Effective Searching: Part 2 - Broaden your search (Generic Web)

1. Effective Searching 2: Broaden your search

2. 1. Effective searching overview: key concepts
2. Broadening your Search
- synonyms, wildcards, truncation tools
3. Narrowing your search
- proximity connectors, phrase searching,
exclusions
4. Constructing your search
- grouping, search history, evaluating your
search
5. Citation Searching
Presentations summary

3. Effective Searching 2: Broadening your search
This short slide deck will provide an overview of
what you should consider when constructing
your search, to avoid missing any relevant
results.
It forms part 2 of a series covering some of the
tolls available to you to construct an effective
search.
Part 1 covered considering the key concepts
around which to structure your search.

4. Define your
information need
• What types
of resource
do you
need?
• Identify
where to
search.
• Identify
your key
concepts.
Broaden
your search
• Be compre-
hensive.
• Ensure
nothing is
missed un-
necessarily.
• “Cast your
nets wide.”
Narrow your
search
• Be focused.
• Exclude any
‘noise’.
• Ensure you
can use
your reading
time most
efficiently.
• “Use the
right nets.”
Evaluate
your results
• Identify
gaps.
• Assess un-
expected
results.
• Review
search
terms with
new knowl-
edge.
Make your
results work for
you
• Be efficient
with your
time.
• Search
alerts.
• Citation
searching.
Effective Searching 2: Broadening your search

5. Effective Searching 2: Broadening your search
We will cover:
(1) Alternative terms (Boolean connectors)
a) Synonyms
b) Changes in terminology
(2) Alternative spelling (Wildcards)
a) Francophone and American English
spellings
b) Style Guides
(3) Word stems (Truncation tools)

6. Effective Searching 2: Broadening your search
Let’s start with:
(1) Alternative terms (Boolean connectors)
a) Synonyms
b) Changes in terminology
(2) Alternative spelling (Wildcards)
a) Francophone and American English
spellings
b) Style Guides
(3) Word stems (Truncation tools)

7. Alternative terms 1: Synonyms
First, you should consider the different keywords
which might describe each of your key concepts
around which you are structuring your search.
For example, if the first key concept for your
research question is: teenagers

8. Synonyms: Using “OR”
teenager OR adolescent
Alternative terms 1: Synonyms

9. Synonyms: Using “OR”
… will return all results which include either the term teenager or the term
adolescent, as well as all results in which both terms are mentioned (and no
results in which neither are mentioned)
teenager adolescent
Alternative terms 1: Synonyms

10. Synonyms:
Using “OR”
… and can be
extended to
cover where
there may be
multiple
synonyms to
account for.
adolescent
teenager
juvenile
“young
person”
teenager
OR
adolescent
OR
juvenile
OR
“young person”
Alternative terms 1: Synonyms

11. Synonyms: Using “OR”
Many databases assume if don’t include the “OR” connector, you only want
results where ALL of the terms entered appear.
e.g. sddsfsdsdfsdfsdfsdfsdf
“If you want to search for pages that may have just one of several words,
include OR (capitalised) between the words. Without the OR, your results
would typically show only pages that match both terms.”
https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/136861?hl=en
Alternative terms 1: Synonyms

12. Synonyms: Using “OR”
Some databases assume if the “OR” connector isn’t present, you only want
results where the terms appear exactly next to each other, such as a phrase.
e.g. dffffffdfffffffffffffffffff
Example: Butterfly: Over 3,000 results
Lepidoptera: Over 3,000 results
Butterfly OR Lepidoptera: Over 3,000 results
Butterfly Lepidoptera: 51 results (as at 24th June 2019) e.g. butterfly (Lepidoptera)
Lepidoptera Butterfly: 131 results (as at 24th June 2019)
Alternative terms 1: Synonyms

13. Alternative terms 2: Changes in terminology
Remember, you “search process” is a journey. As
you explore a topic, your knowledge and
understanding changes. This can mean you
become aware of new keywords you may want
to incorporate into your search which at first you
were unaware of.
This might include changes in terminology over
time.

14. Changes in terminology: Using “OR”
“Mental retardation” OR
“Intellectual disability” OR
“Cognitive disability”
Alternative terms 2: Changes in terminology

15. Use of term “Mental Retardation” Use of term “Intellectual Disability”
Mental Retardation was replaced as the preferred term in UK and other academic publications from
1980s...
… but was still the preferred term in the US until the APA, and changes in US Federal Law, officially
changed terminology in 2013.
Alternative terms 2: Changes in terminology

16. Alternative terms 2: Changes in terminology
These charts show the frequency of the
differing terms in the literature over time.
We can see the decline in use of the phrase
“mental retardation” from about 2009…

17. “mental
retardation”
“intellectual
disability”
136
results
use
both
505
results
2,681
results
Publications in 2018 (Scopus data) But you may still
need to account
for use of “out-
dated”
terminology, even
in more recent
publications!
In this example,
over 15% of
possible results
from one year
alone could be
missed if only
using current
preferred
terminology.
Alternative terms 2: Changes in terminology

18. Effective Searching 2: Broadening your search
Now let’s look at:
(1) Alternative terms (Boolean connectors)
a) Synonyms
b) Changes in terminology
(2) Alternative spelling (Wildcards)
a) Francophone and American English
spellings
b) Style Guides
(3) Word stems (Truncation tools)

19. Alternative spellings
First, a caveat: the focus here will be on English
language publications. But the same can be
applied for searching in other languages and
multilingual publications.
It is often wise to try and account for any terms
which might be missed due to alternative ways
they could be written in the English language.

20. Think about Americanised and
Francophone word spellings:
• colour or color
• centre or center
• licence or license
• organised or organized
Alternative spellings

21. Style guides:
Guardian Tendinitis
Sunday Times Tendinitis OR Tendonitis
Sunday Telegraph Tendonitis
Alternative spellings

22. Alternative spellings
Failing to account for these can result in you not
seeing all of the results which might be
potentially relevant, just because of a difference
in spelling…

23. Via Flickr Creative Commons, by Pink Sherbert Photography. Original
available at http://www.flickr.com/photos/70873497@N02/6935006104/
Donut
Doughnut
- 10,055 results in Discover (as at 4th August 2020)
- 15,475 results in Discover (as at 4th August 2020)
- Either / Or = 25,150 results in Discover
Alternative spellings

24. Alternative spellings
… or might present the results in a different
order, effectively ‘hiding’ some of the results from
your immediate …

25. Style guides:
Guardian Tendinitis
Sunday Times Tendinitis OR Tendonitis
Sunday Telegraph Tendonitis
Alternative spellings

26. You could still use the “OR” connector, but a simpler solution is often to use a
WILDCARD to represent 0,1 or more alternative letters.
– organi?ation will find: organisation or organization
alternative letters
– labo?r will find: labor or labour
missing letters
– d?nut will find: donut or doughnut
multiple missing letters
Alternative spellings

27. A quick note on hyphens
Spider-man Batman Iron man
Be aware of hyphenated words…

28. A quick note on hyphens
How databases account for these in searches can vary, and you may need
to account for this.
Example (from assisting with Systematic Review):
“subjective wellbeing” OR “subjective well-being”
… worked better in some databases than
“subjective well?being”
… because in some cases, a wildcard only looked for an alternative or
missing alpha-numeric character (a-z, 0-9).
Don’t assume… test how the use of a wildcard works for your search, and
in each database you use.
Be aware of hyphenated words…

29. Effective Searching 2: Broadening your search
Now let’s look at:
(1) Alternative terms (Boolean connectors)
a) Synonyms
b) Changes in terminology
(2) Alternative spelling (Wildcards)
a) Francophone and American English
spellings
b) Style Guides
(3) Word stems (Truncation tools)

30. Word stems
You may also need to account for simply how an
author might have used the keyword you have
identified in their text...

31. • Truncation tools
– Word stems (truncation searching)
– negligen* will find:
“Police were accused of negligence”
“Police were accused of acting negligently”
“Police were accused of being negligent”
Word Stems

32. • Truncation tools
– Word stems (truncation searching) for plurals
Word Stems
In this example, video* might be intended to bring back all results
mentioning the terms video or videos….

33. • Truncation tools
– Word stems (truncation searching) for plurals
Word Stems
But a quick check shows it is returning more than just ‘video OR
videos’ (55 extra results in fact, which you may not want to have to
wade through)

34. • Truncation tools
– Word stems (truncation searching) for plurals
– Other results picked up with video*
• Video 615
• Videos 59
• Videotape, videolink etc. 55
– Lesson: be careful what extra terms you might
inadvertently include. Sometimes an ‘OR’
connector might work better for your search.
Word Stems

35. Summary
So in summary:
Broadening your search – Summary
Alternative terms understanding OR comprehension
Alternative spellings organi?ation
labo?r
Word stems negligen*
Terminology and symbols vary, depending on which
database or catalogue you are using. See our database
examples guide.

36. Effective Searching
Define your
information need
• What types
of resource
do you
need?
• Identify
where to
search.
• Identify
your key
concepts.
Broaden
your search
• Be compre-
hensive.
• Ensure
nothing is
missed un-
necessarily.
• “Cast your
nets wide.”
Narrow your
search
• Be focused.
• Exclude any
‘noise’.
• Ensure you
can use
your reading
time most
efficiently.
• “Use the
right nets.”
Evaluate
your results
• Identify
gaps.
• Assess un-
expected
results.
• Review
search
terms with
new knowl-
edge.
Make your
results work for
you
• Be efficient
with your
time.
• Search
alerts.
• Citation
searching.

37. Effective Searching 3: Narrow your search