LibGuides: Social Policy, Sociology & Social Sciences: Websites

Useful websites

Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion (CASE)
Based at the LSE, useful for Children, Families and Education, and Poverty, Exclusion and Inequality.
Centre for Policy on Ageing
Charitable organisation. The website includes access to the AGEinfo database, and selected bibliographies of recommended reading on various topics related to ageing.
European Economic and Social Committee (EESC)
The European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) is a consultative body of the European Union.
Joseph Rowntree Foundation
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation is an independent organisation working to inspire social change through research, policy and practice
The King's Fund
An independent charity working to improve health and care in England, and to shape policy and practice through research and analysis; to develop individuals, teams and organisations; to promote understanding of the health and social care system; and bring people together to learn, share knowledge and debate.
The Nuffield Trust
An authoritative and independent source of evidence-based research and policy analysis for improving health care in the UK.They also produce research and contribute to the debate on social care.
NFER papers on: Education to Employment
NFER is the National Foundation for Educational Research. This section contains a range of research papers as well as practical guides.
NIESR - National Institute of Economic & Social Research
Mostly economic focus. Produces a range of reports that may be of interest to SP students. For example, "What young English people do once they reach school-leaving age: a cross-cohort comparison for the last 30 years".
Resolution Foundation
An award-winning think-tank producing research on issues of economic and social policy such as: living standards in the UK; low pay and the minimum wage; poverty & social mobility; intergenerational fairness; childcare policy; housing policy.
Social Policy Association
Social Policy Digest
The Digest is a companion to two journals — the Journal of Social Policy and Social Policy and Society — both of which are published on behalf of the Social Policy Association by Cambridge University Press.

The Digest is currently suspended and is not being updated. There is, however, useful content to be found up to Sept 2014.
Understanding Society
An innovative world-leading study about 21st century UK life and how it is changing. It captures important information about people’s social and economic circumstances, attitudes, behaviours and health. The study is longitudinal in its design.

Evaluating websites

Finding information on the internet is easy, but finding good quality and reliable information is trickier than you think. Take a look at our tips in this section on how to get the most out of searching online. Before you use any web resource in your assignment ask yourself “Is the web page as good as information you would find in a book or academic journal?”

Webpages can be set up by anyone, therefore before referencing a site check that the information is reliable and accurate.
Check:

Who wrote the information? Do they have relevant qualifications? Have they written other material on the subject? Do they have a bias?
When was the information published? Is it current enough for your needs?
Why was the page put on the web? Is it selling or promoting something? Is it biased?

Look for the clues in the URL

.com – a commercial company
.co.uk – a commercial UK company
.edu – a US academic institution
.ac.uk – a UK academic institution
.org – a non-profit organisation
.gov or .gov.uk – a US or UK government site

Are you struggling to find what you need on Google?

Here are some tips to improve your results!

Try using Google Advanced Search
If you are looking for an exact phrase try using quotation marks "Social Exclusion"
Try a Google site search "Social Exclusion" Wales site:ac.uk This returns results from only academic institutions in the UK.

Still not finding enough academic resources in Google?

Try using Google Scholar which only searches scholarly literature. You can link Google Scholar to Swansea University's subscriptions, full instructions can be found in the guide below.

Advanced Google Search

Here are some useful links you may like to explore further:

Google can be a useful tool for finding information online. However, it can be difficult to find the most relevant and reliable sources of information from a list of thousands or millions of results. Don't assume the results at the top are the best ones! The following strategies will help you search Google more effectively.

Search a website or group of websites

Use your keywords and the command site:url to find results from one website or from a group of websites. For instance, a search for foundation phase site:gov.wales will find information about the Foundation Phase from the Welsh Government website. You could use site:ac.uk to search academic websites.

Find a particular type of document

Use the command filetype: to limit your search to a particular type of document. This can be useful if you are looking for a certain type of information. For example, if you government documents are likely to be published in PDF form, so you could use filetype:pdf to limit your results to PDFs and make it easier to find what you need. Numerical data is likely to appear in a spreadsheet, so you could use filetype:xls to look for Excel documents.

Google Scholar searches scholarly literature such as journal articles and abstracts, but you may have difficulty accessing the full-text of the material you find. Linking your Google Scholar account to Swansea University will help with this. Just go to the settings cog from the menu

and then go to Library Links to find Swansea University.

Why use library databases instead of Google Scholar?

Although Google Scholar can be useful, iFind and subject databases such as Science Direct have certain key advantages:-

Identify peer-reviewed articles.
Easy access to an abstract (summary of the article).
Easy access to the full article, where available, with no extra charges.
Citations and reference lists for each article - usefull for widening your reading.
Pre-publication research.
Be more organised - options to email, download & integration with bibliography managers (like Endnote).