Last week, you should have completed a few simple searches in your area and found four potential sources. This week, you’ll try a few advance searches for better results and find two new potential sources. You’ll record your search parameters, the number of results, your potential sources, and this week, you will also record subject terms for your two new sources.
This activity, and the other library search activities coming up, are intended to ensure you understand a few different search techniques, use reliable databases, and understand a few indicators of what makes a good search of the literature.
Conduct at least Three Advanced Searches. In each search:
- Use a boolean term to refine the search and improve results.
- Use limiters to further refine results.
- Refine each search until it shows less than 200 results.
- Note Your search MUST have 20 to 200 results for full credit in this area. If your first three searches do not, follow the #4 instructions below to try different searches and record the info until you have three searches with 20 to 200 results.
On your blog post, document your three advanced searches and list at least two new potential sources:
- Tell us which database(s) you used for each search.
- Be clear about what search words, boolean terms, and limiters you used for each search.
- Note how many results you had for each search.
- If you end up conducting additional simple or advanced searches to find the right terms to use for the three assigned searches, be sure to take the same notes on them to help you overall with your literature review.
- In at least two searches, create an APA style reference for one article you found that may prove useful.
- Note the subject terms associated with each source.
- Categorize your post as “Week 11 Blog post” include hashtags for your research area, use a unique title, and include at least one picture in your post.
- Your title could be mostly generic with just one or two terms that make it unique, such as your last name or initials.
What Are Subject Terms?
Subject terms are specific terms decided by a database and assigned to articles. They are different than the keywords you developed based on your research topic and different than “author-supplied keywords.” Below, you can see the Subject Terms highlighted in this screengrab of a database:
