When searching for literature in Internet databases, you need to choose a database relevant to your search. You need to know:

• whether you need books, articles from journals or newspapers
• what the database contains and how it is constructed
• which languages the database covers
• the academic level of the database
• which search language the database uses

Search language is the way you conduct a search in the database and that differs between databases. However,they have some important principles in common. Most databases also have good help functions that teach you how to conduct your search.

Find good keywords and concepts to search for before you start your search. Ask yourself:

• Are there any other words I can use when searching, such as synonyms or related concepts
• Is the spelling correct
• In databases with foreign languages, do the words or terminology cover what I am looking for
• Are my search words too general or too specific

Truncation or shortening of words is an efficient way to search for words with different suffixes. You simply add a truncation symbol after a part of the word. There are several truncation symbols:

? and * are the two most common truncation symbols ! and $ also exist.

Some databases will also let you use truncation at the beginning of the word as well(left truncation), and inside a word. The help function in the database will tell you about your options.

Examples of

• Right truncation: child? retrieves child, child's, children, childhood, etc
• Truncation inside a word: wom?n retrieves both woman and women

When using the keyword search you will find words from the entire database, including summaries and names of institutions. You can also search for authors, titles and subjects in the keyword search. Using the keyword search may give you too many and too general hits. For instance, when using the keyword search you will find articles both by and about authors.

You can conduct more specific searches by searching for:

• Subject, by using subject words.

Subject words are used to describe the content of the book or article. Most databases have a thesaurus or an index of subject words.

• Author, by conducting an author search. That will give you books and articles by the author. In the subject search you will find books and articles about the author.

In some databases you can write the author's first name first, while others require the last name first, e.g: ibsen, henrik

Several databases also have a title search where you can search for words found in the title of books or articles.

Combination searches are an important function when searching in databases. You can limit or expand your searches by using the Boolean search technique, Use Boolean operators between words or search boxes. The most common ones are AND, OR, NOT.
Below you can see examples of the Boolean search technique.

AND
Search string with the words: history AND norway
Gives hits where both words are included



OR
Search string with the words: Advertising OR advertisements
Usually used to combine synonyms or topics. Gives hits where both or one of the words appear


NOT
Search string with the words: farm animals NOT horse
Used to exclude a word (reduces number of hits).
Should be used with care. You risk losing too much.