Before entering keywords in the search box, it is useful to write down several words that best describe your research topic. Use a thesaurus if necessary to generate more words.
Descriptive words can then be connected by using words such as AND and OR to form meaningful search statements.
AND Narrows a search by joining keywords so to find articles and other documents that contain both of the keywords (e.g. communication AND downsize).
OR Broadens a search. Will find articles that contain at least one of these keywords (e.g. downsize OR layoff).
NOT Narrows a search by excluding a term. NOT connector will find articles that contain the first keyword but not the second keyword (e.g. web NOT Internet).
Quotation marks are used to search keywords that are a complete phrase (e.g. "public relations").
Keywords within parentheses will be searched as a single unit within the search statement e.g. communication AND (downsize OR layoff)
When a keyword is truncated, the ending of the word is removed and replaced with a truncation symbol, usually an asterisk (*). A truncated keyword search will find articles with all instances of the root word and the root word combined with any possible ending (e.g. Canad* - this will find Canada or Canadian)