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Advanced Search Screens in Research Databases

How to use the library search engine's advanced search options

Limiting Your Search

Search Modes

Search Modes allow you to put automatic controls on how your searches are structured, for as long as you are logged into a search session.

  1. Boolean/Phrase – Clicking this means that you control how your search terms are combined. For more information on Boolean Operators (AND, NOT, OR) and other search tricks, go to the Limiting Your Search page.
  2. Find all of my search terms – This mode automatically applies AND to all search terms.
  3. Find any of my search terms – This mode automatically applies OR to all search terms entered.
  4. SmartText Searching - This mode allows you to copy and paste large chunks of text to search for results. It attempts to identify the most relevant search terms before conducting the search. This search mode is not available for all databases contained within the Ebsco Discovery Service. Click here for more information on selecting databases.
  5. Apply Related Words - Checking this box will allow the database to guess at related keywords and apply them to your search.  This will return more results.
  6. Also Search With the Full Text of the Articles - Unless this box is unchecked, you will automatically be searching the entire record of all items in the database based on your keywords, as opposed to specific fields such as title or subject.
  7. Apply Equivalent Subjects - Checking this box will allow the database to apply related Subject Terms to your search.  This will return more results. Click here for more information about the difference between Keywords and Subject Terms,

Other Limiters

These boxes provide additional ways to improve your search.

  1. Full Text - Controls whether the database will search for your terms in the full text of each item in the database, as opposed to only the title, author, subject and abstract fields. Clicking Full Text will reduce your results list.
  2. Author - Another way to search only the author fields of each item in the database.
  3. Published Date - If you are looking for material that was published during a specific time period, this limiter is useful. For example, you may be looking for articles or book chapters that were recently published, or items that were published immediately following a historical event. 
  4. Scholarly/Peer Reviewed Journals - Checking this box means that you will only see material that is published in journals that have been identified as Peer Reviewed.  Peer Review is a process by which submissions of articles to scholarly journals are systematically evaluated by  others working in the same field. The peer reviewer critically analyzes the submission for accuracy of data, quality of content and writing, and appropriateness for the journal. There are quality academic journals that are evaluated by an editor (edited) rather than peer reviewed, and databases sometimes make mistakes in correctly tagging journals as peer reviewed. By checking this box, you may inadvertently exclude important material from your search. If peer review is a requirement of the journals you need to use, it is best to check a journal’s website to verify whether it is peer reviewed or not. 
  5. Title - Another way to search only the title fields of each item in the database.
  6. Journal Name - Another way to search only through the titles of journals in the database.
  7. Language - If your search turns up many items in languages you can’t read, use the Language limiter to reduce your results list only to languages you can read. Also useful for language learners who want to read publications in a language being studied. 
  8. Available in Library Collection - Checking this box will exclude material that UMass Global does not own or subscribe to. This is useful if you are on a tight deadline and want to view only the material that you can read immediately. However, there is a lot of quality research material discoverable in our databases that UMass Global does not own that may be critical to your field of study.  Be sure to leave plenty of time to analyze your research material and utilize our interlibrary loan when necessary. Interlibrary loan services allow you to request copies of articles from UMass Global’s partners.