Scholars Academy + First Year Scholars
Searching tips for Academic Databases
- A search is essentially a logic command that you are given the database. It will try to retrieve what you want based on the information you provide
- Each line is a seperate concept
- Words on each line should be synonymous, or like terms, and you seperate those with OR
- example: If I wanted any papers on the oilsands I could search:
- "oilsands" OR "tarsands"
- tar sands is an older term primarily used in literature coming fom the the US, but the information may be valuable to have
- example: If I wanted any papers on the oilsands I could search:
- Use quotation marks around multi-word phrases
- example. If I wanted to search for literature on head injuries I would type in "head injury"
- If I don't, the datase will do it's best to find all the literature in it's library containing the word "head" as well as anything about "injury" - and likely not all articles will be relevant
- example. If I wanted to search for literature on head injuries I would type in "head injury"
- Consider truncation. Using a special character at the end of the root of a word will allow the database to find suffix variances without you having to search each iteration of a word
- example: learn*
- learn, learns, learning, learnings, learned, learner, learners
- example: learn*
- On the second line, you put in your next set of terms.
- Using the word AND tells the database you need wish to read articles that contain your first concept and your second (and third, and fourth etc)
- When you AND the database has to find articles that satisfy your command, and your results list will be shorter
- example: sleeping (as a concept) has nothing to do with studying (as a concept), so you have to tell the database to create that meaningful link
Google Scholar Set Up (Reduces the Amount of Paywalls)
