Transcript of 'Searching with Synonyms'

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Hello. In this video, we'll learn how to use synonyms in database searches to get better results.

Here, I've performed a search for teenagers AND Facebook AND "mental health" in Academic Search Premier. I've got 31 results. However, if I'm not quite convinced this is all there is on my topic, or if none of the articles really suit my research, I can use synonyms to increase my number of results. I might think, "perhaps the word teenagers is too casual for the sort of academic results I'm looking for." In that case, I'll include the synonym adolescents connected with an OR. OR tells the database to retrieve results that use either of these words.

I might also try to connect Facebook to the near synonym, "social media". Note that while Facebook and social media aren't true synonyms -not all social media is Facebook- nonetheless, they're related concepts, so research about one is likely to be useful to research about the other. Similarly, I might include depression AND anxiety as near synonyms for mental health. You can see that this has greatly increased the number of results, from 31 to 628.

In many databases, and in Summon, the default view will only show you one search box. There are a couple of ways to search with synonyms in databases like this. The first is to look for an advanced search option. This will show you multiple search boxes like we saw in Academic Seach Premier. Click the plus to add an additional search box. You can add as many search boxes as you like.

The other option is to enter your whole search in one box. In order to do this, place groups of synonyms inside brackets. It's very important to always enclose groups of synonyms in brackets. This tells the database to apply the ORs before the ANDs.

In this video, you've learned how to use synonyms to search in databases and on Summon.