Developing a search strategy - Monash University



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E-Learning Module

Developing a search strategy

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Description

Information Caption: This tutorial is designed to guide you through the principal steps of effective database searching.

This activity should take approximately 10 minutes to complete.

Table of Contents

Module introduction

Module objectives

Help instructions

Topic 1

Analyse your research topic

Identifying the concepts

Synonyms and related terms

Quiz 1: Synonyms and related terms

Phrases truncation and spelling

Truncation and spelling

Topic 2

Principles of Boolean searching

Search options: AND, OR , NOT

Using OR: Broadening the search

Using OR in the databases (animations)

OR - Ebsco

OR - Factiva

OR - Google

Using AND: Combining the concepts

Using AND in the databases (animations)

AND - Ebsco

AND - Factiva

AND - Google

Using AND and OR together

AND and OR - Ebsco (animation)

AND and OR - Factiva (animation)

AND and OR - Google (animation)

Using NOT: Excluding a term

Some extra search tips

Quiz 2: Broadening your search

Quiz 3: Narrowing your search

A final word

More information

Module introduction

Image : Module introduction showing frustrated student leaning over a laptop and 3 questions

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Information caption:

• Can’t make sense of the essay question?

• Overwhelmed by too many search results?

• Can’t find enough relevant material?

Module objectives

Image : Module objectives showing female student using a laptop

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Information caption: In this tutorial you will learn how to:

• analyse your research topic and identify terms to use in a database search for relevant articles

• combine these terms with Boolean operators to create a search statement

• use this search statement in various database searches

Help instructions

Image : Help instructions

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Information caption:

• You will find both information and interactive activities

• There will be instructions on each screen

• If there are no other instructions please press next to continue to the next screen

Analyse your research topic

Image : Topic 1 introductory screen.

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Information caption:

Analyse your research topic

Scenario: Your lecturer has set the following essay topic:

Discuss how social media is affecting the recruitment practices of employers.

You are required to refer to relevant academic journal articles and news articles.

Understanding the topic

Image : includes a male student reading a book and three buttons to click for more information

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Information caption: Before you start searching a database for journal or news articles, make sure that you understand the topic and what you are being asked to do.

Instruction caption: Click each item below to read more

Feedback caption:

Button: Background reading

Background reading is important for

• gaining an overview of the research topic and an understanding of relevant concepts

• identifying potential search terms

Your background reading may also point to further initial sources of relevant information.

When researching for a unit assignment be sure to read any relevant readings your lecturer has recommended as well as the relevant sections of the unit textbook(s).

Button: Definitions

Check an encyclopedia, dictionary or relevant textbook for precise definitions of terms.

Two examples of leading dictionaries which have online versions are Macquarie Dictionary and Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Both include a definition of “social media”.

Library guides often list subject-specific or specialist encyclopedias, such as those comprising Blackwell Reference Online.

Button: What are you being asked to do?

Be clear about the actions required to respond to the topic.

Discuss – consider the aspects of the topic and provide a point of view, based on authoritative evidence.

Depending on the topic, you may be asked to “analyse”, “compare and contrast”, “evaluate” etc.

If you are unsure of exactly what is required, consult your lecturer or tutor, or a Library Learning Skills Adviser.

For this topic you are also required to refer to relevant academic journals and new articles, as evidence in your response.

Identifying the concepts

Image : Quiz screen showing the essay topic

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Information caption: What are the key concepts in this essay question?

Instruction caption: Click on the key terms in the topic

Information caption: Topic sentence: Discuss how social media is affecting the recruitment practices of employers

Feedback caption: Key terms are social media, recruitment and employers

Terms which are not key terms are discuss, affecting, practices.

Synonyms and related terms

Image : Synonyms and related terms

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Information caption: The key terms alone may not be enough to form a successful search strategy. Use synonyms or related terms or phrases, which will allow you to create a more comprehensive search.

Instruction caption: Point the curser at each item below to show some possible alternative terms

Information captions:

Social media: social networking sites, online social networks, Facebook

Recruitment: recruiting selection hiring

Employers: employees, human resources, staff

Quiz 1: Synonyms and related terms

Image : Matching related terms quiz

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Information caption: The three terms in the essay question may not be enough to produce a successful search result. Using synonyms of related terms (alternative words and phrases) will help widen the search,

Instruction caption: Click on the boxes to match the alternative terms with the terms from the essay topic. Then click Submit. Click Clear to start again

Instruction caption: Click press next or back to continue

Feedback caption:

a) Social Media - Facebook is a social media service

- social networking sites is an alternative phrase

- online social networks is an alternative phrase

b) Employers - is related to enterprises and also to businesses

c) Recruitment - is closely related to “staff selection”, recruiting and hiring.

For each of the three key terms there may also be other related terms which have not been listed here.

Phrases, truncation and spelling

Image : Female student deep in thought and click buttons for definitions

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Instruction caption: click each item below to read more

Information caption:

Phrases: two or more words used together to form a single concept

(e.g. social media)

Phrase searching can help to narrow your search.

Some databases automatically treat a string of words as a phrase, and search for an exact match for that phrase. Other databases search for the words individually, which results in a broader and less precise search.

You can ensure a phrase search by enclosing the phrase in double quotation marks.

Example “social media”

In some databases you can select a search option to specify that the entered words are to be searched as a phrase.

Truncation: Sometimes you may want to broaden a search by abbreviating a search term to its stem and then searching for its various endings.

In many databases you can use a truncation symbol to represent these endings. The most common truncation symbol is the asterisk (*).

Terminology and spelling: The articles and other content in a database are usually collected from a wide range of publishers, so expect spelling and terminology to vary according to the origin of the information.

For example

spelling: organisation/organization

behavior/behaviour

terminology: primary school /elementary school

In addition to truncation, some database search engines can allow for spelling variations within a word, with wildcard characters.

e.g. Entering wom?n will find both woman and women, helping to broaden your search.

Truncation and spelling

Image : Truncation and spelling information

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Information caption: truncate a search term to search for the root or stem word with all its various endings:

Instruction caption: Point the cursor at the terms below

Feedback caption: Recruit* : recruit, recruitment, recruiting …

Information caption: For search terms with multiple spellings you can often use a wildcard symbol:

Feedback caption: behavio?r : behaviour, behaviour

Principles of Boolean searching

Image : Introductory screen for Topic 2: Principles of Boolean searching.

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Information caption:

• Most databases require you to group your terms in particular ways

• Boolean logic refers to the way in which you combine terms to create a search statement

• The search statement includes or more of the three Boolean operators: AND, OR, NOT

Search options – AND, OR, NOT

Image : Boolean operations AND, OR, NOT

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Information caption: Use Boolean logic to create an effective search strategy linking the key terms

AND, OR, NOT

Using OR: Broadening the search

Image : Using OR: broadening the search

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Image: Three green overlapping circles (a Venn diagram), with each circle representing the results of a database search on each of the three terms.

Information caption: As we have already seen, there are usually various ways of describing a term or concept, and depending on the database you are using, or the origin of the information, the terminology and spelling may vary.

Use OR to widen your search and catch the variant terms in a single search.

Instruction caption: Click the terms below to see the results of an actual database search for: “social media” OR “social networking sites” OR “online social networking”

The numbers represent the number of results found for each individual concept.

Feedback caption: Clicking on the term “social media” = 9,748 results

Clicking on “social networking sites” = 1,196 results

Click on “online social networking” = 743 results

The coloured area (total area of each circle) represents the total for the three concepts, which is 12,008 unique results.

Using AND: Combining the concepts

Image : Using AND: Combining the concepts.

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Image: 3 pale blue overlapping circles (a Venn diagram), with each circle representing the results of a database search on each of the 3 concepts.

The overlapped areas are a darker shade.

Information caption: We can use AND to indicate that all three terms from the essay question must be included in our search results.

This is expressed as: “social media” AND recruitment AND employers

This is a powerful way of focusing your search; that is reducing the number of results and making them more relevant.

Instruction caption 1: Click on the terms to see the results of an actual database search when combining: “social media” AND recruitment AND employers.

Feedback captions: clicking on the term social media” = 9,681 results

Clicking on the term recruitment = 78,834 results

Clicking on the term employers = 106,386 results

Instruction caption 2: click on overlapping areas of the circles for more information.

Feedback captions 2: 323 = the number of results which include “social media” AND recruitment

5,635 = the number of results which include employers AND recruitment

149 = the number of results which include ‘social media” AND employers

32 = the number of results which include all 3 terms. These are the most likely to be relevant to the topic.

Using NOT: Excluding a term

Image : Using NOT: Excluding a term

Image shows two overlapping circles, one red, one blue; the overlapping area is purple. The image represents the sets of results retrieved by searching on the terms “social media” NOT facebook.

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Information caption: NOT is used much less frequently than AND and OR, but can be used very effectively to exclude unwanted terms.

NOT should always be used with caution, as results which include both the desired and unwanted terms will be excluded. The search “social media” NOT facebook produces the set of results depicted by the red area.

The intersecting area contains results which have both terms, but using NOT excludes these records, even though some may also include useful information on social media other than facebook.

However, if you were searching for information about Melbourne, but not about Melbourne in Florida, you could search for Melbourne NOT Florida to usefully exclude any irrelevant information, since these topics are very distinct.

Some extra search tips.

Image : Some extra search tips.

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Information caption: Some databases require the Boolean operators to be in upper case (AND, OR, NOT). If in doubt, consult the online help for this and other information on correctly structuring and entering a search in that database, or ask a librarian.

Although Google and Monash Search allow natural language searching,

for best results avoid directly typing your essay topic in the search box. Decide on the topic’s key terms and use Boolean searching instead.

Quiz 2: Broadening your search

Image : Tick the box quiz: “Broadening your search”

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Information caption: There are a number of ways you might increase the number of relevant results if you didn’t get enough in your first search

Instruction caption: Based on what has been covered in this module select all the options that would broaden your results

A) Check that you are searching a database relevant to the topic

B) Check for spelling mistakes or other errors in entering the search terms

C) Add a term (using AND)

D) Add a synonym or alternative term with OR

E) Make sure you are using the Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) correctly

F) Use truncations to find variations of your terms

Submit

Feedback caption: A), B), D) E) F) – Correct –any one of these options would help to improve the number of relevant results from your search. Click anywhere or press ‘y’ to continue.

C) Incorrect – all options except C will result in a broader search.

Click anywhere or press ‘y’ to continue.

Instruction caption 2: Please complete the quiz before continuing.

Quiz 3: Focusing your search

Image : Tick the box quiz: Focusing or narrowing your search.

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Information caption: If your search resulted in too many records, you will need to focus or narrow the search to achieve a smaller and more relevant set of results.

Instruction caption: Based on what has been covered in this module select all the options that would narrow the results.

A) Limit your search by date, document type or language

B) Remove a synonym (or alternative terms)

C) Add another concept or key term using AND

D) Use phrase searching where relevant

E) Search using more specific terms

F) use NOT to eliminate an aspect of the topic you are not interested in

Submit

Feedback caption: A), B), C), D), E), F) Correct - any of these options would help to reduce and focus the number of relevant results from your search, but some will do so more effectively than others.

.

If not all the boxes were ticked: Incorrect - all of these options would help to reduce and focus the number of relevant results from your search, but some will do so more effectively than others..

.

A final word...

Image : A final word…

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Information caption: Congratulations on completing “Developing a search strategy”!

You have been introduced to the steps for converting a research topic or question into an effective database search strategy:

1. Understand the topic/question. Clarify concepts, definitions, and what you are being asked to do.

2. Identify the key terms, and alternative expressions that will help to broaden the search and increase the possible number of useful results.

3. Use Boolean operators (especially OR and AND) to construct a search statement.

4. Perform the search and evaluate its results, looking for ways to increase the relevance of your subsequent searches. The tutorial included examples of several databases to show how search statement entry can differ between interfaces.

More information

Image : More information

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Information caption: We hope that you found this activity useful.

For further information on library resources click links below.

Feel free to visit the library information point for further help.

Library home page

Databases

Library guides

Research & Learning Online

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