LibGuides: Introduction to Research Skills: Search Tips

Searching Skills Handout
This two-page handout includes information about searching library databases and also explains some of the limiters, links, and tools you may encounter when using Central Search

Using the Advanced Search Feature on Central Search

Central Search, Smiley Memorial Library's interdisciplinary database, offers advanced searching tools to help you craft and refine your searches.

Multiple search boxes: As a default, Advanced Search offers three search boxes, but users can add more as needed by clicking the plus sign below the Search button
Integrated Boolean Operator searching: Each of the three search boxes are connected using Boolean Operators. The default setting is AND, but the Operator can be changed by clicking the drop-down arrow.
Search field options: The search fields for each search bar can be changed depending on the needs of your search. As a default, these fields are set to "Select a Field (optional)." This means that the search will look for the keywords, regardless of where they appear. Search field options include, but are not limited to: Author, Title, Journal Title, and Subject Terms.

There are many more Advanced Search features that can aid your search, such as limiting to full-text and/or peer-reviewed articles. Searches can also be filtered from the results page by the options found on the left of the screen.

Crafting a Search String

Search keywords and/or phrases can be combined using any combination of Boolean Operators, direct phrase searching, and truncation. To group segments of a search, you can enclose the keywords in parentheses ( ). See the below examples:

"mental health" AND (youth OR adolescen* OR teenage*)
(university OR college OR higher education) AND ("student success" OR "student retention")

Boolean Search Operators

Boolean Operators

Boolean operators are used to connect search keywords and phrases in most library databases. The most common are AND, OR, and NOT. Choose one of the above tabs to learn more.

AND

AND can be used to connect separate, unrelated concepts. AND can be used to find results that include ALL of your search keywords and phrases. For example:

swimming AND beach

This search would return results including both swimming AND beach. Imagine that the two overlapping circles below are topics connected with AND. AND will narrow down your search results to only the areas where the two topics intersect.

Two overlapping circles. The area they intersect is highlighted with green. Below reads: "AND: The search must include ALL search terms. This will narrow your results."

OR

OR can be used to connect related or similar concepts. Using OR in a search will find results that include one or more of the search keywords or phrases. For example:

college OR university OR higher education

This search will return results including one or more of the keywords or search phrases. Imagine that the two overlapping circles in the image below are two search keywords linked with OR; OR will expand your results.

Two overlapping circles highlighted in green. Below the circles reads "OR: Any combination of one or more of the search terms can be present. This will expand your results."

NOT

NOT can be used to limit or exclude searches from your results. NOT is beneficial when dealing with words with multiple meanings. Consider the below example:

crane NOT bird

This search will return results that include the term crane, but exclude the term bird. This search would be helpful if you were looking for results focusing on the construction crane, not the bird crane. Use NOT with caution because it can potentially exclude useful results. For example, an article addressing the use of cranes in construction may be excluded because it has a passing reference to birds.

Imagine that the two overlapping circles below are topics connected with NOT. NOT will remove any results that include the second topic, narrowing the results.

Two overlapping circles with the area occupied only by only circle one highlighted. Below reads: "NOT: Exludes search terms, limiting the results. NOT should be used with caution."

Truncation

Searching for Variations of Words Using Truncation

Databases will search for your search term exactly as you type it, but sometimes a word can have common variations in ending. For example, a search for swim could exclude results that use swimming or swimmer even though those terms could potentially be beneficial to your search.

Some databases allow you to search for variations in endings using a process called truncation, which involves shortening a word so that variations with alternate endings can be found. You can truncate a search keyword using a wildcard, often symbolized using an asterisk (*).

Examples of truncated searches
Truncated Search	Possible Results
nurs*	nurse nursing nurses
educat*	education educational educate

Direct Phrase Searching

Direct Phrase Searching Using Quotation Marks

Databases search for individual occurrences of keywords, regardless of the order they appear. To let the database know that you want to find a phrase in a specific order, enclose the phrase in quotation marks (" ") to conduct a direct phrase search. For example, a search using "social media" will look for the occurrence of the terms social and media in that exact order.