Information Services and Systems Effective Database Searching Bernie Mathias and Clare Boucher...
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Transcript of Information Services and Systems Effective Database Searching Bernie Mathias and Clare Boucher...
Information Services and Systems
Effective Database Searching
Bernie Mathias and Clare Boucher
Information Services and Systems
Session Outline
• Devise a search strategy• Boolean Operators• Truncation and wildcards• Limits• Refining results
Information Services and Systems
Devising a search strategy
• Clarify the different parts of your search -identify the main elements (topics)
• How would someone else describe your topic?
• Synonyms, alternative spellings• Broader & narrower terms
Information Services and Systems
Concept 1
Dyspraxia
Clumsy/clumsiness
Development coordination disorder (DCD)
Motor disordered
Movement difficulty
Apraxia
Concept 2
Child/ren
Boy/s
Girl/s
Infants
Concept 3 Concept 4
Support
Help
Therapy
Intervention
UK, Wales
UK / UnitedKingdom
GB / GreatBritain
Wales / Welsh
England & Wales
“Support for children with dyspraxia in the UK, specifically Wales”
Information Services and Systems
Boolean Searching - AND
librarian* AND cake*
Results will contain librarian/s AND cake/s
librarian cake
Information Services and Systems
OR
librarian* OR cake*Results will contain either librarian/s OR cake/s or
some results will contain both search terms
librarian cake
Information Services and Systems
NOT
librarian* NOT cake*
Results will contain librarian/s but NOT cake/s
librariancake
Information Services and Systems
Truncation
Asterisk to stand for any number of letters:
terroris* finds terrorism, terrorist, terrorists etc.bird* finds bird, birds, birding etc.p*diatric searches for pediatric or paediatric
Sometimes the ? or ! are used instead of the *
Information Services and Systems
Wildcards
Question mark often used to stand for a single character or none (can be useful for different spellings / word formations):
wom?n finds woman, womencolo?r finds color, colourcivili?ation finds civilisation and civilization
Sometimes the # or ! are used instead of the ?
Information Services and Systems
Phrase searching
Use quotation marks to search for a phrase. This allows you to search for the words appearing exactly as you input them e.g.
• “new labour”• “pesticide residues”• “mass media”
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SAME and NEAR
• Animal SAME test* 2,288 results• Animal NEAR/5 test* 1,741 results
Other databases may have • Adj (adjacent to)
Information Services and Systems
Search Order Databases, like WoS, interpret the search operators
in a fixed order of priority (regardless of the order they appear in your search terms):
• ( )• SAME / NEAR• NOT• AND• OR
Information Services and Systems
Search Order cont’d
You may need to use brackets to control the order in which your search terms are combined.
The OR operations (in brackets) are performed before the AND operations.
pesticides OR insecticides AND tomatoes
results would include all references to pesticides whether they mentioned tomatoes or not
(pesticides OR insecticides) AND tomatoes
Searches for pesticides or insecticides first and then combines these results with tomatoes
Information Services and Systems
Limits
• Date
• Language
• Document type
Information Services and Systems
SummaryToday we’ve looked at how to:
• Devise a search strategy.• Use Boolean operators to combine keywords and
create meaningful and effective database searches.• Use features of the Web of Science database.• Refine and limit searches to achieve more focussed
results.
Any queries after today please contact your subject librarian.