Habit 3: Search, Re-Search, and Re-Re-Search

There is no single search that will retrieve all of the sources you need to write your paper. Plan on conducting multiple searches, adding/replacing/deleting terms, limiters, and search fields to narrow and broaden your search. Use the identified key concepts and their synonyms to start. 

On the library homepage, look for the OneSearch search bar. OneSearch searches through almost all library databases for books and articles from academic journals, magazines, and newspapers; including Environment Complete and Science Full Text Select. Some databases are excluded from OneSearch, such as NexisUni newspapers, Science journal articles, and Statista statistical graphs. Find the full database list on the Databases tab. 

 

OneSearch Search Tips

Find the OneSearch search bar on the library homepage (look for the tabbed boxes on the right).

 

Tip 1: Start Broad

Start by searching just your main topic. This will retrieve general sources, which is a good place to start to: 1) get an overview of the discussion or debate and 2) collect additional terms that can be used to narrow (AND) or broaden (OR) your results. 

societal collapse OR civilization collapse

Try this: Searching with phrases between quotes will retrieve around 186 results. Without the quotation marks, you will retrieve around 4,305 results.  Try both to compare the type of results each search retrieves.

 

Tip 2: Open the Advanced Search to Narrow Your Focus

The Advanced Search provides three search bars connected by the AND command. Do not change this drop-down to OR. Think of each search bar as a concept box. Each new concept goes into a new concept box along with their synonyms, narrowing your search. Connect each synonymous term with the OR command to expand your search.

societal collapse OR civilization collapse

AND 

environmental degradation OR environmental damage

 

Try this: A search for societal collapse AND environmental degradation retrieves around 14 results. Adding synonymous terms connected by the OR commands increases results to around 141 results. 

 

Play around with different synonymous terms and see how the results change.

Try this: Change environmental degradation to water pollution (a specific instance) to retrieve around 31 results. Expand the search for this term by changing Select a Field to All Text and increase the number of results to around 210. 

 

You can also use this drop down to narrow results by requiring search terms occur in the source Title or Subject.

 

 

Tip 3: Use the Limiters (in the left column) to Narrow Results by Source Type, Publication Date, Subject, etc.

Limiting the 141 results to just:

• scholarly (peer reviewed) journals = around 71 articles
• those published in the last 10 years = around 86 sources
• those with the subject (about) anthropogenic effects on nature = 11 sources