have been handpicked. I would suggesting browsing the 'Psychology' section of Google Directory (the link is on the front page, under 'Science') - you will see that this then expands out into dozens of sub-categories of psychology which can then be browsed through for websites on that subject area.

One little health warning: even through Intute, Google Directory, Yahoo! Directory, dmoz, Best of the Web and other gateways and directories, you must always evaluate the information you find before using it in your research or assignments - just because it is more likely to be reliable doesn't mean it is reliable!

Saving your searches on PsycINFO/ PsycARTICLES...

...means that you won't need to duplicate effort by repeating your searches the next time you log on. To be able to save searches for the future, you will need to set yourself up for a free 'My EBSCOHost' account:

1. Click on 'Sign in to My EBSCOHost' (at the top of the PsycINFO /PsycARTICLES screen).
2. Choose to 'Create a new account'.
3. Fill out the short form, and you're done!

As well as being able to save searches (via the 'search history' option, once signed in), you can also set up folders to save articles you have found and create personal preferences (such as how results are displayed). Other extra functionality you will gain includes being able to set up email or RSS alerts (for when new articles are published which match saved searches) and being able to share folders with other users. And the best thing of all, is that this extra functionality is all available to you for free by following the very simple account creation instructions above. As ever, do get in touch with me if you have any questions.

New books in the library...

...added to stock during the month of January 2010 can be viewed from this link: January 2010 new books list. Please note that it only lists items purchased from the library's 'psychology' book funds.

The list includes e-books added to stock, as well as those of the traditional paper variety. We now have well over a thousand e-books available through our library catalogue - a figure which is growing all the time. To find an e-book on the catalogue, simply search for it (as you would for a 'normal' book) and follow the link which says 'Online access'. You will need your Athens username and password, but should then have instant access to the whole book, on or off-campus, at any time of the day (even when all the print copies are out on loan in the library!).

Self-collection of reservations...

...now available in Stratford campus library (on a four month trial). As you probably know, the library is open 24/7 during term-time. However, until now it has not been possible to pick up books you have reserved outside of our unstaffed hours (http://www.uel.ac.uk/lls/about/openinghours.htm). As of yesterday (8th February), though, we have started a trial of placing reserved items on open shelves near the self-issue machines. More information is available here: http://www.uel.ac.uk/lls/news/index.htm#selfcollection.

I'm sure you will agree that this is excellent news, as it means that even during staffed hours, you will no longer need to queue at the front counter to pick up items! Fingers crossed the trial will prove a success and we might then be able to roll this out as a permanent new service feature. Keep your eyes peeled!

And so begins a brand new blog...

...brought to you by me - Graham Fennell, Subject Librarian for Psychology at UEL. Intended as a means of updating students and staff in the School of Psychology here at UEL, this blog will feature:

• News on services and innovations in the library.
• Tips, tricks and advice on literature searching in the area of Psychology.
• Info on new books added to library stock.
• Anything else of potential interest to Psychology students and staff.