AND

When you want to find articles containing two or more ideas, you should connect the words in your search with AND. Using AND between keywords means that both terms must appear somewhere in the record. AND is used to narrow a search.

For example: students AND Internet

Entering this search in a research database would find articles that contained the terms students and Internet. If an article's record only had one of these terms, it would not be retrieved. AND is best used for linking different ideas. You can use AND many times in a single search.

For Example: students AND Internet AND assignments

Now all three terms need to be in in the record.

Consider this tip: Think of the nouns related to your topic. These will usually be better keywords to search than including adjectives, prepositions, or pronouns.

For example, rather than searching for social networks and their effect on children

pull the nouns from the phrase, combine them with the AND operator and use them for the search.
Use instead: social networks AND children AND effects

NOTE: you do not need to capitalize the operator.

PRACTICE:

1. Using the library database EBSCOhost Academic Search Premier
(NOTE: you will need your library username and password to enter)

2. In the text box type in the keyword, student

3. Click Search and look at the number of results

4. Now change the search to, student AND internet - see how the number of results is less?

5. You will notice a dramatic decrease in the number of results.

Keep Academic Search Premier open for this module