Skip to Main Content
What to look for
- Different databases interpret searches differently. A common variation is how databases recognize phrases.
- Some assume that words typed next to each other should be searched as phrases.
- Others automatically put a Boolean AND between your search terms, requiring that all the words be present, but not necessarily adjacent to each other.
- These searches can retrieve very different results.
Proximity operators
- Many databases allow you to specify that the words you are searching are within a certain proximity of each other.
- Proximity operators are more specific than Boolean operators and make your search more precise.
