LibGuides: Criminology: Indexes & Databases

Indexes & Databases

Indexes and Databases bring together a number of different online journals and other resources into one search engine. Use these tools to find citations, abstracts and/or full text articles, reports and other resources on your topic. Both scholarly and popular articles may be included.

Criminal Justice Abstracts
Contains comprehensive coverage of international journals, books, reports, dissertations and unpublished papers on criminology and related disciplines. Also covers crime trends, crime prevention and deterrence, juvenile delinquency, juvenile justice, police, courts, punishment, and sentencing.
Sociological Abstracts
Indexes over 2500 journals in the theoretical and applied aspects of sociology. Some international and Canadian content. Articles, as well as unpublished materials, such as conference papers and theses, are indexed. Coverage is from 1986 - present.
America: History and Life
Indexes literature about several aspects and time periods of American and Canadian history. International scope -- includes references to articles, books, media reviews, and dissertations. Coverage from 1964 - present.
Canadian Periodical Index
Indexes Canadian and international academic journals, magazines, and newspapers. The full text of selected sections of The Globe and Mail is included. Several subjects are represented, with an emphasis on Canadian and international issues. Many articles are full-text. Coverage is from 1988 - present.
Gale Academic OneFile
Indexes the arts, humanities, social sciences, science and technology. Includes many full-text articles and abstracts with a mix of scholarly journals, popular magazines, and newspapers published in English. Coverage is from 1980 - present.
Social Sciences Index
Indexes journals from a wide variety of social science disciplines and interdisciplinary fields including environmental studies, urban and regional planning, and international relations, among others. Emphasis is on the United States with some international jurisdictions. Coverage is from 1994 - present.

Print Indexes

Crime and Delinquency Abstracts
Call Number: Scott Reference Z 5703.3 C73
Publication Date: 1966-1972

Online Tutorials

Search Tips

When searching online, various words are used to help broaden or narrow your search. Here are a few tips you should know before searching any academic database:

Boolean operators: Most internet and electronic databases follow the rules of boolean logic. Boolean logic refers to the relationships (connections or differences) between different search terms. The most common boolean operators are:

AND - used to narrow a search and establish more relevant results by linking keywords together (e.g. "behavioural" and "psychology").

OR - broadens a search and get more results. Typically used for synonyms and words with variant spellings (e.g. "self-actualization" and "self-identity").

NOT - use to narrow a search and get more relevant results (e.g. "behaviouralism" not "humanism").

Truncation: used to find similar words with different endings

e.g. human* searches "human and humans"

e.g. educat* searches "education", "educate", "educational" etc

asterisk (*) searches for various different endings of a word in most databases (including York University), however LexisNexis uses an exlamation mark (!).

Other Tips

Advanced Search - this option is available on most databases, and allows you to specialize your search based on documents (books, articles, video etc), date, geographic location, language, etc.

Quotation Marks - using quotation marks will allow you to search for exact phrases. For example, searching "mental impairment" will only retreive searches with both "mental" and "impairment" together in that order.

Refine Search - many online databases allow you to specify your search criteria after selecting your keywords and clicking on search.

Finding a Specific Journal - if you know the name of the journal you are looking for, type it in the library catalogue, then select "Periodical Title", then hit "go".