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Social Science 101 - Kistler: Social Science Articles

This guide provides search strategies and recommended resources for research in Social Science 101 with Prof. Tina Kistler.

Identifying and Saving Research and Review Articles

You assignment requires you to find research studies and/or review articles in scholarly journals representing your specific disciplinary lens. Most articles found in social science journals are research or review articles, but other articles may include scholars’ opinions about trends in the particular social science field.

Article Stable URLs

Most library databases allow you to download, email, or print the full-text sources you find. If you want to save a link to an article in a library database, be sure to save the permalink (sometimes called the stable URL, persistent link, or bookmark). Do not just copy the URL from your browser's address bar -- that link won't always work in the future. 

Follow the instructions below for finding the permalink in different databases:

Features of Original Research Articles

Scientific articles that present the results of original research will include the following sections (though they may be labeled slightly differently):

  • Abstract
  • Introduction / Literature Review
  • Methods
  • Results
  • Discussion / Conclusion 
  • References

Is it a Research Article?

The following video was created for COMM classes to demonstrate how to look for the features of research articles. Though it uses articles from the database Communication and Mass Media Complete, it can help students from any class identify research articles in library databases.

Review Articles

Review articles may give you a broader view of your topic, because they review many previous research studies rather than reporting the results of one particular study.

Some library databases allow you to limit your search by type of article. To limit to review articles, select “Advanced Search,” then select “Review” under “Document Type.” (Do not select “Book Review.”)

Finding Articles from Specific Social Science Disciplines

Start with one of the databases listed for your discipline, or one of the multidisciplinary databases. You can also use the library catalog (books+) to search for peer-reviewed articles from multiple databases at one time. Just limit your search to articles to eliminate the book results.

Keep in mind that even the discipline-specific databases may include journals from related discipline. Determine the discipline based on the article itself, not on the database where you found it. To count as an article from your disciplinary lens, the article’s author, the journal, or both must represent that discipline.

Multidisciplinary — Start here for most topics

Anthropology

The multidisciplinary databases above are likely to be the most useful (start with JSTOR because it allows you to limit your search to anthropology journals). You can also try:

Communication

Economics

The multidisciplinary databases above are likely to be the most useful (start with JSTOR because it allows you to limit your search to economics journals). You can also try:

Ethnic Studies

History

Political Science

The multidisciplinary databases above are likely to be the most useful (start with JSTOR because it allows you to limit your search to political science journals). You can also try:

Psychology

Sociology

The multidisciplinary databases above are likely to be the most useful (start with JSTOR because it allows you to limit your search to sociology journals). You can also try: