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Advanced Search Strategies Information Skills tutorial

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a phrase put together for searching is called a search string. example: 'sustainable development' and ecology ... river and (otter or stoat) Boolean operators ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: Advanced Search Strategies Information Skills tutorial


1
Advanced Search StrategiesInformation Skills
tutorial
  • Learning Resource Centre
  • Information Services

2
What this tutorial covers
  • searching electronically
  • defining your search
  • search strings
  • operators
  • expanding/narrowing searches
  • electronic resources

3
Your aim.
  • to get a small number of
  • relevant
  • specific
  • quality
  • results.

4
Define your search
  • do a pre-search analysis
  • list
  • topic
  • key words
  • synonyms (similar words)
  • spellings (e.g. Americanisms)
  • broader terms

5
Search strings
  • a phrase put together for searching is called a
    search string
  • example
  • "sustainable development" and ecology and
    ecosystems not forests

6
Operators to aid searching
  • quotation marks
  • limiting
  • wildcards
  • brackets
  • Boolean operators

7
Quotation marks
  • for phrases
  • finds words next to each other
  • wild flowers
  • landscape design
  • turbine efficiency
  • mad cow disease

8
Limiting
  • by year (e.g. only articles after 2000)
  • by language (e.g. English only)
  • by document type (eg review, report)
  • by descriptor where available
  • ti title
  • au author
  • ab abstract etc

9
Wildcards or truncation
  • usually but sometimes ? or ! or other symbol
  • abbreviation
  • specifies part of a word
  • educ
  • advert
  • organiation
  • womn
  • cat or felin but whats wrong here?

10
Answer
  • cat will find
  • cat, cats
  • cattle, catch, cathedral, category, catastrophe,
    catastrophic, cataclysmic, catalogue, catfish.
  • and all other words starting with cat.
  • not what is needed in this case!

11
Brackets (parentheses)
  • order of searching by the search engine
  • (brackets)
  • not
  • and
  • or
  • water and pollution not river
  • river and (otter or stoat)

12
Boolean operators
  • named after George Boole, English mathematician
    1815-64
  • Boolean operators are basically just.
  • AND / OR / NOT .!

13
Boolean operators OR
  • OR - broadens, gives most results
  • if you dont mind either term e.g. solar or sun,
    or both together

solar
sun
solar and sun
14
Boolean operators AND
  • AND if you must have both terms - narrows,
    reduces the number
  • e.g. results for only solar and energy together

solar
energy
solar energy
15
Boolean operators NOT
  • NOT removes terms
  • e.g. solar energy results, but without any
    references to heating

heating
solar energy
solar energy heating
16
If you dont get enough results
  • expand the topic use more, or different, terms
  • e.g topic why do foster parents stop fostering?
  • List of key words for searching(remember the
    pre-search analysis?)
  • child care foster care disruption
  • adoption fostering breakdown
  • caring failure disturbances
  • placement foster parents cease
  • child foster families fail
  • selection child fostering problem
  • approval care stop
  • assessments issues interviews
  • training visits retention
  • Tip find more keywords from previous search
    results

17
If you get too many results
  • if you get too many hits, you need to
  • refine your search
  • narrow it down by setting Limits (by year,
    language etc)
  • try different key words from the pre-search
    analysis list

18
More examples...
  • (cats and dogs)
  • (cats or felines)
  • chick or hen or poultry or fowl
  • contact lens
  • (schools and colleges) not (nurseries or
    kindergartens)
  • Liverpool and football club not Everton

19
General tips...
  • always check the Help facility
  • be prepared to do many searches using different
    keywords
  • use keywords from your previous search results
  • the more operators and limits you use, the more
    relevant your results will be

20
Electronic resources
  • databases and indexes to journal articles via the
    Internet
  • all different - in layout, terms of use,
    passwords, and searching techniques
  • look in the Help facility

21
Useful facilities in databases
  • advanced search browse journals
  • keyword search Google images
  • marked results email results
  • subject search narrow by subdivision
  • help facility stop words, wildcards
  • refereed publications alerting services
  • personal profile shopping basket

22
Evaluating your results
  • What do you think of your search results?????
  • Are they What about
  • relevant? authority?
  • accurate? coverage?
  • current? content?
  • good quality? sources?

23
Useful books in the library
  • searching the Internet
  • online searching
  • search engine guides
  • study skills section

24
Finally..
  • Please ask the library staff if you need help
  • Happy searching!

25
Thank you !
  • Learning Resource Centre
  • Information Services
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