EBSCO DATABASES



              The tips below apply to all of the following databases, which are available through EBSCO:

   

Academic Search Premier 
ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials Business Source Premier 
Catholic Periodical and Literature Index  
CINAHL with Full Text

Communication & Mass Media Complete

ERIC
Medline with Full Text
MLA International Bibliography  
Newspaper Source  
PsycARTICLES  
PsycINFO


               1.   Use truncation or wildcards to retrieve variant spellings or different endings.  

*

To truncate, use an asterisk at the end of the stem of a word to retrieve the stem form with various endings. An asterisk will replace from zero to any number of characters at the end of the word stem.


Examples: Ecolog* retrieves ecology, ecologies, ecologist, ecological, etc. 
                  Child* retrieves child, children, childhood, childish, etc.

 ?  
 

A wildcard (?) may be used to replace one specific character in a word.


Examples: Wom?n will retrieve woman or women. Zoo? will retrieve zoos, zoom, Zook , etc.                      G??se will retrieve goose or geese.  

 

 

                2.  Use Boolean operators (and, or, and not) to limit or expand your search.

 


and

 

When you retrieve too many hits:

Use and to make the search more specific by limiting results to articles containing more than one key word.

Example: endangered species and zoos

or

When you retrieve too few hits:

Use or to expand your search by searching for synonyms or variant word forms. 

Example: dogs or canines

 and & or
("nesting")

To use both and and or:

Use parentheses around words joined by or, if you are also using and to join one or more terms. 

Example: hazing and (fraternities or sororities)
 

 



not

 

When you retrieve too many hits that use a term in the wrong context:

Use not to exclude records with the specified term.

Example: foundations not charitable

Note: Use not carefully. You might block information that could be helpful to your search. If the term you are blocking contains two or more words, put them in parentheses. 

Example: reading instruction not (high school)  

 

       

                3.   Limiting Results                                      

 
In the Basic Search option of the EBSCO databases, you may select the following limiters:

      ·        Specific date or time period  

      ·        Peer reviewed (scholarly) literature

      ·        Titles owned by King’s College

      ·        Full-text articles only

      ·        A particular publication (journal, magazine, or newspaper title)  
The limiters that are available in Advanced Search are specific to the particular database you are using. For an explanation of these limiters, click on the Database Help link on the search screen. 

 

                    4.   Viewing Abstracts     

                                   

To see abstracts (brief descriptions) of the articles with the citations in the Results List, click on Preferences in the upper right corner of the screen. Select Detailed. Then click Apply.  

  
          

                     5.     Printing, saving, or emailing your selected results and search strategy  

                                    

Click on the folder icon to the right of the citations that you want to save or email. Then click on Folder has items at the top right of the results list. You may choose to have the full text of HTML articles printed with the list of citations. Articles identified as PDF or Linked Full Text will need to be printed one at a time.  

       

                      6.      Accessing a saved history of your recent searches:  
                                 

In Advanced Search, you may access a saved history of your searches, which shows the limits you used and gives links to previous searches. Use the Search History tab at the top of the Results List.

                           

NOTE: If you have any questions or need assistance with searching, consult the Help section of the database, or speak with a reference librarian.

 

                                   

                                                                                                                                                 August 2005