Because we have access to so much information these days, it can be overwhelming to perform a search and get hundreds or maybe thousands of results. On the other hand, it is also frustrating to search for a topic and find nothing. The techniques below can be used to refine or limit your searches. All of them work in most search engines and periodical databases; however, you should always check the online help for the search engine or database to see if the database supports the type of searching you are doing. Have questions? Ask a librarian for assistance.
Boolean Operators
Boolean operators are words that you can use to narrow or broaden a search. Sometimes you may need to type these words in all capital letters for the search engine or database to recognize them. Check the help section of the database to know how you should enter the words.
| A search for . . . | Finds documents with. . . |
| television AND violence | both television and violence. |
| fiction OR literature | at least one of the words. |
| roasts AND NOT beef | the word "roast" but not beef. |
| peanut NEAR butter | the words "peanut" and "butter" within a specified number of words of each other. |
Other Searching Techniques
| Technique | Example | Explanation |
| Phrase Searching | "hypertext transfer protocol" | Quotations specify that words must be found together as a phrase. |
| Nesting | Southern AND (fiction OR literature) | Use parentheses to group complex Boolean phrases. The example finds both Southern and fiction and also Southern and literature or both. |
| Truncation | music* | Use an * or ? to truncate a word to find all forms of the word. For example, music* finds musical, musician, music, etc. |
| Include Term | +altruism +causes research | Documents must contain the words "altruism" and "causes" but not necessarily "research" |
| Exclude Term | impeachment Clinton -Johnson | Documents must not contain the name "Johnson" |
