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Searching 101: Tips that every college student should know

Or I could show you

and let the numbers

speak for themselves.

I could tell you all about these

awesome search strategies.

I could go on and on about

how they’re going to save you time

and energy and frustration.

Why you shouldn’t type your

thesis/topic into a search box

Many search engines/databases don’t

understand phrases or sentences

When they don’t understand,

search engines and databases

either give up or try to

compensate by guessing your

keywords for you. Either way,

you’re probably not going to

get the information you want.

This search focused just on Hindu rites and

rituals and didn’t bring back any results about

the American part of our topic.

Sentences confuse searches

Use keywords instead!

Keywords force you to break down your topic

into more manageable pieces

This makes it easier to search for specific information.

Finding relevant resources will be much easier!

It also makes you synthesize and draw your OWN conclusions.

But a single keyword isn’t enough!

One keyword by itself makes for a very broad search.

To be included in the result list, all a website or resource has

to do is mention your keyword one time! There’s simply too

much information out there – we have to be more specific

about what we want to find.

How to combine keywords

AND OR Adds another search criteria

Decreases the number

of search results

Makes the search narrower and

more specific

Great for helping you get back

results that are relevant

Gives the search another option

Increases the number

of search results

Makes the search broader and

more vague

Great when you want to use two

synonymous keywords

Using “and”

One keyword: About 1.25 billion results

Two keywords with AND: 1,138,000,000 less than one keyword

Three keywords with AND: 1,248,970,000 less than one keyword

110,970,000 less than two keywords

Four keywords with AND: 1,249,834,000 less than one keyword

111,834,000 less than two keywords

864,000 less than three keywords

Using “or”

Keywords alone: Ritual: 38,300,000

Rite: 33,800,000

Keywords with OR: 65,700,000 more than ritual

70,200,000 more than rite

Keywords alone: Funny website: 291,000,000

Humorous website: 10,600,000

Keywords with OR: 19,000,000 more than funny website

299,400,000 more than humorous website

Why where you search matters: Number of results

Google: About 1.25 billion results

Google Scholar: 1,247,730,000 less than Google

Academic Search Complete

Research database:

1,249,774,687 less than Google

2,044,687 less than Google Scholar

Why where you search matters: Quality of results

Wikipedia page vs.

scholarly article Databases and journals

have already done a bit of

evaluation for you: you

can trust that their

information is quality.

When you use a search

engine or Wikipedia, you

have to evaluate your

resources more carefully.

Make the Internet work for you

.edu hosted by an educational institution

(K-12 school or college/university)

.org hosted by an organization

.gov hosted by the government

(local, state, or federal)

Limit your searches by domain and get back

better results without sorting through junk. You can tell a search engine that you only want results

from websites with a certain domain (.edu, .org, .gov)

Bring it all together:

Congratulations!

You successfully finished the library tutorial:

Searching 101

If you have any questions about this tutorial,

please get in touch with Pilgrim Library or

email adearmond@defiance.edu.

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