From the Deck of . . . The ALA Midwinter 2017 Lunch & Learn

Welcome to “From the Deck of . . .” an irregular series in which we highlight search demos and other information from the slide decks we create for our live training sessions. You can view and download these materials from our SlideShare account.

We recently presented our Lunch & Learn training session at the American Library Association (ALA) Midwinter Meeting & Exhibition. During the session, we reviewed PsycTESTS®, an extensive collection of psychological tests, measures, scales, surveys, and other instruments. Over 42,000 tests are represented in the database, and a full or partial version of the measure is available for about 50% of them.

PsycTESTS is a wonderful resource for students learning to conduct measures, or researchers developing their own tests. In addition, many of the tests included can be used for non-commercial research and educational purposes, which includes general clinical use. (For more information, see our post How Permissions Work in PsycTESTS.)

During our session at ALA Midwinter, we reviewed the record structure of PsycTESTS, which is very different from a database like PsycINFO®. In PsycINFO, one article is represented by one record, which contains information about the article, taken from the article itself. In PsycTESTS, a test can be represented by multiple records, which contain information about the test, taken from a source document. A source document is typically a journal article, book chapter, technical report, or dissertation.

Visual representation of PsycTESTS record structure at http://www.apa.org/pubs/databases/psyctests

A visual representation of the record structure for PsycTESTS.

 

Every test in PsycTESTS is represented by a Test Master Record, which displays basic information about the test. You’ll also see either a Test Development Record or a Test Primary Data Record, which provide additional information about the test.

  • The Test Master Record provides basic information about the instrument and links to other records, which contain information from source documents, such as a journal article or book chapter:
    • Test Development Record: provides information describing the development of the measure
    • A Primary Data Record is provided for commercial tests, or tests with no source document (for example, a historical test)

A small number of tests will have an additional record or records:

    • Test Use Record: provides information describing a new use of the measure (for example, an article that reports on using a test developed for adults with children)
    • Test Review Record: provides information about an evaluation of the measure

The way these records are connected, and how they interact with one another, varies widely depending on how you access PsycTESTS: via APA PsycNET®, EBSCOhost, Ovid, or ProQuest. To see what a PsycTESTS record looks like on your platform, take a look at the slides from our Lunch & Learn. You’ll also find some sample search scenarios for PsycTESTS.

The presentation also included an overview of incorporating APA Style CENTRAL® into your teaching, and a look at some new and forthcoming publications.

Related Resources:

A “Getting Started with PsycTESTS” guide is available for each of the major vendor platforms. This handout demonstrates the various fields and features in PsycTESTS. To download or link to this resource, visit our Search Guides page.

New in PsycBOOKS: January 2017

In January 2017, APA added 4 new APA books to PsycBOOKS®:

Bibliographic records are available through your PsycBOOKS vendor. You may also download RDA records directly from APA by following the instructions in the APA PsycNET® Administrator Help Menu.

View the past monthly PsycBOOKS update lists, a list of sample PsycBOOKS titles, and the full coverage list for PsycBOOKS.

Tutorial Thursday: Writing With APA Style CENTRAL

It’s Tutorial Thursday! In this series, we explore APA’s extensive library of video tutorials. In addition to our APA Databases and Training Videos available on YouTube, we now have an emerging library of training videos on our new APA Style CENTRAL® YouTube Channel. Recordings of webinars, like the one linked below, and other training videos are added as they become available.

For today’s edition of Tutorial Thursday, we’d like to share a recording of one of our APA Style CENTRAL webinars: Writing With APA Style CENTRAL.
Screenshot from the recording of the Writing With APA Style CENTRAL webinar

Covering the unique features and tools that make APA Style CENTRAL a powerful resource for writing in APA Style®, this webinar is designed for undergrad students who are new to APA Style, as well as graduate students and faculty members looking for a refresher. This session provides a brief overview of how to:

  • Seamlessly include all of the required elements of APA Style when writing your paper;
  • Create and manage your APA Style references with ease and accuracy, including RIS-import from your current reference manager;
  • Easily create a properly formatted reference list and in-text citations; and
  • Use the collaboration functionality for simple annotated review or multiple authorship.

Please feel free to link this video or any of our APA Style CENTRAL playlists in your library websites, LibGuides, course management systems, or other locations where students, faculty, and researchers will find them.

With the winter holidays behind us, we will resume our live sessions of this webinar again in late January. When the schedule is ready, we’ll announce it here on the blog and post it on our APA Style CENTRAL training web page.

Webinar Alert: APA Style CENTRAL Trainings for February 2017

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APA Style CENTRAL® is the newest member of the APA Style® family, launched in July 2016.

APA’s training specialists have developed several webinars for librarians, instructors, and students that include a content overview as well as a live demonstration of features.

Click on any session link listed below to register (all times are EST).

The Online Introduction introduces librarians to the platform.

Teaching with APA Style CENTRAL details how faculty, librarians, and other instructors can use APA Style CENTRAL in teaching APA Style.

Writing Papers in APA Style CENTRAL teaches end users how to create and save papers using APA Style CENTRAL.

For more information, and to see the full schedule, visit the APA Style CENTRAL webinars page.

New in PsycBOOKS: December 2016

In December 2016, APA added 3 new APA books to PsycBOOKS®:

Bibliographic records are available through your PsycBOOKS vendor. You may also download RDA records directly from APA by following the instructions in the APA PsycNET® Administrator Help Menu.

View the past monthly PsycBOOKS update lists, a list of sample PsycBOOKS titles, and the full coverage list for PsycBOOKS.