Smart searching involves using basic search strategies to effectively and efficiently search the Library’s online databases.
While most of the strategies on this page can also be used if you are searching within a search engine, they are particularly important when searching within academic or library databases. Check out the tabs below for search strategies you can use in your research.
If using Google, check out Refine Google searches.
Keywords or search terms are necessary when searching library databases to retrieve the best results. (The Library's Research Assistant tool, which lets you enter your research question or topic in plain language, is an exception.)
There are two main steps to identifying keywords. Take a look at the following example:
Example Research Question: Should college athletes get paid?
Look for the who, what, where, when, why words in your topic.
Main concepts: college, athletes, and paid
These are often synonyms, or different words that mean the same thing. Since you are searching in an academic database, which contains a high percentage of scholarly content (information written by experts for experts), consider how your instructor or another expert might describe the topic. Are there any technical terms that you might not be aware of? (For example, heart attacks are often called myocardial infarction in academic writing.) Another way to determine good keyword is to look at the vocabulary authors are using in a good article you find and use similar terms in your search.
Keywords for college: college, collegiate, university, post secondary, school, etc.
Athletes: athletes, athletics, sports, players, football players, basketball players, etc.
Paid: paid, pay, compensation, scholarships, stipend, etc.
Some databases will also have a Thesaurus or Subject Heading feature, such as the nursing database CINAHL. Subject headings are assigned to articles based on their content and can be used effectively to find subject-specific results. In some databases, you can enter a search term and check the Suggest Subject Terms box, or similar, in order to get recommended official search terms.
Once you have identified your keywords, you can begin to enter your search terms into the search box(es). Since you usually have multiple concepts that you want to include (ex. college, athletes, and paid), you can use Boolean operators to connect them.
Boolean Operators, the words AND, OR, and NOT, are used to connect and define the relationship between your keywords and main concepts. Using Boolean operators in a search will help to narrow or expand your search results. See the image below for how you can use Boolean operators while searching.
There are several other search strategies that you can use to narrow or expand your search results. These may work slightly differently depending on the database you are searching, but the most consistent strategies are given below.
If you have any questions about using these or any other of the search strategies discussed on this page during your research, meet with a librarian.
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Quotations Quotations are used to combine keywords into a keyword phrase. This is particularly useful in narrowing down your results. By putting quotes around two or more words, they will have to appear in the exact sequence within your results. Ex. “college athletes” will return results that use that exact phrase and don't contain only the words college or athletes. These words may still appear separately in the article, in addition to appearing as the phrase.
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Truncation Truncation uses an asterisk (*) to leave a word open to variant endings. Putting an asterisk at the end of a root word will retrieve all forms of that word. Ex. pa* will return results that include both pay, paid, and any other pa___ words.
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Wildcards Question Mark Wildcard The question mark (?) wildcard is used to replace an unknown character within a word. The database will return all words with the ? replaced by a letter. Ex. wom?n will return results for both woman and women.
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Pound/Hash Symbol Wildcard Similar to the question mark wildcard, the pound or hash symbol # wildcard is used when there are alternative spellings of a word. The database will return results with all words with or without the additional letter. Note that some databases will do this automatically, however, some results may be excluded. Ex. colo#r will return results for color and colour. Note: Truncation and wildcards cannot be combined in one word.
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Google Search There are also a series of Google specific search strategies you can use to limit domain types (.com, .edu, .gov, etc.), find similar sites to those you already know, and more! Check out this page for more information on searching in Google. |
