InfoSkills for Humanities and Digital Sciences

Search rules

• Enter search terms in the Search Term box ❶.
  • The default is to search for ALL terms entered -- which is a Boolean AND search. For example, a search on youth violence is the same as a search for youth AND violence. This means that you don't have to use the AND operator within a row, but if you prefer to do so you can.
  • Use WCD's truncation and wildcard symbols to expand or focus searches.

    Symbols	Usage	Examples
    TRUNCATION *	Add the asterisk (*) to the end of a search term to retrieve variant endings. Search returns results with 0 or more characters in place of the truncation symbol. A minimum of three characters must precede the symbol.	connect* retrieves connect, connection, connectivity, etc. individual* retrieves individual, individuals, individualism, individuality
    WILDCARDS # and ?	The number sign (#) replaces one character in or at the end of a search term. A minimum of three characters must precede the symbol.	photograph# retrieves photograph, photographs (but not photographer) wom#n retrieves woman, women
    	The question mark (?) replaces 0 to 9 unknown characters in a search term.	lab?r retrieves labor, labour encyclop?dia retrieves encyclopedia, encyclopaedia

  • To search for an exact phrase, put quotation marks around your search terms: "youth violence".
  • For more controlled searching, use parentheses: prevent* ("youth violence" OR "juvenile delinquen*").

• Choose the field(s) you want to search in the Search Index box ➋. When conducting a general search, the keyword field is normally the best one to use. Other fields available from the pull-down menu include Title, Author, Abstract, Subject, and Source Title (=in many cases: journal title).
• Choose the appropriate operator from the operator box ➌ if you want to add more search terms to your search, for example, a particular author.
• If you need more search boxes for your search, click on Add row ➍.

Within Advanced Search, options to limit your search are available under 'Search Tools' at the bottom of the screen ➎. 

Limiters appear in the following order:

• Only return peer-reviewed articles;
• Open Access;
• Format (e.g., book, e-book, article, etc.);
• Language;
• Audience (juvenile or not juvenile)
• Publication year;
• Any content (e.g., fiction, non-fiction);
• Library holdings: Libraries Worldwide, Libraries in the Netherlands, Tilburg University Library.