Always think about different ways to say the same thing. Start with keywords to describe your topic, within results, read the abstract and look at the subject headings to identify additional keywords to use and revise the search (if needed).
Retrieve too many results? Limit to scholarly articles, limit words to abstract or subject.
Search Strategies:
| "wage gap" | "human rights" |
| "minimum wage" | "food insecurity" |
| "political participation" | "border security" |
| "voting rights" | "student loans" |
| environment* = environment or environments or environmental | immigra* = immigrant or immigrants or immigration |
| citizen* = citizen or citizens or citizenship | leader* = leader or leaders or leadership |
| student* = student or students | college* = college or colleges |
| recycl* = recycle or recycling | refugee* = refugee or refugees |
Using OR
When you use OR between search terms, the database will search for any of them. This is useful if there might be multiple ways to refer to your topic or when any of the words will do
"social media" or twitter or facebook
policy or policies
"food insecurity" or "food desert*" or "food security"
college or university
solution* or prevention
"health inequit*" or "health inequality" or "health equity"
lgbt* or homosexual* or lesbian* or transgender
Using AND
When you use AND between two search terms, the database will only show you search results that contain all of those search terms.
"school to prison pipeline" and solution*
"minmum wage" and gender
Put it all together:
"school to prison pipeline"
and
race or racial or ethnic*
--------------------------
"foster care" or "foster children"
and
"age out" or "aging out"
and
future or adulthood
-------
immigra*
and
border
and
policy or policies or legislation
-------
"food insecurity" or "food desert*" or "food security"
and
college* or universit*
and
student*
-----
Additional keywords:
solution*
program*
effect*
prevention
impact*
outcome*
law or legislation
policy or policies
In addition, you can search by a known author / or follow the author link in results
Searching is trial and error!
Take these two searches:
"health inequalit*" or "health inequit*" or "health equity"
and
lgbt* or homosexual* or lesbian* or transgender
OR
health
and
inequalit* or inequit* or equity or equitable
and
lgbt* or homosexual* or lesbian* or transgender
Each search will produce different results = there will be some overlap
