SOC 100Y (Tollini): Identify an Article: The Basics

The basic search for finding an article for your SOC100Y assignment has two important parts:

1. at least one search word that narrows results down to studies with the right data collection technique ("survey," "questionnaire," and "interview" are probably the best options; see Finding Data Collection Techniques page for more tips)
2. limiting your results to peer reviewed journal articles

It's easy to limit results to articles in Peer Reviewed journals--just click in the limiter box (yellow below). Next set each row to the correct search option. Drop down the menu under "Anywhere" and choose "Abstract—AB" for the row with data collection technique search word(s). [Set the option to "Publication Title—PUB" if you include a row with journal title(s). This is optional.] See red boxes below.

If you don't want to search each of the titles/words separately, you may combine multiple options in one row by putting the word "or" in between them* (see green circles below). [Just make sure that all data collection technique words are in one row and journal titles, if used, are in the other. Don't mix them up.]

So your basic search might look something like this screenshot:

To find articles on a certain topic, see the Advanced page for instructions.

*There is no limit to how many titles or search words you can combine together in one row, but if you search all possible titles and all possible search words, you'll end up with a very big results list. Trying one, two, or three titles at a time is probably best.

Here is a list of seven core journals in sociology. This table indicates the years of online availability for these journals at WIU:

Sociological Abstracts searches multiple kinds of information resources. If you can only use content from scholarly, peer reviewed journals, there is a quick limit for that. However, content other than research articles--what many professors want you to find--may still appear, including book reviews. To limit your results to just articles, scroll down on the Advanced Search page to the Document Type limit box and choose "Articles."