User-Friendly Search Opens Up a Trove of Sociological Research

EBSCO’s Sociology Source Ultimate (SSU) is a research database that contains thousands of full-text articles from scholarly journals and trade magazines covering a wide variety of subjects in behavior and social issues. Topics include child development, demography, economic development, migration, and political sociology. Many of the articles include searchable cited references and related video content.

Product Overview/Description

At the time of this review, SSU provides full-text access to 1,382 international journals and magazines of which 1,317 are peer reviewed. Nine hundred seventy of the titles provide access to current content with no coverage embargo. One thousand one hundred forty of them are not available in other EBSCO databases. Eight hundred ninety-nine include searchable cited references. In total, 3,117 journals are indexed and abstracted, 3,025 of them peer reviewed.

SSU includes searchable cited references for approximately 899 journals. Currently, it also includes 848 full-text books, which are indexed and abstracted in their entirety, and 2,683 videos—instructional as well as documentary-style, ranging in length from one minute to two hours—from providers such as IGI Global, Intelligence Squared, MVD Entertainment Group, INTELECOM Intelligent Telecommunications, Journeyman, and SWPictures. Videos include closed captioning and transcripts.

Finally, SSU includes conference papers from such associations as the American Sociological Association, with full-text coverage beginning in 2003, and the Australian Institute of Family Studies, with full-text coverage beginning in 2013, plus indexing and abstracting of other relevant conferences.

User Experience

The EBSCO platform’s clean, user-friendly interface makes searching the SSU database easy.

To review the strengths of SSU, I decided to explore its coverage of the systemic issue of food insecurity, which has a wide impact across global communities and which we are actively addressing at our institution. I began with a basic search, which allows users to enter search terms in any order. My initial search using the term food insecurity yielded 1,699 results. From the filter ribbon located directly under the search box, I chose “peer-reviewed articles” and date range. The results list dropped to 1,563 articles (Figure 1).

Next, I tried the advanced search, which adds several options: users can select where in the resulting articles they would like their search terms to appear, add and eliminate terms, and enter a page range, publication title, publication and document types, and language. They can also select publications by title and search for relevant subject headings by relevancy or word root.

I searched for subject headings related to the root insecur, selecting the term begins with option. Three entries were returned: security (psychology), security (feelings/psychology) and food security (food use). It was easy to add these subject headings to my search string (Figure 2).

When I applied the filters for full text, peer reviewed, academic journals and a date limit of the past 12 months, my search for food insecurity OR the subject heading food security (food use) produced a results list of 95 articles (Figure 3). When I changed the OR to an AND, the number of results dropped to 75. Clicking on the all filters button led to a page where I could easily select or deselect search options to adjust my results.

For users who do not apply filters, the abstract for each article in the results list indicates whether it is peer reviewed or appears in an academic journal (Figure 4).

EBSCO recently released a “natural language” search option that can be turned on by the local library’s database administrator. Even if the natural language search option is turned on, users still can select the traditional search option.

For each article, users can download, view the PDF, or view the full text HTML. In the HTML view, a nice table of contents appears on the right-hand side of the page (Figure 5).

For articles in PDF format, a related items button on the right-hand side of the page links to additional articles on the same or similar topics (Figure 6).

Users can set up an account under the MyEBSCO link located in the platform’s upper right-hand corner. When they are logged into their MyEBSCO account they can download resources, create projects, save their research and search, read, or listen to resources they have saved. A free EBSCO mobile app is available for Apple iOS and Android mobile devices.

The help pages on https://connect.ebsco.com/ provide detailed information for the researcher as well as for library technical support.

The EBSCO support center’s Direct URL Builder permits library staff to input specific search and authentication parameters in order to create a direct link to resources in a given database or set of databases.

To support the library’s collection development activities, EBSCO provides COUNTER-compliant usage reports. Both COUNTER 5 and 5.1 statistics are currently available through June 2025; after that only COUNTER 5.1 will be available.

Contracting and Pricing Provisions

Pricing is determined by a number of factors, including student FTE, consortial discounts, and resource bundling options. EBSCO contracts provide unlimited simultaneous access to authenticated users both on and off campus, as well as walk-in users. Licensing institutions have an obligation to take steps to ensure that only their authorized users have access to licensed content.

Accessibility compliance information is available on the EBSCO website, including VPATs for specific platforms. The documentation addresses WCAG 2.2 AA and relevant European Union standards. Accessibility testing audits are conducted by third parties. Users with visual impairments test resources using popular screen reader technology.

EBSCO terms of use abide by the protections provided pursuant to the US Copyright Act of 1976. Authorized users may download, store electronically, etc. the materials for personal non-commercial use. Personal information is collected if the user provides that information in connection with services. Non-personal information is collected to track database use and for functional analysis. Users’ personal information is not transferred to or processed in a country other than the user’s country of residence.

Authentication Methods

EBSCO offers several methods of authentication, including IP authentication for users on campus. For off-campus users or distance learners, authentication may be handled using Shibboleth, Open Athens, or EZproxy. Authentication using SAML or Single Sign On for institutions is also available.

Competitive or Related Products

Both EBSCO and ProQuest (part of Clarivate) produce products comparable to SSU. SocINDEX is a sister EBSCO product. SocINDEX with Full Text provides full-text access to 570 journals and magazines, of which 559 are peer reviewed, and includes 899 journals with searchable cited references. It includes 3,112 indexed and abstracted journals and 3,020 peer-reviewed and abstracted journals. A full comparison between SocINDEX and SSU is available on the EBSCO site, including the retail value of the included content.

ProQuest hosts Sociological Abstracts, which includes the Sociological Abstracts database and its companion database, Social Services Abstracts. These databases provide bibliographic coverage of current research focused on social work, human services, and related areas, including social welfare, social policy, and community development.

Sociological Abstracts and Social Service Abstracts contain some full text, as well as links to cited references and Web of Science citations, when available. Abstracts of journal articles and dissertations are included, as are citations of book reviews.

Coverage for Sociological Abstracts runs from 1952 to present. Social Services Abstracts provides coverage from 1979 to present.

In SSU, on the other hand, the coverage date range varies by journal title. The earliest indexing and abstracting coverage in SSU begins with Sociological Review in 1908 and the earliest full-text coverage begins in 1910, with Journal of the American Institute of Criminal Law & Criminology.

As I did with SSU, I searched both the Sociological Abstracts and the Social Services Abstracts databases for the search term food insecurity, producing 15,849 results. Filtering to “peer-reviewed” reduced results to 13,527, with 13,524 identified as scholarly journals. Narrowing the search further using the document type produced 11,263 articles and 12,662 features. I also tried the advanced search using the term food insecurity and filters peer-reviewed, source type: scholarly journals, document type: article, and language: English, yielding 11,162 results. To narrow the search results, I added a time frame of three years, the search term United States and a location for the terms in the abstract field, which produced a results list of 42 articles. For less experienced researchers, these steps might be overwhelming or frustrating.

Critical Evaluation

SSU is a well-designed platform. Both the basic and the advanced search are easy to navigate and help guide users through the search process.

The terms used to identify the filters and search options are accessible and appropriate for users with all levels of research experience.

SSU provides access to more content than SocINDEX, including more full-text journals and magazines and more full-text peer-reviewed journals. It also provides more full-text journals indexed in Web of Science or Scopus.

A drawback to SSU is that the included third-party content can change at any time. This means that if a library cancels a standalone subscription for a once-included title, they could lose access to valuable content.

The SSU results list would be improved by the inclusion of links to the citing articles in Scopus and Web of Science. In addition to the subject finder feature in the advanced search, it would be helpful to see recommended subject headings as a filter option on the results screen.

Recommendations

Overall, should the library’s budget permit, SSU is a subscription worth considering. The platform is easy to navigate and provides search options for both the inexperienced and the experienced researcher. The rich, international content will serve the research interests of undergraduate and graduate students, as well as faculty members.

References

EBSCO Industries, Inc. (2025). EBSCOConnect. Retrieved March 17, 2025, from https://connect.ebsco.com/s/?language=en_US

Millhorn, J. (2019). Sociology Source Ultimate. The Charleston Advisor, October 2019, 3739. https://doi:10.5260/chara.21.2.37