New Terms & Other Updates to the Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms®

Posted on February 26, 2019February 26, 2019 by Patti Avellanet in For Librarians

We recently released an update to the Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms. The Thesaurus provides precise and consistent terminology for searching all APA research databases. We added 305 new “preferred” Index Terms and approximately 70 new non-postable or “use” references*.

Each item in the APA databases – journal articles, books and book chapters, dissertations, and more – is represented by a record that is indexed, or tagged, with Index Terms from the Thesaurus. The use of a controlled vocabulary allows someone searching a database to quickly find all items about a specific concept — such as Animal Behavior, Marginalized Groups, or Prescription Drug Misuse — no matter what terminology or keywords the authors used.

Reflecting emerging areas, technologies, and social issues as well as changing nomenclature, this updated vocabulary will provide users with more targeted and efficient search and discovery. Additionally, we added new terminology in the expanding areas of psychological assessment, psychometrics, and research methods. You can view more details on our web page, What’s New in the 2019 Update, including a link to the full list of new and updated Index Terms (PDF, 135KB).

Continue reading →

HTTPS Support for APA PsycNET beginning January 17

Posted on December 21, 2018January 10, 2019 by Patti Avellanet in For Librarians

On January 17, 2019, the APA PsycNET platform will be upgraded to HTTPS. This enhancement provides our customers with improved security, and current platform users should not see any changes in functionality.

Although APA will implement a permanent redirect from HTTP to HTTPS, institutional subscribers using a proxy solution may need to adjust their configurations to ensure continued access to the APA PsycNET platform. All users should update links or shortcuts to reflect the HTTPS protocol.

What You Need to Know
The move to HTTPS will require about an hour of downtime on January 17, 2019 during which the APA PsycNET platform will be unavailable. Details about this maintenance window will be posted on the platform approximately one week ahead of the release.

To transition your institutional logos for co-branding, move the files for your institutional logo, link resolver, and/or ILL icons to a secure server and then update these image URLs in the APA PsycNET Admin Center (admincenter.apa.org).

The stanza for EZproxy and information about WAM configuration are included below. If you need additional assistance, please visit the Proxy Server Configuration page on the APA PsycNET Help site or contact us.

EZProxy Configuration
If your library uses EZProxy for authentication, it will require an SSL Configuration. Below is the updated stanza for APA PsycNET:

Title APA PsycNET (updated 20190117)
URL https://psycnet.apa.org
HJ content.apa.org
HJ doi.apa.org
HJ my.apa.org
HJ proxies.apa.org
HJ psycinfo.com
HJ psycnet.apa.org
HJ psyctherapy.apa.org
HJ psyctherapyalpha.apa.org
HJ search.apa.org
HJ www.apa.org
HJ www.psycinfo.com
HJ https://psyctherapy.apa.org
HJ https://psyctherapyalpha.apa.org/
DJ apa.org
DJ psycinfo.com

Configuring Web Access Management (WAM)
If your library uses WAM, please coordinate with your campus IT department to ensure your proxy has access to a security certificate. Note that your security certificate must include your proxy URL, which may be different from your campus website address. For WAM configuration, please use the following APA PsycNET URL: https://psycnet.apa.org.

In Case You Missed It: New Terms Added to the PsycINFO Thesaurus

Posted on August 3, 2016July 29, 2016 by Customer Relations Staff in For Faculty, For Individual Subscribers, For Librarians, For Students

In November 2015, we released an update to The Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms, the source of the controlled vocabulary used in indexing PsycINFO® and the other APA databases. This particular update was significantly larger than previous vocabulary updates, containing 227 new Index Terms.

In December, we shared the details of the update, highlighting some of the new terms and other changes that were incorporated. We also provided a document with the full list of Index Terms included in the update.

Did you miss that post? Take a look! It explains several important points about the new terminology, including a change to the language used to tag research on Autism Spectrum Disorders.

Related Resources

Changes to the Thesaurus sometimes impact search alerts and saved searches. For example, when a new term replaces an older term, saved searches and search alerts created with the older term will no longer generate updates. In this update, 5 terms were changed such that any saved searches or search alerts that use them will no longer retrieve the desired results.

Here are the terms that were changed, along with the new Index Terms that have taken their places:

*Terms that are now Use* references**	New Index Terms to search
Aspergers Syndrome Autism Pervasive Developmental Disorders	Autism Spectrum Disorders
Complications (Disorders)	Sequelae
Q Sort Testing Technique	Q-Sort

For assistance in updating your search alerts, please see our post PsycINFO Expert Tip: Updating Search Alerts When a Thesaurus Term Changes.

New Terms Added to the PsycINFO Thesaurus

Posted on December 18, 2015December 18, 2015 by Customer Relations Staff in For Faculty, For Individual Subscribers, For Librarians, For Students

By Ian Galloway, Senior Vocabulary Development Specialist

We recently released an update to The Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms, the source of the controlled vocabulary used in indexing PsycINFO and the other APA databases. All of the items included in APA databases – journal articles, books and book chapters, dissertations, and more – are represented by a record that is indexed, or tagged, with Index Terms from the Thesaurus. This allows someone searching a database to quickly find all of the items about a particular concept, such as Affirmative Therapy, Playfulness, or Transactional Leadership, no matter what terminology the authors used.

Keywords, Index Terms, and PsycINFO Classification Codes from a record in the PsycARTICLES database.

Continue reading →