The PSYNDEX database is a comprehensive collection of psychology publications from German-speaking countries that are published in either German or English.
We cover mainly scholarly literature, but also works for practice, instruction and training, and literature for laypeople - provided it is scientifically sound.
Furthermore, in our database section PSYNDEX Tests, we cover psychological and educational assessment instruments published in German that have been developed or are applied in German-speaking countries.
Qualified scientific staff members follow both formal and content-based criteria when selecting the publications for inclusion:
Topics
We cover publications from all branches of psychology as well as those from adjacent disciplines, such as:
- psychiatry
- psychosomatics and behavioral medicine
- education
- sociology
- sport science
- linguistics
- business economics
- criminology
Selection criteria (literature) for PSYNDEX
Selection criteria for publications in the PSYNDEX reference database, as of 27 June 2024.
Download the most current criteria in PDF form from our PsychArchives repository:
Inclusion Criteria
1 Language
- 1a English, for authors who have their primary affiliation in a German-speaking country (Germany, Austria, Switzerland, or Luxembourg), or
- 1b German, also for authors who have a psychological affiliation outside the Germanspeaking countries and
2 Publication types/genres
- 2a journal articles (original contributions to professional/academic journals only), or
- 2b books (including edited volumes/edited books, doctoral dissertations, postdoctoral [i.e., habilitation] theses, and publications of tests/measures; machine translations of edited books and monographs), or
- 2c relevant contributions to edited books, or
- 2d institutional reports (so-called “gray literature”) and relevant contributions within this publication type and
3 Contribution to psychology
- 3a The primary affiliation of at least one author is a psychology department or a comparable institution that is engaged in psychological research. oder
- 3b Publications relevant for psychology by authors from applied psychology (e.g., self-employed professionals, industrial settings, treatment centers) and discipline-related research areas. This selection is based on the professional expertise of qualified scientific staff members of the ZPID. Decisions of this nature are subject to internal peer review when necessary. or
- 3c Contributions to key psychology publications that have, in terms of content, been approved by the editors. This applies to core journals in psychology (i.e., the majority of the contributions are thematically related to psychology, one or more of the editors have a professional background in psychology, or the contributing authors primarily have professional backgrounds in psychology), collections of works central to psychology and the individual contributions included in them (i.e., authors or editors have professional expertise in psychology; the focus is on interdisciplinary topics or documented debates that are substantially contributed to by psychologists; professionals in psychology compose the target audience of the publication; or academics, practitioners, students of other disciplines as well as laypeople are informed about psychological topics), or conference proceedings of the meetings and events hosted by professional psychology associations.
However, the following are formally excluded:
4a The following publication types/genres:
- preregistrations, stage I registered reports and doctoral dissertations which do not belong to a psychology department or a comparable institution that is engaged in psychological research (inclusion criterion 3a)
- preregistrations and data publications that are associated with an existing PSYNDEX record and have been documented there
- articles in daily newspapers and popular science magazines
- poster and oral presentations, audiovisual media
- Bachelor’s/Master’s theses (if they are gray literature)
- loose-leaf collections
- contributions to reference works/encyclopedias and textbooks
- announcements, abstracts, book and film reviews, brief opinion pieces that do not include cited sources, panel discussions, short summaries of workshops or original studies conducted by others
- unpublished manuscripts that are not publicly available, and publications under review or in print that are not publicly available
- machine translations of contributions to edited books
- 4b publications without online edition (no direct link/URL) – except for books
- 4c out-of-print books that are not available through bookstores, publishers, or online
- 4d reprints of historical publications initially published prior to 1972
- 4e publications published more than five years ago
Test selection criteria for PSYNDEX Tests
Test selection criteria for the PSYNDEX Tests database segment, as of 19 May 2021.
Download these criteria in PDF form from our PsychArchives repository:
1. Formal Inclusion Criteria
- a. Publications of German-language test procedures, either distributed by psychology (test or book) publishers or available on the Internet, with a complete set of test materials (such as manuals or instructional guides, questionnaires, and templates) available,
- b. Comprehensive computer-based test systems or software programs in stand-alone or Internet versions,
- c. Tests that are only partially published (e.g., questionnaires are available in separate parts, but the manual or test booklet are not included) as well as tests that have also been released by other publishers (e.g., in the form of reproducible templates or as downloads via the Internet),
- d. Tests from other types of publications such as journal articles (original contributions), monographs (including doctoral dissertations or postdoctoral [i.e., habilitation] theses), edited volumes, institutional reports (so-called gray literature) and the relevant contributions included within this type of publication, as well as contributions posted on the Internet, provided these extensively describe an assessment tool used in research, even if the test procedure or its items are not available in their entirety.
2. Formal Exclusion Criteria
- a. Articles in newspapers and nonacademic magazines, content from poster and oral presentations, audiovisual media, and keyword contributions to reference works/encyclopedias,
- b. The following contributions from professional journals and edited publications: Announcements, abstracts, book and film reviews, brief opinion pieces that do not include cited sources, panel discussions, short summaries of workshops or original studies conducted by others, and editorials serving to provide a general overview of the publication content.
3. Content-based Inclusion Criteria
- a. Test publications by authors affiliated with a psychology department or a comparable institution that is engaged in psychological research1,
- b. Research instruments that contribute to theory generation or that serve hypothesis testing in psychology and discipline-related research areas or tests that are relevant (e.g., for diagnostic clarification, personnel selection and development, cognitive development of children, etc.) for practitioners in applied psychology settings (e.g., industrial settings, treatment centers, or self-employed professionals).2
Note: Numerical minimum (i.e., threshold) values as indicators of psychometric quality are not specified here. The magnitude of a test’s psychometric properties is not determined by the test itself, but results from the specific combination of a test and the sample or context in which it is used, and is therefore not a selection criterion.
Missing Publications
Why can’t I find some publications in PSYNDEX although they should be eligible?
Publications may be omitted if
- they contain no information about the authors’ affiliations
- they were published in a non-discipline journal which is not checked by default (e.g. British Journal of Anaesthesia)
- they were published in a non-discipline work whose title and description don’t explicitly indicate a connection to psychology
- they were published by a publishing house with no known connection to psychology
- they were published by a publishing house that doesn’t permit us access to its publication.
If this applies to an eligible publication that you know of, you may submit it for inclusion in PSYNDEX.