Undergraduate Research and Scholarship Guide

Click here to complete the post-class survey.

To use a database for research, you'll need to use Boolean logic: AND, OR, and NOT.

AND narrows a search, returning only results that have both search terms.

Puppies AND kittens returns results that only have both puppies and kittens within.

Use AND when you want your search to give you fewer, more focused results.

 OR broadens a search, returning results that feature either or all of the terms.

Puppies OR kittens returns results having to do with only puppies, only kittens, or both puppies and kittens.

Use OR when you want your search to give you more results.

NOT narrows a term to only feature one of your terms.

Puppies NOT kittens returns results that only have puppies, and none that have kittens.

Use NOT when you want to exclude a particular term, e.g. if a term can be used in another way.

Databases do not understand full sentences in the same way that search engines like Google and AI tools do. While a search engine tries to understand what you mean, a database will only return results that match exactly what you've asked, even if it's not what you meant.

To use keyword searches in a database, you'll need to pull the most important concepts from your research topic.

If my research topic has something to do with how invasive species are affecting agriculture in Hawaii, my key concepts would be invasive species, agriculture, and Hawaii. I could also include effect, but I'd want to be careful with this term, because it's one of many that could be used in the same context.

A fitting search may look like this: invasive species AND agriculture AND Hawaii.

An even better search would include synonyms for each term, separated by OR. invasive species AND (agriculture OR crops) AND (Hawaii OR Hawaiian Islands)

If I still needed to reduce how many results I was getting back, I could add in (effects OR impacts).

Knowledge check: What concepts would you pull out of the research topic below? Can you think of additional synonyms that you can use with each term?

Topic: How do college students utilize their academic libraries?

By the end of the session, you'll be able to:

•  Use Boolean logic.

• Download a citation from a database.

• Extract search keywords from a research topic.

• Discuss ethical considerations of AI.