Guides: PSC 3340 U.S. Domestic Policy: Find Research

Government Information

Congress.gov
Official website for U.S. Federal legislative information. Find bills, laws, and other congressional documents.
Search Tips:
-Use filters on the left-hand side of the results pages. Ex: Bill Type, Status of Legislation, Subject, etc.
-Use the 'browse' features to see the legislation for various topics.
-When you find an interesting piece of legislation, look it up in Google or the library databases to see if people are talking about it.
GovInfo
Provides free public access to official publications from all three branches of the Federal Government.
Congressional Research Service Reports
CRS is a nonpartisan branch of the Library of Congress that provides research services to Congress.

Data and Statistics About the U.S.
Provides links and information about statistical agencies in the U.S. government such as the Bureau of Justice Statistics, Economic Research Service, etc.
Census Data
Find data from the Census Bureau. Search by location or topic. For more guidance on finding Census data, contact a librarian, or see the Community Assessment Research Guide.
Data.gov
Open data from the U.S. government.
U.S. Government Departments and Agencies Index
Lists websites for individual departments and agencies.
U.S. Federal Government Data Guide - Tulane University
This guide from Tulane University Libraries contains links for government information broken down by topic.

Use the limiter site: to filter for websites that end in a specific domain.

Examples

Political Science Complete
Subjects: gender studies, history, international studies, political science
Content: journals, books, conference papers
Publication date: 1965 – present
SocINDEX with Full Text
Subjects: criminal justice, gender studies, latino studies, political science, psychology, social work, sociology
Content: journals, magazines, books, conference proceedings
Publication dates: 1908 – present
CQ Researcher
Subjects: health, social trends, criminal justice, international affairs, education, environment, technology, economy, political science
Content: reports
Publication dates: 1996 - present
Issues & Controversies on File
Subjects: communication, criminal justice, education, english, latin-american studies, media studies, political science, sociology, speech communication
Content: journals, government documents, newspapers
Publication dates: 1995 - present

Identify keywords for your topic and brainstorm narrower, broader, and related terms.

Example: Factors that affect academic performance in first-generation college students.

Typing the Boolean Operators AND, OR, and NOT into the library catalog or databases allow you to broaden or narrow your results.

Add more keywords.

Adding additional keywords to your search can help to further narrow your topic.

Example: college AND first-generation students AND academic performance

Use OR.

Broaden your search by using OR to link your terms.

Example: (college OR higher education OR university) AND first-generation students AND (academic performance OR student success)