The Basics: What's What in Statistical Universe

Before going any further, it is important to address a few questions about Statistical Universe.

1. What does Statistical Universe cover?

Statistical Universe is an Internet version of three major statistical indexes:

• Federal Sources: American Statistics Index (ASI)
  ASI indexes and abstracts statistical data published by all branches and agencies of the Federal Government, including both depository and non-depository publications. ASI includes federal agency publications that contain social, economic, demographic, or natural resources data, and a selection of publications with scientific and technical data.
• State and Private Sector Sources: Statistical Reference Index (SRI)
  SRI identifies statistical data published by consumer and trade magazines, private organizations, state government agencies, business organizations, independent research organizations, and universities and affiliated research centers. Publications covered by SRI contain important statistics on business, industry and finance, general economic conditions, government programs and politics, and social trends. SRI offers access to national data, such as production, costs, and earnings in major industries; statewide data, such as statistics on crime, health, or employment; data on foreign countries, such as world economic and demographic trends; and local or narrowly focused data, such as detail by county and municipality.
• International Intergovernmental Organizations: Index to International Statistics (IIS)
  IIS covers statistical publications of international intergovernmental organizations (IGOs). These publications are an essential source of basic information on the population, business and financial activities, foreign trade, education, health, and other economic, demographic, and political characteristics of nations and world regions. IIS provides a master guide and index to approximately 100 organizations, including the United Nations system, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the European Union, commodity organizations, development banks, and other important inter-governmental organizations.
  (Source: Lexis-Nexis Statistical Universe User Guide (PDF) http://www.lexisnexis.com/academic/1univ/stat/)

In other words, Statistical Universe covers international (IIS), national (ASI), state (SRI) and private sector (SRI) statistical data. This is important to keep in mind, as it is possible to limit your search to a specific index if you want to. We will talk about doing this when we get into advanced searching.

2. Where do you start on this page?

If this is your first time to this database, it can be difficult to figure out which search option to choose. Basically, choosing the "PowerTables" option is the Lexis-Nexis equivalent to choosing a basic searching option. The "Abstracts" option is the equivalent to an advanced searching option. Finally, the "Links" option brings you to an annotated list of freely-available statistics websites (essentially, this is a Yahoo! for statistics). For this tutorial, we will begin with addressing how to use PowerTables and then move onto how to search Abstracts. You are welcome to explore the "Links" option, but it will not be covered here.

With those questions out of the way, we can get into doing some searching! Go ahead and click on PowerTables, and click on the Continue link below.

Click Here to Continue!

Click Here to Return to the First Page!

(David M. Oldenkamp, Syracuse University Library. Modified 3 March 2002)