This guide provides an overview of our library, as well as links to resources and tools. If you ever need research assistance, don't hesitate to contact us!

• General Library Questions: You can use the Ask A Librarian.
• Social Work and Psychology: Make an appointment for a research consultation with Yali. If the listed times don’t work for you, please email Yali with 2-3 alternative time slots.
• Other Subjects: You can Request a Library Research Consultation with librarians from the Social Sciences, Health, and Education Library, or find additional Subject Specialists in the University Library.

I am Yali, the Behavioral Sciences Librarian in the Social Sciences, Health, and Education Library at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I am the Library liaison to the Department of Psychology and School of Social work, and provide subject-specific research assistance related to psychology and social work across various campus units. My services include research consultation, instruction,  collection development, and facilitating research data services and evidence synthesis (such as systematic reviews).

Collection development. I develop and manage collections in all formats in the areas of psychology and social work, including physical books, ebooks, and ejournals/databases. If you have any suggestions, please fill out the Suggest a Purchase form or let me know directly.

Instructions. I provide library instruction to introduce library resources and services, and information literacy instruction to support teaching and research, with a focus on databases related to social work and psychology. I can also facilitate instruction on any other topics where the Library has specialists, such as reference management tools like Zotero, government information, data management, copyright, publishing, repositories, and more.

Research Consultations. In-person or online research consultations with students and faculty members are a major part of my job. Students and faculty members are welcome to email me and make an appointment to discuss resources and design search strategies related to their research topics. Like instruction, I can collaborate with other subject specialists to provide research consultations.

My current research interests revolve around exploring how to design and provide library services in generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) context, how to foster patrons' growth with DEIA awareness through the teamship between human librarians and AI, and intersection of library and social work.