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Basic Search Screen |
Advanced Search Screen |
Author | Author |
Corporate Author | Title |
Title | Journal Name |
Journal Name | Corporate Author |
Abstract | Publication Information |
Descriptor | Publication Year |
Publication Year | Descriptor |
Abstract | |
Document Type | |
Language | |
Supplier Number | |
Two Additional Fields for Complex Searches |
Before beginning a search, identify the separate concepts to be searched. Then type the word, phrase, or term next to the appropriate database field search prompt, in the column labeled "search for." For example, to find records authored by Giovino, type Giovino in the Author field. Below are explanations on how to combine words in a single field, how to combine words in different fields, and how to alter the conditions that the computer uses to search.
This section explains how to use keyboard characters to combine words in a field to improve a search.
& | The ampersand (&) is used in place
of the word "and." When using the ampersand between terms, the computer will
look for records that have both terms. Example: To retrieve documents written by both Dr. Giovino and Dr. Eriksen, enter: Author: giovino & eriksen |
, | The comma (,) is used in place of the
word "or." When a comma is placed between terms, the computer will look for one
or the other term. Example: To retrieve documents with either the word "newborn" or the word "infant" in the title, enter: Title: newborn, infant |
? | The question mark (?) character is a
"wildcard." It is used to replace one character in a word or phrase. This is
particularly helpful if the correct spelling of a word is
unknown. Example: When unsure as to whether the author's name ends with "sen" or "son." Enter: Author: eriks?n |
* | The asterisk (*) is also called a
wildcard, but it replaces one or more characters. This wildcard will expand a search
that
will give greater retrieval results. Example: When looking for documents related to education, rather than type out all of the variations (educate, education, educational, educator, educated), enter: Abstract: educat* Only use this wildcard with three or more letters, i.e., do not type "an*" or "ed*." Example: The asterisk wildcard can also be used in the middle of a word. To find all authors whose names start with A, and end with N, enter: Author: a*n |
If searching just one field, such as author, skip this section. If searching in two or more fields, continue reading. Connectors enable the user to search more than one field at the same time. The choices are provided in pull down boxes on the right-hand side of each field in a column labeled "join." Click on and hold the arrow on the right of the box to see the other choices. The default is OR, however AND or AND NOT can be also chosen.
OR |
Retrieves documents that meets one
criteria OR the other. Example: Author: Giovino OR Title: cancer This search results in a list of all the documents either written by an author named "Giovino" or with the word "cancer" in the title. OR serves to expand a search. |
AND |
Retrieves only those records that meet
both the first criteria AND the second criteria. Example: Title: newborn AND This search returns those documents that contain the word "newborn" in the title and the word "mother" in abstract. AND is a method to narrow a search. |
AND NOT |
Retrieves documents that meet the
first criteria AND NOT the next criteria. Example: Title: newborn AND NOT Pub Year: 1960:1980 This search retrieves all documents that have the word "newborn" in the title, but were written before 1960 and after 1980. AND NOT serves to narrow a search. Note that the (:) colon means "from 1960 to 1980" and serves to range publication years so that not every year needs to be entered in the search. |
These three tools can be used to customize a search whenever using more than one field at a time. Keep in mind, however, that the conditions OR, AND, and AND NOT only apply to the following field in the form that has been filled with specific search elements. To check on the proper syntax and use of these connectors read the search as if reading a sentence. If it makes sense, the search strategy is sound.
Using AND NOT is quite powerful and may exclude a great deal of literature so that search results are too minimal. A useful application of AND NOT is when the user is searching for citations on a broad subject but wants to exclude some particular subcategory of that subject. The user may wish to create a complex search using the spare boxes at the bottom of the advanced search screen. For example, to retrieve citations on "neoplasms AND NOT breast neoplasms," use first the Descriptor Field, click on AND NOT from the pull down screen at the end of this line, then use the pull down screens from the left side of the last spare field, select Descriptor and Contains the Phrase.
Example:
Descriptor: Neoplasms AND NOT
Descriptor: Breast Neoplasms
This strategy can also be applied to other types of searches.
To the right of each field name is a pull down box, labeled "specify" that contains several types of phrases. These phrases allow the user to specify the search conditions to apply in a particular search. Text fields and date fields each have different search conditions. The following are descriptions of the possibilities.
contains the phrase |
Searches for all terms in exact order and position: the identical phrase must be there. |
contains in order |
Searches for all terms in that order, but other words can be between them. |
contains all |
Searches for terms in any order, but they all must be there. |
contains any |
Searches for any of the terms in any order: one or more of the chosen terms might be there, and the order is unimportant. |
includes |
Searches for any single word. |
equals |
Searches for dates that exactly match the dates entered. |
is not |
Searches for dates that include everything except the dates specified. |
Dates must be four character (i.e., "1982"). The system will not recognize months, days, or two character years. Using a colon retrieves a range of dates. The entry "1980:1985" commands the computer to retrieve everything from 1980 through 1985.
After typing in all the search terms, click on the icon that says "Submit Query." This icon appears at both the very top and the very bottom of each search screen.
HELPFUL HINT: If the search is complicated, and a printer is easily accessible, consider printing out the search page just completed before clicking the "Submit Query" icon so that there is a record of the search strategy.
At this point, the user may select the order in which the citations should be displayed by choosing a field from the "order by" pull down box, (i.e., display alphabetically by Author or Journal Title, or display chronologically by Supplier Number or Publication Year). Next, choose either ascending or descending from the pull-down box named "Sort Order." These pull down boxes are to the lower left of both search screens.
Once a search is submitted, a list of citations that meets the search criteria is presented. Records can be viewed and/or printed one at a time, by clicking on the name of the document, or both citations and abstracts of 20 documents at a time can be viewed and/or printed, by clicking on the "Expand" icon at the bottom of the list. The "Previous" and "Next" links move the user back and forth through the full citation and abstract of each document. The "Summary" link leads the user back to the title list of search results.
Record |
A single item in a
database. In the Smoking and Health Database, records include a bibliographic citation,
descriptors, abstracts, and other information about a document. |
Field |
A defined portion of a
record; for example, the Title field contains the title of the document. |
Author Field |
The Smoking and Health
Database contains authors by last name and first and middle initals. Users have the choice
of searching by any or all of these elements. They need only be connected with an &,
but no punctuation. |
Abstract |
Nearly all of the 56,000
records have abstracts that summarize the contents or findings, or both, of the document.
For pre-1989 document citations, it is best to search for
text
words in this field, as well
as in the descriptor field. |
Audience |
Since 1995, citations are
coded for special audiences: General Public, Educators, Professionals,
and
Media. |
Corporate Author |
This field contains the
name of the organization or agency that published the document. Search on the specific
name or significant parts of the name of the university, government agency, or
organization. Since organizational acronyms are not used in indexing, do not search by
acronym in this field. |
Descriptor |
The Smoking and Health
Database uses a thesaurus of accepted terms. Some pre-1989 citations do not have
descriptors. While these are being updated, search for concepts either in the title or
abstract fields, in addition to the descriptor field. Once the updates have been
completed, these instructions will advise that this search strategy is no longer
necessary. |
Journal Name |
The complete journal name
is included. The entire journal title or parts of the title may be
searched. |
Publication Information |
This field contains
information on conference sponsors, conference site, conference dates, conference title,
book title, publisher, place of publication, Public Health Service publication number, and
editor(s) names. Any of these elements may be entered in the search field for searching. |
Publication Year |
This field contains the
four-digit year of publication (i.e.,"1996"), but does not refer to month, date,
or season. Note that a conference may be held one year but the proceedings may have a
publication year at least one year or more later. |
Supplier Number |
This number is assigned
by the computer to help users keep track of the records. This number indicates the
two-digit
year
that
the record was processed into the database. |
Title |
The main title with full
subtitle is contained in the record. The best search strategy is to enter only the
significant words in a title and use the pull down box for either "Contains All"
or "Contains in Order." Since 1994, "a," "an," and
"the" are deleted from the beginning of the title; so do not enter
"a," "an," or "the." The title may be the title of an
article, book chapter, conference paper, or an entire book or report. |
Document Type |
Documents may be journal
articles, book chapters, conference papers, conference proceedings, books, or reports. The
elements of the citation vary according to the document
type
(i.e., book chapters use the
publication information field for book title, publisher, and editor
information). |
Spare Fields |
The Advanced Search
Screen offers these two extra fields to accommodate more complex searching, especially
when employing AND NOT in the previous field. |
Search Term |
This is a word or phrase
used to describe the subject of interest or concepts in a search. Search terms may be
taken from a controlled vocabulary, called descriptors, or they may be words in the text
of the title or abstract. Words found in the title or abstract of an article may be used
as search terms. |
Boolean Connectors |
And, Or, And Not are
Boolean Connectors. These are logical operators used to establish a relationship between
two or more search terms. |
Stop words |
In English, words such as "and," "of," and "the" are used frequently and are likely to show up several times in the course of a single written paragraph. To keep search time to a minimum, the computer is programmed to stop searching if it is asked to look for certain words: thus the name "stop word." If one of the words typed in is a stop word, the computer will respond with a message that says, "All the tokens in the phrase are stop words. A phrase must have at least one token which is not a stop word." |
To help make the most of a search, look at the complete and alphabetical list of stop words. If you feel other words should be added, or that certain words should not be stop words, please e-mail us at the e-mail address: tobaccoinfo@cdc.gov
Question: Why does the database not have any
records on my topic?
Answer:
It is possible that a search may not find any records for the topic you
have selected
because
Question: Is this database case sensitive?
Answer: No, the database does not recognize the difference between upper or lower case letters.
Question: Why do all the fields not show up for each citation?
Answer: Fields that do no show up are empty for that citation.
Question: Where can I get the full-text or copies of the documents cited?
Answer: Most journal articles and books are available through public, university, or special libraries. Dissertations are frequently sold by University Microfilms International (call 1-800-521-1600). Government documents and papers are frequently sold by the Government Printing Office (call 202-512-1800). Publications from the Office on Smoking and Health are available by calling 770-488-5705.
Privacy Policy | Accessibility TIPS Home | What's New | About Us | Site Map | Contact Us CDC Home | Search | Health Topics A-Z This page last reviewed September 09, 2003 United States
Department of Health and Human Services |