Key Article Databases
Sociological Abstracts (ProQuest)Indexes the literature of sociology and related fields. Includes citations to journal articles, dissertations, books, conference papers, and magazines. Offers abstracts and selected full text.
Criminal Justice Abstracts (EBSCO)Indexes academic journals, magazines, and books in criminology and related fields. Includes abstracts and selected full text. Coverage goes back to the middle of the 18th century.
Sociology Source Ultimate (EBSCO)Provides citations, abstracts, and selected full text for scholarly journals, books, and conference papers in sociology and related disciplines.
More Article Databases
Social Sciences Citation Index - Web of Science (Clarivate)Indexes core journals in the social sciences. Provides information on citing and cited references for each article. Search by article title word, journal title, author, cited author or reference, address word (i.e., author's institution), or funding agency. Covers 1956 to the present.
National Criminal Justice Reference Service Virtual Library Tutorial
Contains abstracts and full text of criminal justice publications, including federal, state and local government reports, books, research reports, journal articles and unpublished research. Materials added since 2014 are limited to materials published and funded by the bureaus, offices, and agencies of the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs. Scroll down and click Use Search Filters to access the database.
Social Sciences Full Text (EBSCO)Index to international, English language journals in psychology, sociology, anthropology, geography, economics, political science and law.
Social Services Abstracts (ProQuest)Indexes the literature of social work, human services, and related fields. Includes citations to journal articles and dissertations. Covers 1979 to the present.
Gender Studies Database (EBSCO)Indexes academic journals and popular magazines, books, conference proceedings, dissertations and newspapers in many disciplines on topics relevant to gender studies. Includes abstracts for most citations. Coverage goes back to the early seventies.
ERIC (EBSCO)Indexes and abstracts education journals, curriculum and teaching guides, conference papers, dissertations and theses, books, and Department of Education (ED) research reports. References for ED research reports often have links to the full text. Coverage goes back to 1966. The Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education.
CQ Researcher (CQ Press)Features in-depth reports of political and social issues, including health, international affairs, education, the environment, technology and the U.S. economy. Reports include overview, background, current situation, pro/con views, chronology, and a bibliography. The issue tracker links to related reports. Coverage goes back to 1923.
HeinOnlineProvides full text access to legal periodicals, books, government documents, legal texts, and other primary source collections in the legal field.
Subscription courtesy of the Charles Widger School of Law Library.
ABI/INFORM Collection (ProQuest)Provides access to scholarly journals, dissertations, working papers, key business and economics periodicals, and country- and industry-focused reports.
Social Science Research Network (SSRN) Limitations on Use
Offers abstracting and full text of working papers in a variety of social science fields. Composed of several specialized research networks, SSRN promotes rapid dissemination of early research results.
Limitations on Use:
You must have permission or rights to post content to SSRN.
Books
Library CatalogThe Library's catalog enables patrons to search & browse Falvey Library's collection of books, journals, audio/video materials, electronic resources and more.
WorldCat (FirstSearch)Presents a combined catalog of the catalogs of more than 10,000 libraries worldwide. WorldCat highlights publications available at Villanova University. Other items can be requested via an inter-library loan request form.
Dissertations and Theses Global (ProQuest)The database offers full text for most of the dissertations added since 1997 and strong retrospective full text coverage for older graduate works.
Encyclopedias
Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology SAGE KnowledgeProvides full text access to encyclopedias and handbooks in the social sciences, as well as selected ebooks. All content is published by SAGE Publications.
Gale eBooksOffers access to a collection of digital encyclopedias, handbooks, dictionaries, and directories in the arts, social sciences, business, and sciences. Formerly known as Gale Virtual Reference Library.
Oxford Handbooks Online (Oxford University Press)Provides digital access in selected disciplines. Each handbook introduces and surveys the state of scholarship in a field of study through review articles written by leading subject specialists. Articles review key issues and debates and set the agenda for new research. Villanova University does not have access to the complete collection. Access print handbooks through the Library's
print collection and/or interlibrary loan services.
Blackwell Companion to Criminology
Literature Reviews
Annual Review of SociologyThe Annual Review of Sociology, in publication since 1975, covers the significant developments in the field of sociology. Topics covered in the journal include major theoretical and methodological developments as well as current research in the major subfields.
Sociology CompassProvides original, peer-reviewed surveys of current research from across the entire discipline of sociology.
Annual Review of CriminologyThe Annual Review of Criminology provides comprehensive reviews of significant developments in the multidisciplinary field of criminology, defined as the study of both the nature of criminal behavior and societal reactions to crime. This journal commenced publication in 2018.
Oxford Bibliographies - CriminologyAnnotated bibliographies of important scholarship on hundreds of topics in criminology. Each bibliography was compiled by a subject matter expert.
Statistics and Maps
Social ExplorerProvides access to maps and tables of U.S. Census and American Community Survey data from 1790 through most recently released data. Also includes datasets on election, health, crime, religion, and environmental topics, as well as some international data (UK Census 2011; Canadian Census 2011; selected Eurostat data; and World Development Indicators from the World Bank.) Create a free personal account in order to save your work.
PolicyMap Tutorial
Offers a tool for mapping and analyzing U.S. national data on a wide variety of topics including education, income, employment, public health, crime, housing, transit, and more. Researchers can conduct demographic and socioeconomic analyses on a variety of geographic levels, from the national level to the neighborhood census block group as well as custom regions. Time series data covers 2000 to present.
ICPSR (Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan) Access Instructions
Provides access to archived social science data and data-driven learning guides designed for the classroom. Includes information about data management and curation services available to member institutions. See Qualitative Data Repository for qualitative and multi-method data.
A free ICPSR account is required to download data. The account must be created on campus. If you are having trouble accessing ICPSR data from off campus, please contact Nicole Daly at nicole.daly@villanova.edu for help.
Crime in the United States (Uniform Crime Report - FBI)Crime in the United States (CIUS) is an annual publication in which the FBI compiles volume and rate of crime offenses for the nation, the states, and individual agencies. This report also includes arrest, clearance, and law enforcement employee data.
Sourcebook of Criminal Justice StatisticsPresents a broad spectrum of criminal justice statistics from over one hundred sources.
Bureau of Justice StatisticsFederal crime statistics on a wide variety of subjects from crime and victims, to criminal offenders and courts and sentencing.
Data sets for analysis available online.
National Archive of Criminal Justice Data Uniform Crime Report (Pennsylvania State Police) Statistical Abstract of the United StatesSite provides access to current 2012 PDF and past editions. Includes everything from government spending to the environment to communications. It is a most comprehensive one-volume reference source on the Nation's economic and social condition.
Data.govData.gov increases the ability of the public to easily find, download, and use datasets that are generated and held by the Federal Government. Data.gov provides descriptions of the Federal datasets (metadata), information about how to access the datasets, and tools that leverage government datasets.
Roper Center for Public Opinion Research (iPOLL) Tutorial
Access Instructions
Offers public opinion poll data from surveys conducted in the U.S. and other countries by many major polling organizations. Includes the full text of questions and responses. Items with a green plus icon have crosstab breakdowns; those with an X have microdata available for download; while those with a green and blue star icon allow you to perform custom crosstab analysis online. Covers 1935 to the present, updated daily.
To download or analyze data online, each user needs to set up a free account.
Purdue Owl Guide to ASA
Citation and Writing Tools
A guide by Falvey librarians, with information on citation styles and citation management software.
Zotero.org
Zotero is a free, easy-to-use citation management tool that must be downloaded to your computer. Go to Zotero.org to sign up for your Zotero account and to download the software and the browser plugin. Click here to download a quick-start guide to Zotero.
ZoteroBib
ZoteroBib is a free web-based tool for creating quick, on-the-fly bibliographies. Click here to download a quick-start guide to ZoteroBib.