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Search Tips

• Entering Keywords
• Widening Your Search
• Narrowing Your Search
• Punctuation Marks
• Noise Words

You can search for items in two ways: Quick Search and Advanced Search. The Quick Search provides a quick way to search for keywords and/or author in most fields in the resource library. The Advanced Search allows you to specify more search criteria in addition to the keywords and author.

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Use the Keywords field and other text fields such as Title and Journal Name to search for resources that contain specific words. It is important to enter the right keywords in the right fields or else the search may not return the desired results. For example, if you enter an author's name in the Keywords field and leave the Author field blank, the system may not return resources by the specified author even if resources by the author are present in the resource library. This is because the system will not search within author, document type, language, and audience fields for text entered in the Keywords field.

Important:

• Check spellings carefully. A misspelling could result in no resources being returned.
• Do not use punctuation to separate or group text strings. The system removes all punctuation from the search criteria.
• The more search criteria you enter, the narrower your search will be.
• To search for an author, enter the author's last name in the Author field. If you know the author's first initial, enter it in the in the First Initial field. The system will not return resources by an author if you enter the author's name in the Keywords field.
• Never enter an author's first name in the Author field. Enter only the author's last name and first initial, if known. The system does not store authors' first names.
• You can search for only one author at a time.
• When performing an Advanced Search, if you leave the text box for the beginning year blank and complete the ending year, the system searches for all resources published before the ending year. If you complete the beginning year text box and leave the ending year text box blank, the system searches for all resources published from the year entered to the present date.
• By default, the system performs an AND search, meaning it searches for resources that contain all the specified keywords. For example, if you search for "nicotine weight", each resource in the results list contains both keywords. However, if you enter OR between the keywords in the Keywords field, the system will perform an OR search, meaning it searches for resources that contain any of the specified keywords. For example, if you search for "nicotine or weight", each resource in the results list contains any one of the keywords.

To find...	Type...	Example
One word	All or part of a word	program Results include program and all other words containing that string of letters, such as programs
All search words	two or more words	Example 1 nicotine weight Example 2 nicotine and weight Results include all resources that contain nicotine and weight
Any search word	the words separated by OR	cessation or program Results include all resources containing cessation or program

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A wide search encompasses a range of resources. Use this technique when you want to browse through resources, or your original search did not yield any results.

Search Technique	Example	Results
Leave all search fields blank		Results include all resources in the resource library
Type only one word or part of a word in the Keywords field or other text fields such as Title, Journal Name, etc.	keyword = smok	Results include all resources that contain that string of letters, such as smoking and smokeless
Type more than one word in the Keywords field and separate them with OR	keywords = nicotine OR weight	Results include all resources containing nicotine or weight
Type only one word or part of a word in the Author field	Author = Smi	Results include resources by Smith, Smithsonian, Smitts, Smiley, Smirnoff, etc.

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Use a narrow search if you have a specific set of criteria to meet, or when the original search displayed too wide a range of resources.

To narrow your search, follow these tips:

Search Technique	Example	Results
Type more than one word in the Keywords field or other text fields such as Title, Journal Name, etc.	keywords = nicotine weight mortality	Results include all resources containing all words: nicotine, and weight and mortality
Type one word in the Author field and the author's first initial in the First Initial field	author = Johnson T	Results include all resources by Johnson, T., Johnson, T. M., Johnson, T.J., etc.
Specify the beginning and ending publication years	Publication year between 1997 and 2004	Results include resources published between 1997 and 2004
Select the New Citations check box		Results include only new resources added to the resource library in the past eight weeks

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The system ignores all punctuation marks entered in the Search fields. For example, if you enter "nicotine, weight; mortality" as your search criteria, the system drops the comma and semicolon and treats the search as if you entered "nicotine weight mortality". The comma and semicolon will also not appear at the top of the Search Results page as part of your search criteria. Instead, the system displays "nicotine" AND "weight" AND "mortality" as your search criteria and searches for resources containing all three words.

If you enter a punctuation mark other than a comma or semicolon, such as a question mark (?) or exclamation mark (!), the system displays a warning at the top of the search results informing you that the punctuation mark has been removed from the search.

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Words such as "and", "of", "after", "about", "where", "it", and "the" are regarded as noise words. These words are used frequently and are likely to show up several times in the course of a single written paragraph. To keep search time to a minimum, the system ignores such words when searching. Noise words are also not included at the top of the Search Results page as part of your search criteria. For example, if you entered "relationship to smoking history and the history of lung cancer" the system displays "relationship" AND "smoking" AND "history" AND "history" AND "lung" AND "cancer" as your search criteria at the top of the Search Results page.