2. Finding Information: Teaching the
Strategies for Searching
• Current Issues in Searching
• The Information Landscape
• Search Strategies
• Additional Search Strategies
3. Finding Information: Teaching the
Strategies for Searching
• Finding relevant, high-quality information that
can be the basis of evidence-based nursing
practice is not as simple as the Google search
that most students are comfortable using when
they enter college or graduate school.
• There is no one single correct search strategy.
4. Current Issues in Searching
• According to the 2011 Pew Internet Health
Topics survey, 80% of Internet users, or 59%
of U.S. adults, look online for health
information
• The amount of information online can be
overwhelming and discouraging
• More than half of health information-related
resources have serious accuracy concerns.
• Many students are not equipped to access the
wealth of information in academic databases.
5. The Information Landscape
• Internet users are used to immediate
information availability
– The delay of making a photocopy or
entering an additional password can make
the difference in whether or not an article is
read.
– Researchers at every level admit that they
would rather use a less relevant and less
authoritative e-journal article than a more
relevant and more authoritative print article
6. The Information Landscape
• Libraries
– Used to be the “gatekeepers” of information
– Now they are limited by licenses, contracts
and costs associated with high quality
information
– The costs of serial subscriptions have been
increasing exponentially
– Open-access – calls for publishing models of
peer-reviewed research that distributes the
costs and profits more evenly
7. The Information Landscape
• Libraries
– There is debate whether being able to own
information gives unique benefits to
students over simply being able to access
information.
– Discovery systems – being able to search all
resources that a library has access to.
• Fairly new but important development
8. Search Strategies
• Many search strategies work in open search
engines (Google), point-of-care reference
sources (DynaMed), and general reference
sources (Credo Referece)
• Search Terms
– Students tend to use broad, long-form topics
of interest
– Keywords must be developed and searched
instead
– Most resources depend on literal words and
phrases
9. Search Strategies
• Keywords
– Express the concentrated essence of
important concepts
– Must address all of the concepts within a
question
– Use AND to search multiple keywords
• E.g. parent-nurse relationships AND
patient outcomes
10. Search Strategies
• Searching
– There is no perfect search, try different
numbers and combinations of keywords
– The search is flexible and can be thrown
away if necessary
– Many databases save search history
11. Search Strategies
• Searching
– Sometimes researchers use different
language than students so using OR can be
helpful
• E.g. Parent-nurse OR family-centered OR
parent-professional
• Each phrase describes the same core idea
12. Search Strategies
• Searching
– Using NOT can exclude concepts from the
search
• This is not always the best way to build a
search since many students do not know
enough about a subject to know for
certain that a specific topic is not relevant
to their search.
13. Search Strategies
• Searching
– “no results found”
– Students need to be encouraged to always
try again and not assume that there is no
research on a topic.
– Try different keywords or a different search
location
– Mining – using article references to further
searching and information gathering ability
14. Additional Search Strategies
• Keywords can also be used to limit results
based on a certain type of literature
– E.g. adding quantitative to the search limits
the search to only quantitative data
• There are also limiting tools built into the
databases to assist students in narrowing
down results
15. Conclusion
• Faculty can choose to teach and view search
strategies as a skill set that empowers students
to take responsibility for their own learning.
• Teaching students to be empowered, confident
searchers is the first step in training them to
start thinking critically about the information
they choose to use in their academic work,
their clinical practice, and throughout their
everyday lives
