Subject Librarian
Questions?
Ask a Librarian!
In Person: Wells Library, Scholars' Commons Reference Desk (East Tower)
Email: libref@indiana.edu
Chat: libraries.indiana.edu/help
Find Sources
This page will help you find information sources for your research. The library gives you access to a ton of high-quality information. The rest of this page provides links to sources on topics related to criminal justice, organized by type of source:
Encyclopedias
Encyclopedias can be a good place to start researching a new topic. They offer short guides to the current research and often include lists of other recommended sources.
Crime and Punishment in the U. S by
This book offers a clear examination of the hard topics relating to types of crimes and types of punishment.This set offers clear, comprehensible, and authoritative treatment of the core aspects of criminal justice that should prove both accessible and engaging to nonspecialist readers. Essays focus on types of crimes, apprehension of wrongdoers, criminal trials, and types of punishment.
ISBN: 9781587654275Publication Date: 2008-08-30
Encyclopedia of Law Enforcement by
This three-volume Encyclopedia of Law Enforcement provides a comprehensive, critical, and descriptive examination of all facets of law enforcement on the state and local, federal and national, and international stages. This work is a unique reference source that provides readers with informed discussions on the practice and theory of policing in an historical and contemporary framework.
ISBN: 0761926496Publication Date: 2004-12-15
Journal Articles
Journal articles are the type of source most commonly used by social scientists, including researchers in criminal justice. They are shorter than books and typically focus on a specific topic. They take less time to publish than books and usually provide more current research on a topic. Journal articles are often peer reviewed, which means they have been vetted by other experts on the topic. As a student researcher in criminal justice, you are most likely to cite journal articles in your own assignments and papers.
Criminal Justice Databases
Try searching these library databases to find journal articles on topics related to criminal justice.
- Criminal Justice Abstracts with Full Text
This link opens in a new window
Criminal Justice Abstracts with Full Text contains nearly 500,000 records selected from important sources within the discipline. This resource includes full text for over 315 magazines and journals.
- Criminal Justice Database
- This link opens in a new window
Comprehensive database supporting research on crime, its causes and impacts, legal and social implications, as well as litigation and crime trends. Includes U.S. and international scholarly journals, and correctional and law enforcement trade publications, dissertations, crime reports, crime blogs and other material relevant for researchers or those preparing for careers in criminal justice, law enforcement and related fields.
- NCJRS Virtual Library
This link opens in a new window
NCJRS is a federally funded resource offering justice and substance abuse information to support research, policy, and program development worldwide.
Multidisciplinary Databases
These library databases contain journal articles from other subjects related to criminal justice. You can use these databases to expand your search.
- Family Studies Abstracts
- This link opens in a new window
Bibliographic records covering essential areas related to family studies, including marriage, divorce, family therapy, and other areas of key relevance to the discipline.
- Sociological Abstracts
- This link opens in a new window
Abstracts to journal articles and citations to book reviews in the international literature of sociology, social work, and related disciplines in the social and behavioral sciences. Includes abstracting and indexing of articles and book reviews drawn from thousands of serials publications, plus books, book chapters, dissertations, conference papers, and working papers.
- Social Services Abstracts
- This link opens in a new window
Bibliographic coverage of current research focused on social work, human services and related areas, including social welfare, social policy and community development. Abstracts and indexes serials publications and includes abstracts of journal articles and dissertations and citations to book reviews.
Databases like Google Scholar and Academic Search (EBSCO) are great for researching across a variety of subject areas. Use these databases if you want to do the broadest search possible.
- Academic Search (EBSCO)
- This link opens in a new window
Provides full-text coverage of magazine, newspaper, and scholarly journal articles for most academic disciplines.
- Google Scholar
- This link opens in a new window
Special version of Google's index to scholarly content on the web. Connects to full-text resources available to IU users.
Books & Media
While books may not be used as often as journal articles in social science research, they are still valuable and play an important role in research. Books are much longer in length than journal articles and tend to cover more aspects of a topic. You might not have time to read an entire book for your assignment, but you can cite a particular chapter or section of a book.
You can use the library's online catalog, IUCAT, to search all IU libraries for books and media on topics related to criminal justice. Watch the tutorial below to learn how to search IUCAT. Check out the box below the video to tutorial to search IUCAT directly from this guide!
Ways to access IUCAT:
- Use the IUCAT search box above
- Go to http://iucat.iu.edu
- From the IU Libraries website click on 'IUCAT.'