BRSU Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman
Memorial Library

Emma 102 Course Materials
Emma 102A
2 Faces of Searching with Google
Boolean & Phrase Searchinges
Intro. to Citations for Online Resources

Emma 102B
Credibility on the Web
Borrowed Words


Course Home Page

[Lesson Plan]

[Course Dev. Report]
Emma Goldman Memorial Library
8600 Kroptkin Pike
Winstanley, OR 97481
(541) 262-5600


[210 Home]
[MLIS Home]
[GDS Home]
Emma Goldman Memorial Library Reference Services
Catalog | Reference | Instruction | Special Services | Service Policy | Library Home
 

Emma 102: Internet Search Engines and Academic Research

Guide to Boolean & Phrase Searching

Quick Summary
  • AND narrows your search, retrieving fewer but more precise results that must contain all key concepts or terms
  • OR expands your search, retrieving more results with any of your similar key concepts or terms
  • NOT narrows your search, eliminating material that is irrelevant, and should be used carefully

Despite its intimidating name, Boolean search techniques are very easy to learn and give you the power to narrow your search to a reasonable number of potentially useful documents thereby increasing your likelihood of success.

Boolean logic can be used in searching library catalogs, online databases and Internet search engines to help you control your search and find exactly what you are looking for.

There are three main Boolean operators: AND, OR and NOT.

AND

  • means "I want only documents that contain both words."
  • narrows a search
  • can be used to link multiple terms together: poverty AND crime AND drug abuse
  • the more terms or concepts you combine with AND, the fewer
  • records you will retrieve

and

[Next Page >>]