Capstone Project in Sociology3

Capstone Project in Sociology

September 8, 2008

Shirley Knight, Reference Librarian Erin Augis, Professor

sknight@ramapo.edu SOCI 410

Provides access to the catalog (OPAC), databases, course reserves, interlibrary loan forms, etc.

Course Reserve - Need either Ramapo ID (R#) or barcode (provided by the library)

Research Strategies Worksheet - Use to track your research and refer back to when compiling your work cited list.

II. Finding Books at the Potter Library

Catalog: use this to find books, journal titles NOT ARTICLES, government documents, reserve items, music,and movies owned by the Library. You may limit a search by language, year(s) of publication, type of material, etc. This may take a few seconds to load.

Search the catalog using Keywords to find material
- For example: search for "gender" or "focus groups" to locate a broad range of material and look for resources for your topics.
OR
Search the catalog using Subject Browse feature ONLY if you know the Library of Congress Subject Headings, for example:

Subject Headings

Tips

Start with broad searches. It is much easier to discard too much rather than start with too little.
If you don't know the Subject Heading, use the Subject etc. tab located on the top of a catalog record to get to the headings. This will help you focus in on more relevant material.
Can "virtually" browse the shelves by clicking on the call number in a record.

III. Reference Material

The reference stacks are located on the 3rd floor (this is also the library's entrance).

General Sources	Call Number
International Handbook of Sociology	Ref HM 585 .I57 2000
Sociological Theory	Ref HM 585 .A33 2001
Education of Sociology: An Encyclopedia	Ref LC 189.95 .E38 2002
Social Research Sources
The A-Z of Social Research: A Dictionary of Key Social Science Research Concepts	Ref H 62 .A5124 2003
The Sage Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods	Ref H 62 .L456 2004
The Sage Handbook of Qualitative Research	Ref H62 .H2455 2005
A Guide to Empirical Research in Communication: Rules for Looking	Ref H 61.8 .S964 2001
Encyclopedia of Evaluation	Ref H 62 .M312 2005
Encyclopedia of Social Measurement	Ref H 62 .E53 2005
Dictionary of Statistics and Methodology: a Nontechnical Guide for the Social Sciences	Ref HA 17 .V64 2005
Interview Source
Handbook of Interview Research: Context and Method	Ref H 61.28 .H36 2001
Topical Sources
Encyclopedia of Women and Genger: Sex Similarities and Differences and the Impact of Society on Gender	Ref HQ 1115 .E43 2001
Handbook of Research Methods in Development Science	Ref BF 713.5 .H36 2005
See Also:
Career Sources
Occupational Outlook Handbook	http://www.bls.gov/oco
O*NET Online	http://online.onetcenter.org

Tips

Use reference books to gain an overview of your topic.
Use the Bibliographies at the end of encyclopedia entries to find more information on your topic.

IV. Electronic Resources

Sociological Abstracts	Covers abstracts on topics such as homelessness, child and family welfare, aging, community organization and more. Also, includes a listing of clinical social workers who have met national standards for education and experience established by the NASW competence certification commission.
Social Science Journals	A full-text database that provides information on hundreds of topics such as community development, culture and social structure, demography, social psychology and more.
JSTOR	An archival database containing full-text scholarly articles. Do Not Print from browser print button. Use the JSTOR print option. It does not have email feature. However, you can email yourself the article URL.
See Also:
PsycInfo	Contains more than two million citations and summaries of scholarly journal articles, as well as related topics as social work, anthropology, sociology etc.
Psychology Journals	Encompasses a wide-range of topics from psychology, clinical social psychology, social welfare, criminology and more.
Academic Search Premier	A multidisciplinary database that contains many full-text articles. May also limit to scholary (peer-reviewed) journals.

(Scholarly/Peer Reviewed/Refereed articles have been reviewed by a selected panel of experts in the discipline covered by that journal).

Tips

Always switch to the Advance Search page in a database. This will give you more control over your results.
Always use Boolean Operators-AND, OR, NOT when running a search. For Example, poverty and employment and race
Always check your Spelling if the database results are Zero.

Journal Finder: Indicates whether a journal or periodical is available in either full-text online, in print or on microfilm in the library's collection.

Sample Journal Titles

Located and Indexed in:

Interlibrary Loan: allows studens to borrow a book or article that the Potter library does not own. There is a link from the Journal Finder page.

Both of these links can be found under QUICK LINKS on the library's homepage.

V. Web Sources

Use the following Statistics link found under Subject Resources to locate supplemental information or data on your projects.

VI. Bibliographies

Use Evaluating websites to determine if the site is authoritative enough to use in your paper.

Use the Citing Websites and Print Sources to get the call number for the Chicago Style Manual. Refer to for examples of "In-Text Citations"

Academic Integrity - give credit where credit is due. See Ramapo College's Policy under Resources about Plagiriasm and Citing Sources, one of the new Library Research Tutorials on the library's homepage.

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