How to search

Material 3
English III

How to search
Finding the relevant materials, and
especially the most important for your
purpose, is not easy
It required patience, detective skills, and
continued hard work.
Fortunately, in the digital age it is
possible to make much more rapid
progress than previously. But, you
should have a sound research strategy

Starting point of research

Keyword search in electronic resources (e.g.
GSW)
Reference list in the lecture note
Reference list in earlier thesis/papers
Reference list in textbooks
Review papers
each reference is placed in context, within
indication of importance
Reference list in research papers in recent
issues of relevant journal

Search Strategy
Build concept groups from your research topic
Develop a set of terms for each concept
group
Find synonyms
Decide which Boolean logic is needed, place a
brackets and combine concepts
Decide whether to use truncation or not
Choose the databases and use proper
research commands for each

Boolean (logical) operators

And operator
Retrieves records that include both term
Narrow your search
Used for terms or concepts that are not related
Or operator
Retrieves records that include either of the terms
Widens your search
Used for related terms or concept
Not operator
Retrieves records thet include one term but not another
term
Eliminates all the records containing the second term
Narrows your search
May eliminate relevant records

Truncation
Replace part of the word with a symbol, the search engine
will match anything for the missing part.
Truncation symbol can be used wither inside the word or at
the end of it.
Each database uses it own truncation symbols; the
asterisk* is the most common.
wom*n, finds woman and women
diet* finds diets, dietician, dietary, but also
diethylstilbestrol
plan*-finds plan, plans , planning, but also planet,
planetary
system*-finds system, systems
science-finds science, sciences

Search example

The spider approach

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The spider approach

Once you have found some relevant literature, look for:
Works that are cited in the papers you have found
(backward spider); note these has been put into
context for you by the papers authors
Works that cite the papers you have found (forwards
spider)
Use the forwards search of an electronic resource
such as GSW, Web of Science
Works by the same author (s)
Related articles links in the search results (sideways
spider)
Papers in the same journals