EBSCO
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND apples | narrow | will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| NOT | surf NOT web | exclude | will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| W# | animal W3 therapy | proximity and order | Within: specifies the order of search words and their proximity to each other within an article. Animal W3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, etc. |
| N# |
animal N3 therapy |
proximity | Near: will search for terms that have a specified distance between each other and are in any order. Animal N3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, therapy animal, therapy using animals, therapy animal, etc. |
| quotation marks | "San Francisco" | exact phrase | use around two or more words to find articles that include that specific phrase. |
| asterisk | educat* | truncation and wildcard |
Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc.The asterisk can be used at the end (right-hand truncation) or in the middle of a word. You can also use an asterisk between two words to match any single word. For example, a search for midsummer * dream will match the phrases midsummer night’s dream and midsummer day’s dream. |
| question mark | wom?n | wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
| hashtag | colo#r | wildcard | Use the hashtag (#) when an alternate spelling might contain an extra character. For example, type colo#r to find all records containing color or colour. |
Order of operation: AND, OR
Additional details can be found on these EBSCO guides:
Boolean Operators
Proximity Searching
Wildcards
Gale
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND applies | narrow | will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| NOT | surf NOT web | exclude | will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| W# | animal W3 therapy | proximity and order | Adjacent: specifies the order of search words and their proximity to each other within an article. Animal W3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, etc. |
| N# |
animal N3 therapy |
proximity | Near: will search for terms that have a specified distance between each other and are in any order. Animal N3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, therapy animal, therapy using animals, therapy animal, etc. |
| quotation marks | "San Francisco" | exact phrase | use around two or more words to find articles that include that specific phrase. |
| asterisk |
educat* |
truncation |
Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. |
| question mark | wom?n | truncation and wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Can be used in the middle or at the right end of a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
| exclamation point | colo!r | truncation and wildcard | An exclamation point (!) stands for one or no characters and is especially useful when you want to match the singular and plural of a word but not other forms. For example, product! matches product and products but not productive or productivity. The exclamation point can also be used inside a word to match certain variant spellings. For example, colo!r matches both color (American) and colour (British). |
Order of operation: proximity operators, NOT, AND, OR
Complete guide to Gale can be found online.
HeinOnline
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND applies | narrow | Will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms. The AND operator is applied by default; for example cat AND dog produces the same results as cat dog. |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | Will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| NOT | surf NOT web | exclude | Will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| quotation marks | "peanut butter" | exact phrase | use around two or more words to find articles that include that specific phrase. |
| quotation marks and tilde combo |
"debt relief IMF"~10 |
proximity | To search for documents containing two or more terms that appear within a certain distance of each other, put quotation marks around the terms followed by a tilde (~) and a number to indicate the maximum number of words apart that the terms can be. "debt relief IMF~10 retrieves documents containing the terms debt and relief and IMF within ten words of one another. |
| w/# | debt w/10 relief | proximity | To find two single terms within a certain number of words of each other in a document, use w/# between the terms. |
| w/s | debt w/s relief | proximity | Use w/s between single terms to find results that contain the terms within approximately the same sentence. |
| w/p | debt w/p relief | proximity | Use w/p between single terms to find results that contain the terms within approximately the same paragraph. The syntax defines a paragraph as within 75 words. |
| asterisk |
educat* |
truncation |
Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. |
| question mark | wom?n | wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
| tilde | color~ | fuzzy searching | Use fuzzy searches to search for terms similar in spelling to another term. Color~ retrieves color and colour. |
| caret symbol | cat^7 dog | relevance boosting | Users can increase the relevance of one term in a multiple-term query by raising the term’s “boost factor.” Raise a term’s boost factor by appending a caret symbol (^) and a number (the boost factor). For example, entering cat^7 dog gives the term cat seven times more relevance than the term dog. |
Complete guide to HeinOnline can be found online.
Ignacio
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND apples | narrow | will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| AND NOT | surf AND NOT web | exclude | will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| quotation marks | "San Francisco" | exact phrase | use around two or more words to find articles that include that specific phrase. |
| asterisk | educat* | truncation | Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. |
| question mark | wom?n | wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
Complete guide to Ignacio can be found online.
JSTOR
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND apples | narrow | will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| NOT | surf NOT web | exclude | will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| tilde symbol | "animal therapy"~3 | proximity | Proximity searching: JSTOR search allows you to find terms that are within a set number of words of each other using the tilde (~) symbol. "animal therapy"~3 will retrieve results with the terms animal and therapy within three words of each other. You can replace "3" with a different number of words. |
| caret symbol |
cat^7 dog |
relevance boosting | Search results are listed in order of relevance. Users can increase the relevance of one term in a multiple-term query by raising the term’s “boost factor.” Raise a term’s boost factor by appending a caret symbol (^) and a number (the boost factor). For example, entering the query cat^7 dog gives the term cat seven times more relevance than the term dog. |
| quotation marks | "San Francisco" | exact phrase | Use quotation marks around two or more words to retrieve results that include that specific phrase. |
| tilde symbol at end of word | dostoyevsky~ | fuzzy search | You can find words with spellings similar to your search term by using the tilde (~) symbol at the end of a search term. For example, dostoyevsky~ helps find items with dostoyevsky, as well as variant spellings like dostoevsky, dostoievski, dostoevsky, dostoyevski, dostoevskii, dostoevski, etc. |
| asterisk | educat* | truncation | Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. |
| question mark | wom?n | wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
Complete guide to JSTOR can be found online.
NewsBank
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND apples | narrow | will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| NOT | surf NOT web | exclude | will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| ADJ# | animal ADJ3 therapy | proximity and order | Adjacent: specifies the order of search words and their proximity to each other within an article. Animal ADJ3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, etc. |
| NEAR# |
animal NEAR3 therapy |
proximity | Near: will search for terms that have a specified distance between each other and are in any order. Animal NEAR3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, therapy animal, therapy using animals, therapy animal, etc. |
| quotation marks | "San Francisco" | exact phrase | use around two or more words to find articles that include that specific phrase. |
| asterisk | educat* | truncation | Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. |
| question mark | wom?n | wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
Nexis Uni
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND applies | narrow | will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| AND NOT | surf AND NOT web | exclude | will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| pre/# | animal pre/3 therapy | proximity and order | Pre: specifies the order of search words and their proximity to each other within an article. Animal pre/3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, etc. |
| w/# |
animal w/3 therapy |
proximity | Within: will search for terms that have a specified distance between each other and are in any order. Animal w/3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, therapy animal, therapy using animals, therapy animal, etc. |
| quotation marks | "San Francisco" | exact phrase | use around two or more words to find articles that include that specific phrase. |
| asterisk | educat* | truncation | Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* would retrieve educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. |
| question mark | wom?n | wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
Order of operation: OR, proximity operator, AND, AND NOT
Complete guide to Nexis Uni can be found online.
Ovid
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND applies | narrow | will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| NOT | surf NOT web | exclude | will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| ADJ# |
animal ADJ3 therapy |
proximity | Near: will search for terms that have a specified distance between each other and are in any order, in a sentence or in a paragraph. Animal ADJ3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, therapy animal, therapy using animals, therapy animal, etc. ADJ# does not cross paragraphs. |
| phrase searching | peanut butter | exact phrase | If you enter multiple words (without any commands/operators between them), Ovid will search for the words as an exact phrase. |
|
asterisk question mark |
educat* educat? |
truncation |
Use an asterisk (*) or question mark (?) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. |
|
asterisk# question mark# |
econom*2 econom?2 |
limited truncation | Use an asterisk and number (or a question mark and number) for limited truncation: a number can be entered next to the asterisk to restrict to a certain number of characters. Econom*2 retrieves economy and economic but not economies, economical, economist, etc. |
| hashtag | wom#n | truncation or wildcard | Use a hashtag (#) to replace exactly one letter in a word. Can be used in the middle or at the right end of a word. Wom#n retrieves woman and women. |
| question mark | flavo?r | truncation or wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace zero or one letter in a word. Can be used in the middle or at the right end of a word. Flavo?r retrieves flavor and flavour. |
Order of operation: Ovid processes query and set operators from left to right.
Complete guide to Ovid can be found online.
Proquest
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND applies | narrow | will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| NOT | surf NOT web | exclude | will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
|
PRE/# p/# |
animal PRE/3 therapy | proximity and order | Adjacent: specifies the order of search words and their proximity to each other within an article. Animal PRE/3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, etc. |
|
NEAR/# n/# |
animal NEAR/3 therapy |
proximity | Near: will search for terms that have a specified distance between each other and are in any order. Animal NEAR/3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, therapy animal, therapy using animals, therapy animal, etc. |
| quotation marks | "San Francisco" | exact phrase | use around two or more words to find articles that include that specific phrase. |
| asterisk |
educat* econom[*2] |
truncation and wildcard |
Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. The asterisk can be used at the end (right-hand truncation) or in the middle of a word. The default maximum number of characters that will be retrieved is 5. Use an asterisk and number in brackets [*2] for limited truncation: a number can be entered next to the asterisk to define how extensive the truncation should be. The max number supported is 20. |
| question mark | wom?n | truncation and wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Can be used in the middle or at the right end of a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
Order of operation: PRE, NEAR, AND, OR, NOT
Complete guide to Proquest can be found online.
Sage
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND applies | narrow | Will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms. The AND operator is applied by default; for example cat AND dog produces the same results as cat dog. |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | Will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| NOT | surf NOT web | exclude | Will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| quotation marks | "peanut butter" | exact phrase | use around two or more words to find articles that include that specific phrase. |
| quotation marks and tilde combo |
"debt forgiveness"~10 |
proximity | To search for documents containing two or more terms that appear within a certain distance of each other, put quotation marks around the terms followed by a tilde (~) and a number to indicate the maximum number of words apart that the terms can be. "debt forgiveness"~10 retrieves documents containing the terms debt and forgiveness within ten words of one another. |
| asterisk |
educat* |
truncation or wildcard |
Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. The asterisk can be used at the end (right-hand truncation) or in the middle of a word. |
| question mark | wom?n | truncation or wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Can be used in the middle or at the right end of a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
| tilde | dostoyevsky~ | fuzzy searching | To construct a query that includes a term for which multiple spellings may exist, use the fuzzy search feature by appending a tilde (~). entering the term dostoyevsky~ returns documents containing the variants dostoevsky, dostoievski, etc. |
| caret symbol | cat^7 dog | relevance boosting | Search results are listed in order of relevance. Users can increase the relevance of one term in a multiple-term query by raising the term’s “boost factor.” Raise a term’s boost factor by appending a caret symbol (^) and a number (the boost factor). For example, entering the query cat^7 dog gives the term cat seven times more relevance than the term dog. |
Order of operation: AND, OR
Complete guide to Sage can be found online.
Scopus
| Command | Example | Function | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| AND | organic AND apples | narrow | will narrow searches by showing only results with both terms |
| OR | cat OR feline | broaden | will broaden searches by showing results with either or both terms |
| AND NOT | surf AND NOT web | exclude | will narrow search by by excluding results with specific terms |
| PRE/N | animal PRE/3 therapy | proximity and order | Adjacent: specifies the order of search words and their proximity to each other within an article. Animal PRE/3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, etc. |
| W/N |
animal W/3 therapy |
proximity | Near: will search for terms that have a specified distance between each other and are in any order. Animal W/3 therapy retrieves animal therapy, animal based therapy, animal assisted play therapy, therapy animal, therapy using animals, therapy animal, etc. |
| quotation marks | "heart-attack" | fuzzy search | Quotations marks will search for fuzzy phrases. It will also search for both singular and plurals (with some exceptions). Wildcards can be used. “heart-attack” will search for heart-attack, heart attack, heart attacks, and so on. |
| curly brackets | {heart-attack} | exact phrase | Curly brackets will search for a specific phrase. It limits the search to only the specified character string. {heart-attack} will only search for heart-attack. |
| asterisk | educat* | truncation | Use an asterisk (*) to find a root word plus all the words made by adding letters to the end of it. Educat* retrieves educate, educated, educating, education, educator, educators, educational, etc. |
| question mark | wom?n | wildcard | Use a question mark (?) to replace a single letter in a word. Wom?n retrieves woman and women. |
Order of operation: OR, AND, AND NOT
A Scopus Search Guide is available online.
Order of Operation
You can enclose search terms and their operators in parentheses to specify the order in which they are interpreted. Information within parentheses is read first, then information outside parentheses is read next. For example, when you enter (pet OR animal) AND therapy, the search retrieves results containing either of the words pet or animal along with the word therapy.
If there are nested parentheses, the search engine processes the innermost parenthetical expression first, then the next, and so on until the entire query has been interpreted. For example, ((pet OR animal) AND therapy) AND training.
If you don't use parentheses, the following databases utilize an "order of operation" to execute the search:
- Ebsco: AND, OR
- Gale: proximity operators, NOT, AND, OR
- Nexis Uni: OR, proximity operator, AND, AND NOT
- Ovid: processes operators from left to right.
- Proquest: PRE, NEAR, AND, OR, NOT
- Sage: AND, OR
- Scopus: OR, AND, AND NOT