Just as knowing what resources to use and avoid is crucial and life-long, knowing how to actually "search" in the most efficient way is a very important and underestimated skill. Indeed, some researchers are better than others because they can "search" better and more effectively.
You now have a strong grasp on selecting resources based on many criteria points. You understand what type of resources you should use. Currently, the obvious question is how to find those resources. As mentioned, when starting your research, even before having your hypothesis (much before it), you may use any type of resource to get an idea of what's going on with the topic. Remember, you're trying to know what is generally known, being aware not only about what you know; you're trying to close this gap between yourself and the scientific community.
It's however better to have limits or boundaries of what you're researching at this stage, yet you will eventually get narrower and narrower. The conclusion is that at such a pretty early stage, it's fine to use popular resources. After you've formulated your research question and have enough boundaries to your search, you're getting to what you will read from and cite in your paper.
You firstly need to know what specific keywords you will use while doing your research. Your keywords are very important as they act as the building blocks for constructing your search queries.
Next, you need to determine which databases or sources you will use. At this step, you may decide on what specific tools you will use (refer to Effective Tools). Examples of databases are Google Scholar, PubMed, JSTOR, ScienceDirect, etc. As a beginner research, it would be important if you could develop the practice of using databases. Most beginner researchers, especially at this point of being scholars at research programs, whether they are in high school or even in college, don't pay attention to such valuable tools and proceed to do random searches for papers/references they wll use. You can't imagine how much time you would save using them, or precisely, when you systematically use them.
Use of AI:
To review everything about AI, check our AI Policy. AI tools can be efficiently used in finding resources. You can see more on this from "Efficiency Tools".
As a general rule, the more specific and narrower it is, the better. That's why when you're searching, you're always trying to keep it focused and specific as possible. For you to effectively do so, you can use something called Boolean operators. These operators are used to either narrow or broaden your results. The three main Boolean operators are: AND, OR, and NOT.
AND is to narrow your research results. It functions by telling the databases that all search terms must exist in the results. OR does the opposite: it broadens your results, telling the databases that any of your search terms can be present. Finally, NOT excludes terms from your search. It narrows your research by telling the database to ignore any concepts implied by your terms. See examples in the following table.
Since there are so many operators, the following table has the most significant for you to use, with examples.
| Symbol | Purpose | Example | Effect |
|---|---|---|---|
| " " (Quotes) | Search for an exact phrase. | "climate change impact" |
Retrieves results containing the exact phrase. |
| ( ) (Parentheses) | Group terms or Boolean operators to prioritize logic. | (education OR learning) AND technology |
Ensures results include "education" or "learning" along with "technology." |
| + (Plus) | Include specific terms in the search (used in some engines). | +biology +genetics |
Both "biology" and "genetics" must appear in results. |
| ~ (Tilde) | Search for synonyms or related terms. | ~healthy eating |
Includes terms like "nutrition," "diet," or "wellness." |
| *** (Asterisk)** | Include variations of a root word. | develop* |
Retrieves "develop," "developer," "development," etc. |
| ? (Question Mark) | Represent a single unknown character in a search term. | wom?n |
Retrieves "woman" or "women." |
| **** (Double Asterisk)** | Represents multiple levels of directories or nested terms (used in programming searches). | **/data |
Finds any file path containing "data." |
| ** | (Pipe)** | Synonym for OR in some advanced search systems. | `biology |
| $ (Dollar Sign) | Used for stemming in certain databases. | run$ |
Retrieves "run," "running," or "runner." |
| : (Colon) | Site-specific or field-specific searches. | site:nytimes.com climate change |
Retrieves results only from The New York Times website. |
| - (Hyphen) | Excludes specific terms from search results. | dolphins -football |
Excludes results related to football when searching for dolphins. |
| ^ (Caret) | Indicates prioritization or weighting in search results (used in advanced queries). | "solar energy"^2 "wind energy" |
Prioritizes results with "solar energy" over "wind energy." |
| / (Slash) | Used for proximity searches in some databases. | environment /5 pollution |
Finds "environment" within five words of "pollution." |
| % (Percent) | Acts as a wildcard in some systems. | bio% |
Retrieves "biology," "biological," or "biochemist." |
| ! (Exclamation) | Used for truncation or variations in some search engines. | educat! |
Retrieves "education," "educator," or "educational." |
| [ ] (Brackets) | Specify ranges or exact matches. | date:[2020 TO 2023] |
Retrieves results within the date range 2020 to 2023. |
Here is also a table for popular and useful search operators:
| Search Operator | Function | Example |
|---|---|---|
| AND | Shows the results in which both the expressions to the right and left of it are present. | Genetic AND mutation |
| OR | Shows the results in which one of the expressions to the right and left of it is present. | (Climate Change) OR (Urban Congestion) |
| Parentheses: “()” | Used to combine more than word/expression while searching | (BMW OR Mercedes) AND Car |
| Define: | Gives the meaning of the word after it. This search operator is a little obsolete since there are many ways to achieve this purpose. | Define:Integrity |
| Filetype: | ||
| OR | ||
| ext: | Gives only files that have the specified extension in the search results. (Be sure to type the operator with no spaces) | Theoretical Physics filetype:pdf |
| inurl:WORD | Search for pages with the word found in the url | inurl:research |
| after:YYYY-MM-DD | Shows results published only after a specified date. | Is AGI possible? after:2020-07-20 |
| before:YYYY-MM-DD | Shows results published only before a specified date. | Could a virus outbreak happen in 2020? before:2019-09-30 |
| site: | Includes only results found in a particular site. | Journal Issues site:ijhsr.terrajournals.org/ |
| Quotation Marks: “” | Search for a group of words or a sentence exactly as it is. | “Urban Congestion” |
| (This example means you do not want results that do not have the complete term as it is written above) |
One of the popular ethical traps that researchers may often fall into is using illegal methods to get research articles. You are expected to be aware of our policy on this. View it from Paywall Policy. While you already have access to everything you may need at ARPL through our partnerships, there were some tools developed to aid researchers in this. One tool is Unpaywall. If you opened a webpage including a paid research paper, the extension will tell you if the paper is available freely in other locations. It also tells you if there are no free versions. (View more tools like this in "Efficient tools")
One other handy way is to type [the name of what you are looking for] + pdf on the web, and you will probably find it. However, make sure the resource respects the copyrights.