Crime & Delinquency Prevention Research Guide

Library resources that index and link to scholarly journal articles

Here is a selection of databases that will help you find peer-reviewed articles. Contact me for further suggestions.

• Criminal Justice Abstracts
  Covers crime trends, crime prevention and deterrence, juvenile delinquency, juvenile justice, police, courts and sentencing.
• NCJRS (National Criminal Justice Reference Service Abstracts)
  Contains summaries of more than 190,000 publications including books, government reports; research reports; and unpublished research. It also includes content from 189 journals, including 12 with core coverage.
• Sociological Abstracts
  Covers scholarly journals in the field of sociology.
• Social Services Abstracts
  Covers current research focused on social work, human services, and related areas.
• ERIC
  The ERIC (Educational Resources Information Center) database is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education to provide extensive access to educational-related literature. It indexes both journal articles and reports from government and private agencies.
• PsycINFO
  Indexes journals, dissertations and some books in the fields of personality psychology, social psychology, educational psychology and more.

Helpful tips and suggestions

Tip #1:  Your gateway to the full text of journal articles.

Full text online:  Links to the full text online are listed first, if the Library has access.
Holdings information:  Click on the link to the Library's catalog to find out whether the Library has a print subscription.
ILL:  Submit an interlibrary loan request and you will get a digital version of the article via e-mail. This can take 1-2 weeks.

Tip #2:  Search multiple databases simultaneously.

This works for all the databases listed above.  Click on the Specific Databases link below the search box after you logged into Sociological Abstracts or any of the other databases. You will be prompted to select from a list of databases. Select the databases that you would like to include into your search and click on Continue to Search. The search screen will identify your selections under Now selected.

Tip #3:  Export references in APA style for your cited reference list.

Check off all articles in which you are interested and click on Save, Print, Email. The QuickBib feature has a selection of styles available from which you can choose. APA is the most widely used style in the social sciences.

Encyclopedias

The Library has a large number of subject specific online encyclopedias with up-to-date articles on your paper topic. They will lead you to exhaustive and well-researched articles that are written and signed by scholars. Jump start your research with valuable background information, a detailed overview and/or a bibliography of current research. Here is an examples of a typical encyclopedia article:  "Delinquency, III. Trends and Data." Encyclopedia of Juvenile Justice. 2002.

• Encyclopedia of Juvenile Justice
• Encyclopedia of Sociology
• Encyclopedia of Crime & Justice
• Encyclopedia of Education
• Encyclopedia of Educational Psychology
• Encyclopedia of School Psychology
• Social and Cultural Foundations of Education
• Encyclopedia of Social Problems
• Encyclopedia of Law Enforcement
• Encyclopedia of Prisons & Correctional Facilities
• Search all the Library's Sage encyclopedias simultaneously.

For more criminal justice encyclopedias consult the Criminal Justice Subject Guide.

Books

• The Library's online catalog

subject search:  "juvenile delinquency" AND schools
subject search: "criminal statistics" AND Pennsylvania

• WorldCat
  A catalog of library holdings worldwide. WorldCat will indicate any local library holdings and also offers an inter-library loan request option.
• Dissertations & Theses Full Text
• E-Z Borrow and Interlibrary Loan
  Interlibrary loan is available for books and journals that are not owned by Falvey. EZ-Borrow is usually faster than interlibrary loan, since the books come from a local library network. EZ-Borrow can be used for books that the Library owns, but that are currently checked out by somebody else.

Citing your sources

• Documenting Source in APA Style:
  Research and Documentation Online by Diana Hacker.
• Refworks
  Never type a bibliography again! RefWorks will help you easily gather, manage, and store bibliographic citations for all types of information, as well as generate footnotes and bibliographies.

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