Library

Search Strategies and Online Information Retrieval

R. Zidya
Email Address: rzidya@uzlib.uz.ac.zw
 Introduction

Information finding aids/access tools help you to discover

information
Information searching has to be systematic and organised
The web is vast
Information explosion and information overload
Scientific advancements
Information searching has to be fast and on cue
 Learning Outcomes

By end of this unit, students should be able to:-

Identify keywords from a research topic/problem
Use various search techniques to maximise the potential of each of
the words and phrases
Review and evaluate search results
Appreciate the importance of a search strategy
 Unit Requirements and Duration

Students are expected to complete a task at the end of the unit

Students are encouraged to take part in the practical sessions that
will further increase their information search skills
The unit will require 4 hours to complete
 Structure of the Unit

Online information retrieval tools

Types of information searches
Developing a search strategy
◦ Including search techniques
The application of search techniques electronic resources
 Online information retrieval tools

Library website - http://library.uz.ac.zw

Campus access
Off campus access
Search engines
Databases
 Types of Searches

Simple search
Advanced search
 Simple Search

Simple Search doesn’t modify the search page, it just adds a new
view on top, showing just those “traditional” search results provided
by the search engine. If you’d rather see the other results, too, you
can easily close the window.
 Advanced Search

Allows one to perform complex searches

Allows one to apply filters and parameters to a search query
Developing a Search Strategy
What is a search strategy?
•A systematic plan of conducting a search.
•An organised structure of key terms used to search a database.
•After you've selected your topic, come up with a research question, and do
some background reading,
•It is important to map out how you will go about searching library
databases, the library catalogue, or even search engines like Google
Scholar for research materials on your topic.
•Database searching is different from searching Google - databases cannot
interpret questions and phrases, hence it’s necessary to build a search
strategy to get the best results quickly.
Steps in formulating a Search
Strategy
Step 1: Identify the main concepts or ideas in your topic
Using the following topic as an example:

◦ Health implications on water pollution

The main concepts would be ;

Health………..Water……….Pollution
Steps in formulating a Search Strategy
Step 2: Find alternate words for your main concepts
You can find alternative keywords or phrases for your concepts through the
following:
oUse a thesaurus to identify synonyms.
oSearch for your concepts on a search engine like Google Scholar, scanning the
results for alternative words and phrases.
oExamine relevant abstracts or articles for alternative words and phrases
Examples of alternative keywords for the main concepts in Step 1 :
Health…diseases….illness…..bacterial infection
Water……dams………rivers……wells
Pollution…..contamination….. Infection….. adulteration
Steps in formulating a Search
Strategy
Step 3: Create your search statement

oOnce you have identified the concepts you want to search and have
carefully chosen your keywords, device how you will combine and
them into the search box of your selected search tool.
oThe following search techniques can be used to create an effective
search statement when searching in both research databases and web
search engines;
Using search techniques to create
your search statement
1. Phrase searching
oPhrase searching is a useful technique if you are searching for a term
that is more than one word.
oIf you are searching for a phrase and find you are getting some
irrelevant results, try putting your phrase in quotation marks.
oThis tells the academic database that you only want to see results
where the words appear next to each other in a sentence.
oThis can increase both the precision of your search and the relevance
of your results.
oExample: “sustainable development”
Using search techniques to create
your search statement
2. Boolean Operators
oYou can use Boolean Operators to combine your search terms
together to either narrow or broaden your search.
oThe main Boolean operators are OR, AND, and AND NOT (or just
NOT in some databases).
oThese will make your search both thorough and precise and produce
the most relevant search results.
oThe next slides will demonstrate how to use each of the operators;
Using search techniques to create
your search statement
Boolean Operator “OR”
oUse the operator OR to combine two or more alternative terms for the same concept.
oThis will give you results which contain all terms.
oUsing OR will increase your number of results and make your search more thorough
and comprehensive.

oIllustration for Operator “OR”

Using search techniques to create
your search statement
Boolean Operator “AND”
oYou can use the operator AND to combine terms for different ideas or concepts.
oThis will find only those results which contain BOTH terms.
oAdding AND will reduce your number of results and make your search more precise
and specific.

oIllustration for operator “AND”

Using search techniques to create
your search statement
Boolean Operator “AND NOT” (or just NOT)
oTo EXCLUDE a term that you don’t want in your results you can use the operator AND
NOT (some databases just use the word NOT).
oThis technique can be effective if you are getting a lot of results on an aspect of your
topic that you are not interested in.
oHowever, you may want to check your results to make sure you have not excluded
anything that is potentially useful.

oIllustration for operator “NOT”

Using search techniques to create your
search statement
3. Proximity Searching
oProximity searching allows you to search based on how closely two or more search terms
appear in the search results, most used when you are looking for concepts that might be
expressed by multiple different phrases.
oProximity operators are composed of a letter (N or W) or word (NEAR) and a number (to
specify the number of words appearing between your search terms). Remember, the lower the
number, the narrower the search.
oFor example, curriculum N3 theories would search for curriculum within 3 words of
theories, in any order.
oSo, curriculum W3 theories may pull up articles about curriculum design theories or
curriculum reform theories, but not theories of curriculum design or theories of curriculum
reform.
oHowever, it is important to keep in mind that different databases use different proximity
operators. Check the help menu of the database you're searching to find out what symbols it
uses.
Using search techniques to create
your search statement
4. Stop words
oStop words are frequently occurring, insignificant words that appear
in a database record, article or web page. Common stop words
include: a, an, the, in, of, on, are, be, if, into, which etc.
oMany databases ignore common words from your search statement.
If included, the database returns far too many results.
oIn some databases, you can use techniques to include stop words as
part of the search.
oSome databases use quotes around stop words. Example: Title
keyword= out "of" Africa retrieves title: Out of Africa
Using search techniques to create
your search statement
5. Truncation and Wildcards
oAlthough some databases will automatically search for variant spellings, mostly they will just
search for the exact letters you type in. Use wildcard and truncation symbols to take control of
your search and include variations to widen your search and ensure you don't miss something
relevant.
oA truncation symbol (*) retrieves any number of letters - useful to find different word endings
based on the root of a word. See examples below;
◦ Africa* will find africa, african, africans, africaans
◦ Agricultur* will find agriculture, agricultural, agriculturalist
oA wildcard symbol (?) replaces a single letter. It's useful for retrieving alternate spellings (i.e.
British vs American English) and simple plurals. See examples below;
◦ Wom?n will find woman or women
◦ Behavio?r will find behaviour or behavior
Hint: Not all databases use the * and ? symbols - some may use different ones (! instead of *, for
example), or not have the feature at all, so check the online help section of the database.
Steps in formulating a Search
Strategy
Step 4: Evaluate your search results
oAs results are retrieved, you can modified search statements based on
your information requirements.
oYou can expand retrieval by including broader terms and related
terms
oOr you can reduce retrieval substituting broader terms with narrower
terms
oYou can also modity your search using a different search technique
e.g. Use “AND” operator instead of “OR” to narrow your search.
oMost databases also have Limiters which cam be used to refine your
search as will be shown in the next slides;
Refining your search using Limiters
Refining your search using Limiters
 Activity
Congratulations for going through this section Developing a Search
Strategy!
You are now expected to finish by doing the following Quiz:
a. Which search technique is this? 1/4
oIt will only find results where the words in your search appear next to each other in a
sentence, and will make your search more specific:
b. Which search technique is this? 2/4
oIt will only find results which contain both your search terms, reducing the number of
results and making your search more precise and specific:
c. Which search technique is this? 3/4
oIt will exclude any terms that you want to remove from your search if you find you are
getting too many irrelevant results:
d. Which search technique is this? 4/4
oIt will find results containing all search terms, increasing the number of results and making
your search more thorough and comprehensive:
 Further Reading
Becker, B. W. (2018). Information literacy in the digital age: Myths and principles
of digital literacy. School of Information Student Research Journal, 7(2), 2.
Welsh, T. and Wright, M., 2010. Information literacy in the digital age: An
evidence-based approach. Elsevier.
Koltay, T., 2011. The media and the literacies: Media literacy, information
literacy, digital literacy. Media, Culture & Society, 33(2), pp.211-221.
Chisman, J.K., 1996. Teaching electronic information literacy: A how-to-do-it-
manual-edited by Donald Barclay. New York: Neal Schuman, 1995. 179p. ISBN
1-55570-186-8. LC 95-31401. The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 5(22),
p.401.
 Further Reading

Yates, S. and Lockley, E., 2020. Digital Engagement and Class: Economic, Social, and
Cultural Capital in a Digital Age.
Vechtomova, O., 2009. Introduction to Information Retrieval Christopher D. Manning,
Prabhakar Raghavan, and Hinrich Schütze (Stanford University, Yahoo! Research, and
University of Stuttgart) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Vechtomova, O., 2009. Book Review: Introduction to Information Retrieval by
Christopher D. Manning, Prabhakar Raghavan, and Hinrich Schütze. Computational
Linguistics, 35(2).
Bawden, D. and Robinson, L., 2002. Promoting literacy in a digital age: approaches to
training for information literacy. Learned Publishing, 15(4), pp.297-301.