APA PsycTests Expert Tip: Finding Psychometric Information about a Test

Posted on by Marta Soto in For Librarians

APA PsycTests® can help you find an existing test that you can reuse in your own research. In doing so, you may want to evaluate the psychometric data that were reported by the original test developer.  

Psychometrics is the branch of psychology that studies the quantification and measurement of mental attributes, behavior, and performance, as well as the design, analysis, and improvement of the tests and other instruments used in such measurement.  

You will find three types of psychometrics included in an APA PsycTests record, when the information is provided by the original author and publisher of the test.  

  • Reliability describes the consistency of scores across contexts (e.g., different times, items, or raters), and provides an estimate of the amount of score variance that is due to true variance between subjects rather than to error.  
  • Validity is the degree to which a test or instrument is capable of measuring the stated construct, rather than some other trait or concept.   
  • Factor Analysis is a broad family of mathematical procedures that reduce a set of interrelations among stated factors to a smaller set of unobserved latent factors.  
Continue reading →

APA Librarian Conference Travel Award: Reflections from the Spring 2019 Recipient on the International Conference on Performance Measurement in Libraries

Posted on by Patti Avellanet in For Librarians
Photo of HyunSeung Koh

HyunSeung Koh, PhD of the University of Northern Iowa received the APA Librarian Conference Travel Award in the spring of 2019. She used the award to defray the cost of attendance at the International Conference on Performance Measurement in Libraries (LibPMC) annual conference in Aberystwyth, Wales in July. In support of her research involving the first year experience of international students, APA was pleased to help HyunSeung pursue this especially valuable opportunity for professional development, networking, and serving the field of librarianship.  

Patti Avellanet of the Customer Engagement team for APA Publishing recently talked with HyunSeung about her conference experience. The following transcript of their conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and context. 

Patti: Hi, HyunSeung! We’re pleased that we were able to support your conference travel this past summer. What is your overall impression of the International Conference on Performance Measurement in Libraries (LibPMC)? 

HyunSeung: It’s small but mighty! With 121 attendees from 21 countries, it included a wide range of current and key topics in relation to library assessment. It was also a great venue for obtaining useful and practical insights from presenters with diverse cultural backgrounds, including non-American cultures. 

Continue reading →

Tutorial Thursday – How to Find Preprint Articles in PsycINFO through EBSCOhost

Posted on by Marta Soto in For Librarians

It’s Tutorial Thursday! In this series, we explore APA’s library of video tutorials available on the APA Publishing Training YouTube channel. Please feel free to link to or embed our videos in your library websites or LibGuides, course management systems, or other locations where students, faculty, and researchers will find them.

A new version of the tutorial How to Find Preprint Articles in PsycINFO through EBSCOhost is available.

In this short video you’ll learn how to find preprint articles in PsycINFO when you are accessing it through the EBSCOhost platform. We’ll start with a brief description of preprint articles including why they matter. Next, we’ll demonstrate how to access them and how to create an alert to stay current on upcoming preprints in your research area.

By the end of this video you will be able to:

  • Recognize the value of preprint articles.
  • Identify several ways preprint articles are referred to by databases and publishers.
  • Access preprint articles in EBSCOhost.
  • Create an alert in EBSCOhost to access forthcoming preprint articles.

Tutorial Thursday – Searching PsycINFO’s Tests and Measurements Field on EBSCOhost

Posted on by Marta Soto in For Librarians

It’s Tutorial Thursday! In this series, we explore APA’s library of video tutorials available on the APA Publishing Training YouTube channel. Please feel free to link to or embed our videos in your library websites or LibGuides, course management systems, or other locations where students, faculty, and researchers will find them.

A new version of the tutorial Searching PsycINFO’s Tests and Measurements Field on the EBSCOhost platform is available.

This short video shows how to use the Tests & Measures field in PsycINFO to look up information related to psychological tests and measures. While we’ll show how to use PsycINFO from the EBSCOhost platform, the strategies introduced here are applicable for any version of PsycINFO. First, we’ll demonstrate how to use the Tests & Measures field to identify research instruments on a particular topic. Next, we’ll show how to locate research that uses specific psychological tests or measures. By the end of this video, you’ll know when and how to use PsycINFO to access tests and measures information.

By the end of this video you will be able to:

  • Identify tests and measures on a specific topic
  • Locate research that uses a particular test or measure

Sarah Johnson Receives a 2019 APA Librarian Conference Travel Award

Posted on by Patti Avellanet in For Librarians
Photo of Sarah Johnson

We are pleased to announce that Sarah Johnson, Assistant Professor and Reference & Instruction Librarian at CUNY Hunter College, was recently selected to receive an APA Librarian Conference Travel Award. Ms. Johnson will use the award to attend the annual meeting of the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) in Denver in October.

As both a librarian and a Licensed Master Social Worker, the award selection committee noted that Ms. Johnson’s application demonstrated her strong commitment to a multi-faceted research agenda that will simultaneously benefit the fields of social work and librarianship. Ms. Johnson is scheduled to present her research involving two separate projects that have explored the ways in which social work students and educators experience public libraries as field placements.

Thank you to all who took time to apply – librarians working in a wide variety of institutions and positions. The applicant pool is always strong, and the committee encourages previous applicants to apply again when they are next in need of conference funding.

The next award cycle is currently underway! Is there a conference happening sometime between January and April 2020 you’d like to attend for professional development as an academic or health sciences librarian? Please visit our website for details on eligibility, required application materials, and rolling deadlines. Current deadline: November 30, 2019.