TAXONOMIC INFORMATION (if it exists?)
- Identify the species, genus, or other taxononic rank you are studying e.g. black-capped chickadee, amphibians, etc.
- If you are not studying a particular taxonomic rank, just represent the main "thing" you are studying with appropriate keywords e.g. invasive species, endangered species, marshes, island biogeography, etc.
RELATED TAXONOMIC NAMES
- Find the scientific name for your what you are studying e.g. Poecile atricapillus, Amphibia, etc.
- Are there any related common names? You can include these too
- If you are not studying a particular taxonomic rank, are there any synonyms, related terms, alternative spellings, etc. to represent your main concept? e.g. invasive species OR introduced species
- Combine the related taxonomic terms using OR. This will find articles that contain either term or both terms.
ADDITIONAL CONCEPTS
- What additional concepts are you looking at? What particular aspects of your main concept? Combine different concepts with AND. This will look for articles that contain both terms. If only one term is present, it will not be in the results list.
e.g. Poecile atricapillus AND foraging
RELATED CONCEPTS
- Combine alternate terms with OR, which = any of the words
e.g. foraging OR feeding OR food OR diet OR insects
HELPFUL TIPS
- Truncate: forag* will search for forage, forager, foraging, etc.
- Phrase Searching: Put "words in quotations" when you want them searched as a phrase e.g. "invasive species"
- When an article database allows you to, use both AND and OR in a search.
- Look for limiters provided within article databases that will exclude popular magazines, letters to the editor, articles published in the 19th Century, etc. You can also limit to recent articles only.
- When using Google Scholar, use advanced search options.
- Experiment with where your words are searched: All fields, Keywords, etc.
