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Psychological Sciences

Resources for Professional Psychology

DEVELOPING SEARCH STRATEGIES FOR SYSTEMATIC REVIEWS

VIDEO: Introduction to the Resources - and to your Research Librarians (9:08) Recorded 2022

VIDEO: PSYCINFO (Ovid) Search (40.22) (Recorded 2022) (if you are time poor? - at least watch this one!)

VIDEO: Developing search terms (4:17) (Recorded 2020)

  1. What is your research topic? make it a question!
  2. What is your PICO?
  3. Prepare your own table (Concept Grid) and generate possible alternatives for your search terms.

VIDEO: Preliminary Scoping search (7:19) (Recorded 2020)

  1. Find OVID Medline in the library catalogue
  2. Enter your proposed search terms to get some preliminary results. How many articles did you find?
  3. Find an intervention that matches the types of article you would most like to find
  4. Do you have questions? Note them down.

VIDEO: Finding more terms for the Concept Grid (5:43)​ (Recorded 2020)

  1. Select an article from your results that is particularly relevant to your topic.
  2. Are there more Subject Headings (MeSH) or other key terms you can add to your search strategy? 
  3. Do you have questions? Note them down.

VIDEO: MEDLINE (Ovid) Search (12:35) (Recorded 2020)

ENGAGE: Jane Van Balen and Medwenna Buckland will be attending your lecture on Friday 28 July 2023.  Please have your questions ready to ask!

Extra readings

Search strategies

Article: Systematic Reviews: Constructing a search strategy and searching for evidence 

Aromataris, E., & Riitano, D. (2014). Systematic Reviews: Constructing a Search Strategy and Searching for Evidence. AJN The American Journal of Nursing, 114(5), 49-56. doi:10.1097/01.NAJ.0000446779.99522.f6

Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions Version 6.3 Technical Supplement to Chapter 4: Searching for and selecting studies https://training.cochrane.org/technical-supplement-chapter-4-searching-and-selecting-studies-v63

Inclusion and Exclusion criteria (specific parameters of the topic)

Meline, T. (2006). Selecting studies for systemic review: inclusion and exclusion criteria. Contemporary issues in communication science and disorders, 33(Spring), 21-27. 

PRISMA

The PRISMA 2020 statement: an updated guideline for reporting systematic reviews 

Page, M. J., McKenzie, J. E., Bossuyt, P. M., Boutron, I., Hoffmann, T. C., Mulrow, C. D., … Moher, D. (2021). The PRISMA 2020 statement: an updated guideline for reporting systematic reviews. BMJ (Online), 372, n71–n71. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.n71

Screening the results

Polanin, J. R., Pigott, T. D., Espelage, D. L., & Grotpeter, J. K. (2019). Best practice guidelines for abstract screening large‐evidence systematic reviews and meta‐analyses. Research Synthesis Methods, 10(3), 330-342

Using EndNote to assist screening process

https://libguides.ul.ie/systematic-reviews/endnote

Writing up the Systematic Review

Article: How to write a systematic review 

Harris, Joshua D, Quatman, Carmen E, Manring, MM, Siston, Robert A, & Flanigan, David C. (2014). How to Write a Systematic Review. The American Journal of Sports Medicine., 42(11), 2761-2768.

Videos

The following videos are selected from OVID training (some very detailed)

The final link is a guide from University College London

Systematic Reviews QuickLinks

Systematic Reviews (SRs) aim to find and evaluate all studies, published and unpublished, relevant to a research question. They use systematic methods to minimise bias and they also use transparent methods that allow for replication and verification.