Library 101 - Part 3: Advanced Research Techniques

You can use wildcard and truncation symbols to create searches with unknown characters, multiple spellings or various endings.

• The asterisk (*) matches multiple characters.
• The hash sign (#) matches one optional character.
• The question mark (?) matches exactly one character.

1. Asterisk Wildcard

The asterisk (*) wildcard, also known as the truncation wildcard, is generally used to find word endings. Enter the root of a search term and replace the ending with the asterisk (*). For example, type comput* to find the words computer, computers, computing, computation.

The asterisk can be used within words to find multiple characters. For example, a search for hea*one will match words beginning with “hea” and ending with “one.” For example, headphone, headstone, hearthstone.

The asterisk (*) can be used between words to match any single word. For example, a search for midsummer * dream will match the phrases midsummer night’s dream and midsummer day’s dream.

2. Hash Wildcard

To use the # wildcard, enter your search terms and place # where an alternate spelling might contain an extra character. For example, type colo#r to find all records containing color or colour. Type p#ediatric to find all records with pediatric or paediatric.

3. Question-Mark Wildcard

To use the ? wildcard, enter your search terms and replace the unknown character with a ?. For example, type ne?t to find all records containing neat, nest or next.

Question marks at the end of words or character strings are not treated as wildcards. They are automatically removed from a query. For example, the question marks in the search terms below are ignored when searched:

To use a question mark as a wildcard at the end of a word, you need to put a # before the ? character. The hash before the trailing question mark indicates that the question mark should be treated as a wildcard to find exactly one character at the end a word. For example, a search for Monday#? will match Mondays but not Monday.

4. Combining Wildcards

Wildcards can be combined in a search term. For example, the following searches are allowed.

5. Restrictions When Using Wildcards

• Wildcards are not allowed as the first character in a search term.
• If there is only one leading character before a wildcard then, there must be at least one additional literal character within the first four characters.
  • f#r* (allowed because two literal characters are within the first four characters)
  • f??* (not allowed because only one leading character within the first four characters)
• When using any wildcard in a search term, the plural or possessive forms and any synonyms for the word will not automatically be searched. For example; when searching for colo#r, the plural words "colors" and "colours" are not searched.
• Wildcards do not work with Chinese (中文), Japanese (日本語), and Korean (한국어) languages.

-From EBSCO Searching with Wildcards

Use Wildcard Characters to Search on Multiple Similar Terms

Using wildcard characters (*, ?, !) allow you to only type part of your search term to search for multiple terms. This is also known as truncation.

Use the Asterisk (*) for the widest search

The asterisk stands for any number of characters, including none.

• carib* finds: carib, caribs, caribbean, caribe, caribou, etc.

Use the Question Mark (?) for specific words of known length

The question mark stands for exactly one character.

• psych????y finds: psychiatry, psychology but would not find: psychotherapy.

Use the Exclamation Point (!) for specific word variations

The exclamation point stands for one or zero characters.

• colo!r finds: color, colour.

-From Gale Advanced Search

Wildcards take the place of one or more characters in a search term. A question mark (?) is used for single character searching. An asterisk (*) is used for multiple character searching.

Wildcards are used to search for alternate spellings and variations on a root word. Wildcard characters cannot be used in place of the first letter of a word or within an exact phrase search, and word roots must contain at least three letters preceding a wildcard. For example:

*Note: When using the asterisk (*) or wildcard (?) in your search, any terms retrieved using either of these are not considered when sorting your results based on relevance. This is because there is no way for ProQuest to assess the relevance of these terms to your research as the term itself is not exact. For example, your search on 'bio*' could return occurrences of any of all of these terms: 'bionic' or 'biosynthesis' or 'biodegrade' or 'biographic.' One, some, all, or none could be relevant to your search. 

-From ProQuest Search Tips

The * Wildcard

An asterisk (*) entered as part of a search is interpreted as a substitute for any number of letters. For example, a search for hea* will return results containing any word starting with "hea", such as "head", "heats", "health", "heated", "heating" and so on. The wildcard search works best when there are at least 3 characters before the wildcard operator.

The ? Wildcard

A question mark (?) entered in a search is interpreted as a substitute for any single letter. For example, a search for hea? will return only results that contain four-letter words starting with "hea", such as "head", "heat", "heal", and so on. The wildcard search works best when there are at least 3 characters before the wildcard operator.

-From SpringerLink Search Tips

EBSCO Databases Proximity Searching

The proximity operator is placed between the words that are to be searched, as follows:

• Near Operator (N): N5 finds the words if they are a maximum of five words apart from one another, regardless of the order in which they appear. For example, type tax N5 reform to find results that have a maximum of five words between the beginning and ending terms, that would match tax reform as well as tax that has been submitted for reform.

• Within Operator (W): W8 finds the words if they are within eight words of one another, in the order in which you entered them. For example, type tax W8 reform to find results that would match tax reform but would not match reform of income tax.

Multiple proximity operators can be used in a search expression and multiple terms can be used on either side of each proximity operator. See the following examples:

• tax N5 reform OR tariff N5 reform
• (tax OR tariff) N5 reform
• oil W3 (disaster OR clean-up OR contamination) N5 (fisheries OR habitats)
• (baseball OR football OR basketball) N5 (teams OR players) N5 (greatest OR best)

Note: The number must be under 255.

-From EBSCO Connect

Gale Databases Proximity Search

Proximity operators (N, W) can be used to tell the search engine how closely terms must be to each other within a document. They operate like the AND operator in that both terms must be found.

Use N to find terms when order doesn't matter.

The N (near) operator finds terms within a set number of words apart in either direction of the first term.

• memory n5 repressed finds documents that contain memory and repressed within five or fewer words of each other.

Use W to find terms after the first.

The W (within) operator finds the second term within a set number of words after the first.

• shared w3 values finds documents that contain the term values within three or fewer words after the term shared.

Note: Proximity operators can only be used between two search terms, like fleas n10 dogs or fleas n10 cats. They cannot be used between a term and a nested expression, like fleas n10 (dogs or cats).

-From Gale Search Tips [with corrections/modification that N and W should be used, not Nn/Wn as described on Gale's site.]

JSTOR Database Proximity Search

JSTOR search allows you to find terms that are within a set number of words of each other. In Basic Search, use the tilde (~) symbol followed by a number to set the desired proximity. 

In this example, your search will return results with the terms debt and forgiveness within ten words of each other.

So, whereas a search for "debt forgiveness" within quotation marks will give you search results for that exact phrase, a search for debt forgiveness~10 will give you results that include both the words "debt" and "forgiveness" within 10 words of each other.

In Advanced Search, use the Boolean drop-down boxes to combine search terms with NEAR 5/10/25. The NEAR operator looks for the combinations of keywords within 5, 10, or 25 words places of each other.

The NEAR operator only works when searching for single keyword combinations. For example, you may search for cat NEAR 5 dog, but not "domesticated cat" NEAR 5 dog.

-From JSTOR Searching

ProQuest Databases Proximity Searching

Proximity and adjacency operators are used to broaden and narrow your search.

-From ProQuest Search Tips

Google Proximity Search

To perform a proximity search in Google, you use the AROUND operator, which allows you to specify the maximum number of words that can appear between two search terms. For example, if you wanted to search for web pages that contain the words “coffee” and “shop” within five words of each other, you would type: coffee AROUND(5) shop into the Google search bar.