There are four different search options for EBSCO, below is a description of each to help you select which search option will be most beneficial for your research.
- Boolean/phrase: This search type is the first option and will likely be the one you utilize the most in your research. Boolean utilizes the and/or/not search method and will allow you to pick and choose which of the three you would like to use. Some examples are travel AND Europe this means that EBSCO will look for articles dealing with both travel and Europe, College OR universities which means that the results will contain at least one of the search items, and television NOT cable this will exclude cable and only show results for articles that deal with television.
- Find all my search terms: This automatically utilizes the AND function.
- Find any of my search terms: This automatically utilizes the OR function.
- Smart Text Searching: This search method allows the researcher to copy and past up to a page (250-300 words) of information and the system will generate search terms bases off that information. Thus if you already have an article this is a good way to find articles similar to the one you have.
