Topics
Selecting Key Words and
Concepts
Prepare for searching by identifying the central
concepts in your research question.
Computers are programmed to match strings of
characters and spaces and do not often understand
the natural language we use with each other. They
can't guess what you mean, don't "read"
subtexts, and are easily confused by ambiguity,
so clarify for them what you will be looking for.
Focus only on essential concepts.
"media coverage
of 9/11" |
Media cover events. Unless the
media caused the event, this term
is unnecessary. |
advantages
of home schooling over public schools |
Value words like "favorite," "advantage,"
or "better" are not useful if you
need to gather evidence to help you
make a decision or develop a solution. Don't
just grab an opinion or the "right"
answer off someone else's shelf. |
dissertations
about bioethics |
Many databases and search engines are programmed
to ignore common words that don't impact a
search. These are called "stopwords"
and typically include terms like "the,"
"from," "about," "when,"
etc. |
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