Tricks in database searching for concept analysis terms.

Introduction: The Goal of the Literature Review
Synonyms and Truncation
Proximity Searching
Field Labels
Strategies Based on Database Styles:

• EBSCO examples; OVID examples; SCIENCEDIRECT examples; LexisNexis examples; Thompson Gale INFOTRAC examples; FIRSTSEARCH examples; CAS Illumina examples; ProQuest examples

The goal of the literature review in a concept analysis is to obtain literature that provide definitions of a specific term. Throughout this explanation the example concept analysis term is: Love.

We are looking for articles which, more or less, explicitly includes a sentence or paragraph with something along the lines of:

Our concept of love includes….
The conception of love is…
We conceive love to be….
To define love as…
The conclusion provides that love should be defined as…
The definition of love could be….
This understanding of love is…
She understands love to be….
They understood love to include…

So here we are looking for articles that contain very specific ideas that can be expressed in sentence format. Fortunately computers can do this, if the article or chapter is on the web or in a database somewhere.

Most search engines are capable of searching fulltext if fulltext is available and certainly are capable of searching abstracts when these are available. One could enter a single word, the concept term, but this tends to lead to an overwhelming number of retrievals. Most search engines will accept an additional second term connected logically with an AND. Without more sophisticated modification this results in a default search with arbitrary retrievals.

However, databases can be powerful and useful programs and are able to retrieve very specific material, if you know how to manipulate them.

NEXT: SYNONYMS and TRUNCATION

BACK TO:
The goal of the literature review
FORWARD TO:
Proximity Searching
Field Labels
Strategies Based on Database Styles:

• EBSCO examples; OVID examples; SCIENCEDIRECT examples; LexisNexis examples; Thompson Gale INFOTRAC examples; FIRSTSEARCH examples; CAS Illumina examples; ProQuest examples

TRUNCATION:

Fortunately most databases understand truncation. This is where the first part of a word is entered along with a character code telling the program to fill in the rest. These character codes may be different from one database to another. We can ask for the program to retrieval all occurrences of CONCEP by typing CONCEP$ . This could retrieve: Concept, concepts, conception, and, conceptual. Thus, a search for: LOVE AND CONCEP$  would retrieve articles which include "CONCEPT of LOVE ", "CONCEPTION of LOVE", "CONCEPTS of LOVE", and so on. Of course, the search would have to be repeated with DEFIN$, and again with UNDERSTAND$, and again with CONCEIV$, and UNDERSTOOD.

A quick way to do this search is using the logical operator OR.

LOGICAL OR: However the search engines can be even more helpful. By using the logical operator OR we can ask the machine to retrieve all these synonyms, even the truncated ones, at single attempt. This type of search would look like this:

The parenthesis or the idea of the parenthesis is important because these are the synonyms we are looking for as a set, not separate from each other. They will have to be combined with the key term using a logical AND. Ors are broader than ANDS, the parenthesis gathers them together as a set.

However, over 300 entries to review is probably not a good search. The search engines have abilities to refine this better.

Next: PROXIMITY SEARCHING

BACK TO:
The Goal of the Literature Review
Synonyms and Truncation
FORWARD TO:
Field Labels
Strategies Based on Database Styles:

• EBSCO examples; OVID examples; SCIENCEDIRECT examples; LexisNexis examples; Thompson Gale INFOTRAC examples; FIRSTSEARCH examples; CAS Illumina examples; ProQuest examples

love AND (concept* OR defin* OR understand* OR conceiv* OR understood) .

N# where # is any number you think is reasonable.

So modifying the search some more causes it to look like:

Some databases can accept the search in the above format and some can not.
Sometimes it has to look like:

(love N5 concept*) OR (love N5 defin*) OR (love N5 understand*) OR (love N5 conceiv*) OR (love N5 understood)
 

Of course, 36 results is much cleaner than 311 but there is some refinement which still can be done.

NEXT: FIELD LABELS

BACK TO:
The Goal of the Literature Review
Synonyms and Truncation
Proximity Searching
FORWARD TO:
Strategies Based on Database Styles:

• EBSCO examples; OVID examples; SCIENCEDIRECT examples; LexisNexis examples; Thompson Gale INFOTRAC examples; FIRSTSEARCH examples; CAS Illumina examples; ProQuest examples

Of course, 36 results is much cleaner than 311 but there is some refinement which still can be done.

All records have record lay outs with Field Labels associated with various parts of the record:

The HELP screens or drop down menus are useful in locating coding associated with field labels.
Some databases have the information needed in icons right up front. Click on the Icon or arrows.

Once you obtain the major search results you can modify that search so the key term is in the abstract. If it is in the abstract, chances are that the article will discuss this concept.

A main topic of the article should be your concept term, so it would be a good idea if the term was in the title or abstract of the article.

For example:

Find: (love N5 concept*) OR (love N5 defin*) OR (love N5 understand*) OR (love N5 conceiv*) OR (love N5 understood) in Select a Field (optional) TX All Text AB Abstract AF Author Affiliation AG Age Group AI Literacy Level AN Accession Number AU Author CA Corporate Author CH Cochrane AN CR Commentary CT Gender DN Dissertation Number DT Publication Date EM Entry Date GI Grant Information IB ISBN IN Instrumentation IP Issue IS ISSN IR Supplement Title JT Journal Title Abbreviation LA Language LE Legal MW Word in Subject Heading MH Exact Subject Heading MJ Word in Major Subject Heading MM Exact Major Subject Heading NM Name NP Named Person NT Notes OS Original Study PB Publisher PG Number of Pages PM Medline PMID PP Pagination PT Publication Type PY Year of Publication RF Number of References RP Report Number RW Review SB Journal Subset SC Special Interest SE Series Title SO Journal Title TC Table of Contents TI Title VI Volume and or not in Select a Field (optional) TX All Text AB Abstract AF Author Affiliation AG Age Group AI Literacy Level AN Accession Number AU Author CA Corporate Author CH Cochrane AN CR Commentary CT Gender DN Dissertation Number DT Publication Date EM Entry Date GI Grant Information IB ISBN IN Instrumentation IP Issue IS ISSN IR Supplement Title JT Journal Title Abbreviation LA Language LE Legal MW Word in Subject Heading MH Exact Subject Heading MJ Word in Major Subject Heading MM Exact Major Subject Heading NM Name NP Named Person NT Notes OS Original Study PB Publisher PG Number of Pages PM Medline PMID PP Pagination PT Publication Type PY Year of Publication RF Number of References RP Report Number RW Review SB Journal Subset SC Special Interest SE Series Title SO Journal Title TC Table of Contents TI Title VI Volume and or not in Select a Field (optional) TX All Text AB Abstract AF Author Affiliation AG Age Group AI Literacy Level AN Accession Number AU Author CA Corporate Author CH Cochrane AN CR Commentary CT Gender DN Dissertation Number DT Publication Date EM Entry Date GI Grant Information IB ISBN IN Instrumentation IP Issue IS ISSN IR Supplement Title JT Journal Title Abbreviation LA Language LE Legal MW Word in Subject Heading MH Exact Subject Heading MJ Word in Major Subject Heading MM Exact Major Subject Heading NM Name NP Named Person NT Notes OS Original Study PB Publisher PG Number of Pages PM Medline PMID PP Pagination PT Publication Type PY Year of Publication RF Number of References RP Report Number RW Review SB Journal Subset SC Special Interest SE Series Title SO Journal Title TC Table of Contents TI Title VI Volume in Database List Academic Search Premier Alt HealthWatch Bibliography of Native North Americans Biological Abstracts Business Source Complete CINAHL Plus with Full Text CINAHL Select Clinical Pharmacology Communication & Mass Media Complete Econlit Fuente Academica GLBT Life Health Source - Consumer Edition Health Source: Nursing/Academic Edition Information Science & Technology Abstracts (ISTA) Inspec Legal Collection MedicLatina MEDLINE Mental Measurements Yearbook Military & Government Collection MLA Directory of Periodicals MLA International Bibliography Newspaper Source Pre-CINAHL Professional Development Collection PsycARTICLES Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection PsycINFO Regional Business News SPORTDiscus Texas Reference Center TOPICsearch Vocational and Career Collection SPORTDiscus with Full Text SPORTDiscus Select Multiple Databases

retrieves the following

Voila!

29 references about a specific concept term (love) and have words meaning define near the concept term.

Some look really, really useful, for example:

Arman, M., & Rehnsfeldt, A. (2006). The presence of love in ethical caring. Nursing Forum, 41(1): 4-12.
            Caring as a virtue and an act of ethics is from both a natural and a professional point of view inseparably related to love as a universal/ontological value. Love is shown, like suffering and death, to be a concept of universal or metacharacter. From current nursing/caring science as well as from ethical and philosophical perspectives, this paper explores how love can be visible in caring through virtue and that the art of caring creates its evidence. The ethical and existential practicing of love, particularly unselfish love, allows a caregiver to come distinctly closer to the essence of his or her own personality and to live in a more authentic manner. Obstacles and alienation in caregivers that induce a holding back of one's own natural impulses to give the suffering patient tender, dignified care are examined. Economy, paradigm, and caring culture are cited, but ultimately it is a question concerning every caregiver's decision and responsibility to come forward to serve those the caregiver is actually there to represent, the suffering patient. This does not always require new knowledge, rather, liberation of the inner life and authenticity in caregivers. Love, if viewed only as a phenomenon without connection to a universal or ontological philosophy, risks being a problematic concept for caring science. If, on the other hand, it is viewed as the ontological basis for caring and ethical acts, then we can look for and practice phenomenological expressions for love that can enhance the patient's understanding of life as well as giving relief from suffering.

Falconi, A., & Mullet, E. (2003). Cognitive algebra of love through the adult life. International Journal of Aging & Human Development, 57(3): 275-290.
            The study was aimed at characterizing the exact algebraic structure of the love schema in order to trace possible changes in the conceptualization of love throughout the adult life cycle, notably as regards the weight attributed to the three components of love: passion, intimacy, and commitment. The methodological framework was the Functional Theory of Cognition. Irrespective of the gender and age of the participants (from 18 to 93), the structure of the love schema was shown to obey an equal-weight-averaging rule; the love schema was conceived as a strictly compensatory schema. Irrespective of age and gender, passion was the most important factor (w = .51), followed by intimacy (.29) and commitment (.20). The relationship between overall love value and degree of passion (or intimacy or commitment) was not conceived as a linear one, but as an exponential one. The weight of passion was shown to decline over age, and the weight of commitment was shown to increase over age. This change was, however, very limited and observed in elderly participants only.

Jackson, T., Chen, H., Guo, C., & Gao, X. (2006). Stories we love by: conceptions of love among couples from the People's Republic of China and the United States. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 37(4): 446-464
            This research examines conceptions of love among dating and married couples from China and the United States. Sixty-one dating and 81 married American couples and 46 dating and 94 married Chinese couples completed portions of Sternberg's (1998) Love Stories Scale and measures of demographics, stress, and relationship satisfaction. Factor analyses revealed several love story components (objectification-threat, devotion-caring, pragmatism, pornography) common to both cultures, albeit there were subtle differences in their specific elements. Culturally unique components included "love as war" and "love as fairy tale" for the Americans and "love as current tending" and "incomprehensibility of lover" for the Chinese. Devotion--care was the strongest predictor of relationship satisfaction within each culture, independent of demographics and perceived stress. In sum, the research suggests that although Chinese and American views of love overlap somewhat, subtle cultural differences and culturally unique metaphors are also apparent.

Seki, K., Matsumoto, D., & Imahori, T.T. (2002). The conceptualization and expression of intimacy in Japan and the United States. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 33(3): 303-319.
            This study addresses several limitations of previous cross-cultural research of intimacy by (a) differentiating meaning and expression of intimacy, (b) developing items reflecting both cultures' concepts of the two constructs,(c) specifying the relationship context rated, and (d) examining and adjusting cultural response sets in the data set. Findings indicated that the Japanese were more likely to conceptualize intimacy through expressive concepts such as "consideration/love" and "expressiveness" than did the Americans toward same-sex best friend. Likewise, "directly verbalizing how you feel about each other" was more valued by the Japanese than by the Americans toward mother, father, and same-sex best friend, whereas the Americans valued "indirectly verbalize how you feel about each other" more than did the Japanese toward mother, father, and lover. These results, which are contrary to those typically found in the literature, were discussed in relation to the methodologies used, which we believe reduced the possible cultural bias in research.

Go To: SEARCH STRATEGIES BASED ON DATABASE STYLES

BACK TO:
The Goal of the Literature Review
Synonyms and Truncation
Proximity Searching

• EBSCO examples; OVID examples; SCIENCEDIRECT examples; LexisNexis examples; Thompson Gale INFOTRAC examples; FIRSTSEARCH examples; CAS Illumina examples; ProQuest examples

Format of search strategies are based on search engines. The examples in the previous pages were using the databases with EBSCO search engine.

Different databases may have different codes to perform the same procedure. The codes are related to the search engines. For example:

	TRUNCATION (WILDCARDS):	PROXIMITY (replace nn with a number)	LOGICAL OR
EBSCO	*	Nnn	OR
OVID	$	ADJnn	OR
SCIENCEDIRECT	*	W/nn	OR
LexisNexis	!	W/nn	OR
FIRSTSEARCH	*	Nnn	OR
Gale Thompson INFOTRAC	*	Nnn	OR
CAS Illumina	*	Near #	OR
ProQuest

Because the search engines have a variety of techniques, it is probably easiest to use a word processor to develop the search phrase, copy it, and then paste it into the databases' search box.

EBSCO databases include:

Academic Search Premier : Alt HealthWatch: Bibliography of Native North Americans: Biological Abstracts: Business Source Complete: CINAHL: Clinical Pharmacology: Communication & Mass Media Complete: Econlit: Fuente Academica: GLBT Life: Health Source - Consumer Edition: Health Source: Nursing/Academic Edition: Information Science & Technology Abstracts (ISTA): Inspec: Legal Collection: MedicLatina: MEDLINE: Mental Measurements Yearbook: Military & Government Collection: MLA Directory of Periodicals: MLA International Bibliography: Newspaper Source: Pre-CINAHL: Professional Development Collection: PsycARTICLES: Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection: PsycINFO: Regional Business News: SPORTDiscus: Texas Reference Center: TOPICsearch. (UT Arlington subscribed databases as of 10/2006)

 The search strategy might be a little complex due to the format of the entry screen:

Be prepared to enter the search phrase exactly as you want it to be searched. I recommend opening a text program, typing the phrase in that program, and then copying it over into the database search box.

The phrase should be in the form of:
(concept term Nnn definition synonym) OR (concept term Nnn definition synonym) OR (concept term Nnn definition synonym) OR (concept term Nnn definition synonym)

For Example:
(love N5 concept*) OR (love N5 defin*) OR (love N5 understand*) OR (love N5 conceiv*) OR (love N5 understood)

PASTE search phrase:
(love N5 concept*) OR (love N5 defin*) OR (love N5 understand*) OR (love N5 conceiv*) OR (love N5 understood)

Make sure you scroll and work with appropriate LIMITS
    including Also search within the full text of the articles.

CONSIDER CHECKING search full text
    after you see what retrieves AFTER searching without it being checked
 

 If too many articles are retrieved, the search can easily be modified. Consider adding the concept word to be searched in the abstract or title fields.
You could also search for disciplines (art, sociology, computer*) as additional terms.

 CINAHL is the only database that has a formal subject heading identifying items that are Concept Analysis. Always try a keyword search for your concept term and combine it with the subject: Concept Analysis. You may just happen to have a term with previously published concept analyses.

OVID examples

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BACK TO: FIELD LABELS
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BACK TO: SYNONYMS and TRUNCATION
BACK TO: The Goal of the Literature Review

Includes:
Journals@Ovid Full Text; Your Journals@Ovid; Health and Psychosocial Instruments (UT Arlington subscribed databases as of 10/2006)

(LOVE ADJ5 (concept$ OR conceiv$ OR defin$ OR understand$ OR understood)).af.

If too many articles are retrieved, the search can easily be modified.

Consider adding the concept word to be searched in the abstract or title fields. You could also search for disciplines (art, sociology, computer*) as additional terms.

SCIENCEDIRECT examples

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FIRST click on SEARCH tab to have full abilities

Enter the complete phrase in the following form:
love W/5 (concept* OR defin* OR understand* OR conceiv* OR understood)

Change box to Full Text

Click on SEARCH box

Click on Browser's BACK button if too many items are retrieved. Modify by adding concept word or discipline term in 2^nd box. Restrict 2^nd concept word to "Abstract, Title, Keywords".

If too many articles are retrieved, the search can easily be modified. Consider adding the concept word to be searched in the abstract or title fields. You could also search for disciplines (art, sociology, computer*) as additional terms.

LexisNexis examples

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LexisNexis databases include:
Academic (including: Quick Info, News, Business, Legal Research, Medical, Reference); Congressional (including: Congressional Publications, Legislative Histories, Bills & Laws, Members & Committees, Regulations, Congressional Record & Rules, Political News/Hot Topics); and Statistical (UT Arlington subscribed databases as of 10/2006)

FIRST: Identify content area  to be searched
SECOND: Paste full search phrase
THIRD: Select dates
FOURTH: Click SEARCH

Use the search form:
Love W/5 (concept! OR defin! OR understand! OR conceiv! OR understood)

If no references are retrieved, go broader and use the logical AND instead of a proximity search.

If there are too many reference retrieved use the FOCUS^TM Terms box and the ATLEAST command (where n = the number of times you want your term to appear in the document) to limit your search to documents that contain multiple instances of your term or phrase.
atleast5 ( love )

 (see LexsNexis Finding References that Define Terms or Phrases, http://support.lexisnexis.com/academic/record.asp?ArticleID=Academic_legal_finding_definitions for additional recommendations)

Thompson Gale INFOTRAC examples

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INFOTRAC: 
Includes: Biography and Genealogy Master Index; Business and Company Resource Center; Contemporary Authors; Contemporary Literary Criticism Select; Dictionary of Literary Biography; Contemporary Literary Criticism -; Eighteenth Century Collections Online; Gale Virtual Reference Library; Health and Wellness Resource Center and Alternative Health Module; Health Reference Center Academic; InfoTrac Newspapers; Investext Plus; Literature Resource Center - LRC; Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center; Scribner Writers Series; Texas Almanac 2006-2007; Thomson Gale LegalForms; Twayne Authors Series - Twayne World, English, and US Authors (UT Arlington subscribed databases 10/2006)

You may need to click a PROCEED button to fully enter the database

Perform a Keyword Search:
(love N5 concept*) OR (love N5 defin*) OR (love N5 understand*) OR (love N5 conceive*)

FIRST: Click for Keyword search
SECOND: Paste full search phrase
THRID: Click SEARCH

If no references are retrieved, go broader and use the logical AND instead of a proximity search.

If too many articles are retrieved, the search can easily be modified. Consider adding the concept word to be searched in the abstract or title fields. You could also search for disciplines (art, sociology, computer*) as additional terms.

FIRSTSEARCH examples

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FIRSTSEARCH Databases include:
ArticleFirst; ClasePeriodica; CWI*; Ebooks; ECO; ERIC; GPO; MEDLINE 30; PapersFirst*; Proceedings*; RILM_Music_Abstracts*; WorldAlmanac Funk & Wagnalls New Encyclopedia and four almanacs; WorldCat OCLC; WorldCatDissertations (UT Arlington subscribed databases 10/2006);

First test the the concept term; most of the UT Arlington subscribed FirstSearch databases are NOT full text and have limited abstracts. Really tricky searching is sometimes ineffective.

Some databases may have too many synonyms for certain truncated terms. In these cases all synonyms for those terms have to be explicitly written out.

Enter the phrase (substitute your concept term):
love N5 (define OR defines OR defined or concept OR concepts OR conceptual or understand OR understands OR understanding OR conceive OR conceives OR conceived OR understood)

FIRST: Paste search phrase
SECOND: Select TEXT
THIRD: Select Limits
FOURTH: Click SEARCH

If no references are retrieved, go broader and use the logical AND instead of a proximity search.

If too many references are retrieved, go narrower with a logical AND for a term in the ABSTRACT field.

If no references are retrieved, go broader and use the logica