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InfoSkills for Theology

InfoSkills @ TiU

1.1. ProQuest: Advanced Search page

On the ProQuest front page, click the Advanced Search tab.

This brings you to the Advanced Search page.

Search rules

  • Boolean operators
    • ProQuest uses an implicit AND operator when you run a search on two or more adjacent terms. For example, a search on healthy eating is the same as a search for healthy AND eating
      Note that ProQuest interprets the AND operator correctly, so you can use AND if you prefer to. 
    • Use OR to find any of the terms. 
    • Use NOT to exclude terms so that each search result does not contain any of the terms that follow it.
  • For more controlled searching, use parentheses to override the default operator precedence (AND, OR, NOT).
  • To search for an exact phrase, use quotation marks around your search: "healthy eating".
  • Truncation & Wildcards
    • The truncation character is the asterisk (*), used to replace one or more characters. The truncation character can be used at the end, or in the middle of a word (e.g. searching for econom* will find economy, economics, economical, etc.).
    • The wildcard character is the question mark symbol (?), used to replace any single character, either inside or at the right end of the word. (e.g. searching for ad??? will find added, adult, adopt).
  • When running a search, the search default is set to the field 'Anywhere' which searches the full record (all indexed fields) including the full text. Other search fields can also be chosen from the pull-down menu such as Document title - TI (article title), Abstract - AB, All subjects & indexing - SU (subject), Author - AU, and Publication title - PUB (journal title or book title).

Full text, Peer reviewed

  • By selecting Full Text, you can limit your search to only return items with full text. However, publications that are not full-text accessible in ProQuest may still be accessible through the TiU library. Therefore, it is wise to not check this limit.
  • Checking the Peer reviewed limit will restrict your search to only retrieve articles from peer reviewed journals. 

❸ Publication date

The Publication Date limit defaults to search all dates. Date limits include Last 12 months, Last 3 years, and Specific date range.

Other limits: Source type, Document type, Language

Limiting your search by marking any of the limits will only run your search to include those limits you selected.

  • The Source type limit refers to the publication type. This includes scholarly journals, books, conference papers, magazines, trade journals (professional journals, and blogs/podcasts/websites). 
  • The Document type limit is used to refer to the format of the full-text. This includes articles, blogs, books, company profiles, industry reports, market research, and many others. 
  • The Language limit is used to restrict your search to documents published in one or more languages. 

Advanced Search: See how it works

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