Geography

Contents:

What are journal packages?

How should journal packages be used in geography research?

Recommended journal packages for geography research

What Are Journal Packages?

Journal packages are electronic collections of journals that are usually produced by one publisher. For example, the publisher Elsevier produces all of the journals in the journal package Science Direct and Wiley Publishing produces all of the journals in Wiley InterScience.

How Should Journal Packages Be Used in Geography Research?

Journal packages should not be used to find articles on a subject. Topic searches should be done in a journal database (abstract and index). Journal packages should only be used to find already identified articles in full-text.

The reasons for the above statements are:

1. Journal packages usually contain 100s of journals, while journal databases index and/or abstract 1000s of journals, so you get a more extensive search with a journal database.
2. Journal databases have more sophisticated search features, so you can do a more tailored search in them, then in journal packages.
3. If a publisher has an agenda, that bias may be reflected in some or all of the titles in a journal package, thus you would only get one perspective on a topic.

 Appropriate uses of journal packages are:

1. Finding a full-text article that is not available in a journal database. Many times the Find Full Text link in an article record in a journal database will take you directly to a journal package. If it does not, you can search for the journal title in the catalog and then find the link to the correct journal package.
2. Setting up a journal alert so that you will get an email every time a new issue of a journal is posted in the journal package. Most journal packages allow you to create a personal account in which you can create journal and other kinds of alerts. For more information,  see the Email Alerting Services webpage.

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Recommended Journal Packages for Geography Research

Sage Journals Online

The SAGE Journals Online database indexes over 220 full-text journals; UNT has access to ~165 of them. When searching, limit the search to SAGE conent available to me. You will see on the search results page whether you have access to a particular article. The SAGE Full-Text Collections include Communication Studies, Criminology, Education, Management & Organization Studies, Materials Science, Health Sciences, Political Science, Psychology, Sociology, and Urban Studies & Planning.

ScienceDirect provides full text access to over 1800 journals from Elsevier and Academic Press, representing all areas of science, medicine, and technology, as well as inter-disciplinary titles. Coverage is from 1995 to current, but some titles in physics, chemistry, and mathematics begin with volume 1, regardless of the year.

Wiley Online Library

Full text access from 1997 to current for over 350 Wiley journals in biology, chemistry, mathematics, behavioral sciences, and computer sciences. 

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