E-Reference Ratings: Sociology

Applied Social Sciences Index and Abstracts (ASSIA). ProQuest. www.proquest.com

With indexing and abstracting updated monthly, ASSIA provides timely access to a broad range of sociological disciplines spanning sociology, psychology, education, economics, and more from 1987 to the present. More than 500 journals from 16 different countries are indexed, including Indian Journal of Social Work, American Journal of Health Behavior, and Prison Service Journal. Upper-level undergraduates through professionals have myriad options available to them, including the ability to run basic, advanced, and command-based search queries. Browsing is available by journal title only and lateral searching is made easy through hyperlinked authors and subject descriptors. Despite the lack of full text, CSA's Illumina platform (used for access) easily supports OpenURL functions. Pricing options lean toward the mid-level to the upper end for bibliographic databases of this size and nature but are not unreasonable.

Child Development & Adolescent Studies (CDAS). EBSCO. www.ebscohost.com

A quite specialized database in terms of scope, CDAS provides indexing and abstracting for books and book chapters, journals, dissertations and theses, technical reports, and reviews on growth and development of children and young adults through age 21. Incorporated within CDAS is bibliographic access to the 1927–2001 back file of Child Development Abstracts & Bibliography (CDAB). The content is hosted on the EBSCO 2.0 platform, which enables users to execute simple, advanced, and visual search queries. A wide variety of limiters are immediately available within the results page, making the process of refining a search quick and painless. Though there is no full text, EBSCO facilitates OpenURL linking with other full-text resources, including those offered through other vendors.

International Bibliography of the Social Sciences (IBSS). CSA. www.csa.com

Comparable in scope to SocINDEX w/Full Text (below), IBSS currently indexes more than 2800 journals and hundreds of thousands of books and book chapters covering the following core areas: sociology, politics, economics, and anthropology. Produced by the library at the London School of Economics and Political Science, the product is updated weekly, with coverage going back to 1951. More than 50 percent of the content is published outside the United States and the UK. Academic libraries at institutions conferring master's degrees and above in social science disciplines would benefit by having access to both IBSS and SocINDEX w/Full Text, since only about 15 percent of the content overlaps. Some 7000 books are added annually, and full-text availability is continually increasing.

ProQuest's Social Science Journals (PSSJ). ProQuest. www.proquest.com

Although not tailored to sociology specifically, PSSJ offers a broad range of coverage across many sociology-related topics, including addiction studies, urban studies, family studies, and international relations, in contrast to an in-depth examination of a single sociology subject such as, for example, EBSCO's VAA (below). Access is offered to more than 570 titles (dating back to 1994), 340 of which are available in full text, including the Journal of Family Issues, American Demographics, and Spectrum. For the remaining 230 titles, ProQuest's interface is OpenURL-enabled, which allows users to link effortlessly to full text provided by ProQuest or another vendor. Those looking for more cost-effective alternatives should turn to EBSCO's SocINDEX w/Full Text (below).

Social Sciences Full Text (SSFT). Wilson. www.hwwilson.com

For institutions that can afford to purchase this ample but pricey database and the training needed to overcome its less-than-user-friendly interface, SSFT would be an appropriate resource. Indexing and abstracting is provided for more than 625 journals, of which 215 are available in full text. The text can be translated into nine languages, including Arabic, Japanese, and Russian. General users will enjoy the file's expansive scope, with topical and up-to-date coverage including area studies, international relations, and public welfare. Another neat feature: Library Holdings Indicator links to your library's OPAC, letting users know if they'll find cited issues on your shelves.

Social Services Abstracts (SSA). CSA. www.csa.com

With coverage beginning in 1979, SSA is essential for any institution that trains in social work, human services, or related areas—especially if international perspectives are of interest, since 50 percent of the 1300-plus journals indexed are published outside of the United States. Major areas of coverage include crisis intervention, gerontology, poverty and homelessness, support groups, and welfare services. Unlike its closest competitor, Social Work Abstracts (not reviewed here), which is published by the National Association of Social Workers and indexes about 75,000 records, SSA more than doubles that number with an impressive 153,914 records as of September 2009. The robust file is updated monthly, with 5500 records added annually.

Social Theory. Alexander Street. alexanderstreetpress.com

Suitable to sociology students and researchers but also to those in the fields of politics, economics, history, psychology, anthropology, religion, and literature, Social Theory provides access to more than 150,000 pages of relevant documents dating back to the late 1700s, with major social thinkers and less-well-known ones well represented. The visually appealing interface encourages browsing by authors, sources, documents, theories, years, and subjects, while the advanced search provides users with the ability to limit results by author's race, the original language of a document, and even the author's perspective. Two minor downfalls: the cumbersomeness of scrolling through a list of over 9000 documents and the HTML print quality. Owing to the vast amount of full-text information contained within this database, there is an equally hefty price tag attached.

SocINDEX w/Full Text. EBSCO. www.ebscohost.com 

With full-text access to close to 800 journals, 820 monographs, and almost 14,000 conference papers covering a flood of topics from the fields of sociology, anthropology, education, and social work—examining, among other topics, marriage and family, abortion, ethnicity and race, and demography—this comprehensive index is a standout in this category. Featuring more than two million records with subject headings from a 20,000-term thesaurus (designed by lexicographers) and containing abstracts from more than 1200 core journals (some dating back to 1895), the product has only one competitor: IBSS (above). That said, prospective subscribers, particularly those with smaller budgets, will want to examine carefully the combined scope and content of the social science databases to which they already have access before writing a substantial—though completely justifiable—check for this powerhouse of a file.

Sociological Abstracts. CSA. www.csa.com

Combine tailored, scholarly content, including a back file dating to 1952, with a not overly embellished but reliable interface, and you have Sociological Abstracts. The resource provides abstracts of journal articles and citations to book reviews drawn from over 1800 publications as well as abstracts of books, book chapters, dissertations, and conference papers. Researchers interested in a wide variety of sociological research will appreciate the product's coverage, including history and theory of sociology, mass phenomena and political interactions, and studies in violence and power. But beware—this file faces tough competition as SocINDEX w/Full Text's (above) two million records overshadow Sociological Abstracts' 950,000. However, the file is growing rapidly, with 30,000 new records added annually.

Sociology: A SAGE Full-Text Collection. SAGE. www.sagefulltext.com

This collection may be small, but it is certainly mighty. Users will find detailed indexing, abstracting, and 100 percent full-text access to 36 peer-reviewed journals, with over 45,900 articles spanning the field of sociology from consumer culture to leisure studies to the sociology of work and employment. Sociology students and researches have the benefit of both current and historical access within one database. A large majority of the journals date back to the 1950s and 1960s. Also worth mentioning is SAGE's new Online Journals interface, which will house this and all other SAGE full-text collections (see also Education, above) after December 31, 2009. Since this resource fills a unique gap and pricing is a bit steep given the amount of full text, it will appeal to larger academic institutions or smaller colleges that have strong sociology programs.

Urban Studies Abstracts (USA). EBSCO. www.ebscohost.com

With somewhat spotty coverage, USA addresses almost everything that is urban including urban affairs, community development, and urban history. Purely bibliographic in nature, USA indexes and abstracts 211 journals (with more than 45,000 records), including Comparative Urban and Community Research, Ekistics, and Urban Anthropology, of which all but three are peer reviewed. The file has been fully digitized, with coverage from 1973 to the present. EBSCO customers that also subscribe to Academic Search Premier or Business Source Premier gain full-text access to 64 of USA's journals, which will show up seamlessly owing to EBSCO's strong support of OpenURL resolvers.

Violence and Abuse Abstracts (VAA). EBSCO. www.ebscohost.com

Focusing on very specific subjects like sexual assault, bullying in schools, and emotional abuse, VAA provides bibliographic access to more than 17,000 records via 200 titles, including Aggression and Violent Behavior, Child Abuse and Neglect, and Child Maltreatment. Though the majority of titles indexed are peer-reviewed journals, users will also encounter the occasional magazine or monograph. Contents are easily exposed through the flexibility of the EBSCO 2.0 interface. Basic, advanced, and visual search capabilities cater to novice students all the way through professional researchers. Although full text is not available to the thousands of articles VAA contains, lengthy and detailed abstracts make it easy to determine relevance when considering interlibrary loan requests. Of course, some full text may be supplemented through other products, EBSCO's or otherwise, via seamless link resolver functionality.