Criminal Justice

This and other research guides are on the ACC Library web page under
Research Guides & Tutorials: http://library.sunyacc.edu

Adirondack Community College, 640 Bay Road, Queensbury, NY 12804
(518) 743-2260

Books | Reference books | Articles | Web sites

At any point in your research, please consult a reference librarian. Librarians are available whenever the library is open at (518) 743-2200 ext. 2462. Library hours are listed on the ACC Library's home page: http://library.sunyacc.edu.

Finding Books:

To find books or multimedia items, search the ACC book catalog (ACC Library web page > Finding Books > Catalog):

• Reference books, on the library’s main floor, don’t leave the library, so are always available.
• Circulating books, on the upper level of the library, may be checked out for four weeks.
• Videos, DVDs and music CDs may be borrowed by faculty. Students may use equipment near the video/DVD shelves.

Search tip: Start with a keyword search. When you find an interesting book, look for the subject headings in the book's online description. Click on any that refine your search best. Here are some subject headings to consider using:

 You may also find some books listed in the catalog from ABC-CLIO publishers that are available full-text electronically, such as Equal Protection: Rights and Liberties under the Law and The Right to Bear Arms.

Reference Books:

Reference books, on the main floor, can help you select a research topic. They also offer quick background information and overviews on subjects.

Statistics: 

Gale Virtual Reference Library:

You can search thousands of full-text chapters from more than 250 reference books published by Thomson Gale. The ACC Library owns many of these books in printed format also.They are the exact equivalent of the printed titles of the same name. Use the Basic Search for a simple search or the Advanced Search, which allows Boolean logic and truncation (wildcard endings; use an asterisk).

Enter in a simple keyword search. If you find too much, limit the search to Document Title. This will search for your term as chapter titles only. A search gives you full-text chapters from the reference books. The content is the exactly the same as the original printed books.Click the database's Title List link to see all of the books you can search at once in this database. Your subject will likely be listed in several different reference books.

Go to ACC Library Web page > Finding Books > Reference > Gale Virtual Reference Library. Note: This is a subscription database. ACC students, faculty and staff may log in from off-campus with their campus network user names and passwords.

Among the criminal justice books it searches are: Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice and West’s Encyclopedia of American Law.

Finding Articles:

Journal articles offer current and specific information and research. For a full list of journals ACC Library receives, see the online Periodicals at ACC list or the Periodicals booklet in the ACC Library.

Article databases offer you an easy way to search for journal articles by subject. Results may appear as article citations, abstracts (article summaries) or full-text articles, depending on the database. If the information is not full-text, ask a reference libarian to find out how to find the article though another database, print sources or interlibrary loan.

Article databases are subscription-only products. ACC students and faculty may search these from home by following screen directions. To get your ACC student username and password, see Lookup Account and Password on the Student Portal page.

From the ACC Library Web page, go to Finding Articles. Then, choose either:

• General Databases to find articles on a current, popular or multidisciplinary topic and need a mix of newspapers, magazines and scholarly journals; or
• Subject Databases to find specialized articles on one subject only, such as business, science, literature, nursing, etc.

Among the General Databases are:
● EBSCO's Academic Search Premier: Over 8000 journals are indexed; more than half are full-text.
● JSTOR: full-text; 117 journals covering the arts, sciences and social sciences.
● New York Times: Current (1980-present) and historical editions (1851-2003) are available full-text; also, NYT Book Review & Magazine (1997-present).
● WilsonSelectPlus: Completely full-text; over one million articles since 1994 from 1400 journals.
● New York State Newspapers: includes New York Times full-text.
● Opposing Viewpoints, CQ Researcher, more.

Criminal Justice Article Databases:

In the Subject Databases, scroll down to the Social Sciences group for these databases:
- CQ's Electronic Ency. of American Government: Congress, Supreme Court, Constitution, more.
- Westlaw Campus Research: Use this database to search for state and federal laws, cases and regulations. Just click "I agree" button on the initial page, then click the "Law" tab.

Listed below are some of the 20+ criminal justice-oriented journals the library receives:

Web sites:

Here are some recommended Web sites. Of the billions of Web sites in the world, these are more appropriate for college-level research.

For more information:

Consult a reference librarian at any point in your research. You may also want to see other online ACC Library research guides.

Among them are are the Controversial Issues, Psychology and Statistics research guides.

Updated 8/07; additions 2/08/TR/JM