Search Tips

Use "quotation marks" to search for exact phrases.
2 word queries (such as circus elephant) are searched as an exact phrase by default.
3 word queries (such as new york orchestra) are searched as words that need to appear in proximity to each other by default.
Use special characters and operators (below) to focus your query.

Truncation and Wildcard Characters

	The symbol * is used as a right-handed truncation character only; it will find all forms of a word. For example, searching for econom* will find "economy", "economics", economical", etc.
	The symbol ? is used to replace any single character, either inside the word or the right end of the word. ? cannot be used to begin a word. For example, searching for "wom?n" will find "woman" and "women." Searching for "t?re" will find "tire", "tyre", "tore", etc.

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Operators

Boolean, proximity and adjacency operators are used to broaden and narrow your search.

AND	Find all the words. When searching for keywords in "Citation and Document Text," AND finds documents in which the words occur in the same paragraph (within approx. 1000 characters) or the words appear in any citation field. Use W/DOC in place of AND when searching for keywords within "Citation and Document Text" or "Document Text" to retrieve more comprehensive results. Example: internet AND education
AND NOT	Find documents which have the first word, but not the second word. Example: Internet AND NOT html
OR	Find any of the words. Example: Internet OR intranet
W/#	Find documents where these words are within some number of words apart (either before or after). Use when searching for keywords within "Citation and Document Text" or "Document Text." Example: computer W/3 careers
W/PARA	Finds documents where these words are within the same paragraph (within approx. 1000 characters). Use when searching for keywords within "Document Text." Example: internet W/PARA education
W/DOC	Find documents where all the words appear within the document text. Use W/DOC in place of AND when searching for keywords within "Citation and Document Text" or "Document Text" to retrieve more comprehensive results. Example: Internet W/DOC education
NOT W/#	Find documents where these words appear but are not within some number of words apart (either before or after). Use when searching for keywords within "Citation and Document Text" or "Document Text." Example: computer NOT W/2 careers
PRE/#	Find documents where the first word appears some number of words before the second word. Use when searching for keywords within "Citation and Document Text" or "Document Text." Example: world pre/3 web

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Search Field Syntax

Author
Citation and Abstract
Citation and Document Text
Date (Alpha)
Date (Numeric)
Document ID
Document Language
Document Text
Document Title
Document Type
Issue
Page / Pagination / Start Page
Publication Title / Journal Name
Source Type
Volume
Word Count
Year

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Author

Use to find articles written by an author or reviewer.

Valid Forms:
AUTHOR
AU

Examples:
AUTHOR(Gertrude Enders Huntington)
AU(Michael Kinsley)

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Citation and Abstract

When you select Citations and abstracts from the drop-down menu, ProQuest searches the following fields:

Author
Personal Name
Abstract
Product Name
Article Title
Subject Terms
Company Name
Source (publication title)
Geographical Name

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Citation and Document Text

When you select Citation and document text, ProQuest searches within the complete text of the article, the citation fields, and the abstract.

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Date (Alpha)

The publication date in alphanumeric format (month day year). For example December 12, 1999 appears as Dec 12 1999.

Do not use a comma.

Valid Form:
   PDA
   DA
   DATE

Example:
DA(Jul 4 2001)

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Date (Numeric)

The publication date in numeric format (mm/dd/yyyy). For example December 12, 1999 appears as 12/12/1999.

You can use the < and > signs to indicate dates before and after a date, or between specific dates. For example, PDN(>1/1/2002) AND PDN(<1/5/2002) will find results from publications with numeric dates between January 1 2002 and January 5 2002.

Valid Form:
   PDN
   DDT
   ND
   PD
   PDN
   XP

Example:
PDN(12/12/1999)

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Document ID

Searches the unique database ID for articles and documents in ProQuest.

Valid Forms:
ID

Examples:
ID(356894)

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Document Language

Used to search Language index. This field contains the language in which the document was published originally. You can select languages from Language field specific index.

Valid Forms:
LA
LN

Examples:
LA(french)
LN(french or english)

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Document Text

Searches only the full text of articles for your search terms. Article abstracts are not included in this search. AND, OR, and other search operators are treated as such unless enclosed in quotes.

Valid Forms:
TEXT
TX

Examples:
TEXT(Kofi Annan)
TEXT("North Sea oil")

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Document Title

The title of a document, such as "Peering into the Future of Careers." This search field locates the occurrence of search words in the title of the document.

Valid Forms:
TITLE
TI

Examples:
    TITLE(Future)
    TI(future AND career)
    TI("Peering into the Future of Careers")

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Document Type

Use this search field to look for search words or phrases in articles of a certain type.

Valid Forms:
    AT
    TY
    DT

Examples:
    DTYPE(commentary)
    TY(editorial cartoon)
    AT(review)
    DT(arts/exhibits review)
    DTYPE(television review-no opinion)

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Issue

Used to search Issue Number. Use keyword(s) to search this field.

Valid Forms:
ISSUE
IS

Examples:
IS(10)

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Page / Pagination / Start Page

Use to search for specific pages of a publication. Useful for finding front page articles.

Valid Forms:
    STARTPAGE
    PAG
    PAGE

Examples:
PAG(A.1) AND PUB(wall street journal) AND PDN(1/10/2003)

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Publication Title / Journal Name

Used to search by a specific publication or publications.

Valid Forms:
    SOURCE
    SO
    JR
    JN
    JO
    SR
    PTI
    PUB

Examples:
    SO(Forbes)
    SO(New York Times or Washington Post)
    JO(computing) — retrieves all periodicals with "computing" in their titles

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Source Type

Use to include or exclude the following source types from your search: dissertations, newspapers, periodicals and wire feeds.

Valid Forms:
STYPE

Examples:
NA(Winston Churchill) AND STYPE(periodical)
GEO(Japan) AND STYPE(wire feed)

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Volume

Used to search Volume. Use keyword(s) to search this field.

Valid Forms:
    VOLUME
    VO
    VOL

Examples:
VO(100)

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Word Count

The number of words in the article text. Use this search field to locate articles under (<) or over (>) a certain length.

Valid Forms:
    WORDS
    WRD
    WD
    WC

Examples:
    WORDS(<1000) finds articles containing 1000 words or less
    WRD(>500) finds articles containing 500 words or more
    WC(>750 AND <1000) finds articles between 750 and 1000 words

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Year

Use to search Publication Year index.

Valid Forms:
YR
PY

Examples:
    YR(1986)
    YR(1986-1987)
    YR(>1998)
    YR(<1998)

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Stop Words

ProQuest ignores the following frequently-used words. To use them as part of a search phrase, enclose them with quotation marks: e.g. "the sound and the fury".

about	can	just	out	those
after	could	like	said	through
also	do	make	should	to
an	each	many	so	use
and	for	more	some	was
any	from	most	such	we
are	had	much	than	were
as	has	no	that	what
at	have	not	the	when
be	how	now	their	which
because	if	of	them	while
been	into	only	there	who
between	is	or	these	will
both	it	other	they	with
but	its	our	this	would
by

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Example Searches

The examples below illustrate the kinds of searches you can build in Basic Search or Advanced Search using operators and fields.

Content varies between ProQuest databases; therefore, the number of documents found using the examples below would vary.

weather

Finds documents that contain the word weather.

educat*

Finds documents containing the words education, educator, educate, and educating. The "*" is the truncation symbol to find multiple forms of a word.

weather AND pacific ocean

Finds documents that contain the word weather and the phrase pacific ocean.

"Blair Witch Project"

Finds documents that contain the phrase Blair Witch Project.
Always enclose phrases longer than two words in quotation marks.

sub(mars) AND water AND life

Finds documents about Mars that mention water and life. The Subject Terms search field will help you find documents that are about a particular subject.
Keywords (such as water and life as in the example) focus your search more precisely.

author(Dave Barry)

Finds documents written by Dave Barry, a popular commentary writer.

at(book review) AND name(Stephen King)

Finds book reviews of works by Stephen King. Use the document Type search field to find different kinds of documents, including biographies, interviews, and recipes.
Note that dtype is also a valid syntax form for document Type.

source(Fortune) AND company(Ford) AND PDN(>03/01/2001 AND <10/30/2001)

Finds documents from the magazine Fortune about the company Ford published between March 1, 2001 and October 30 2001. Use the Source search field to restrict your search to a specific newspaper or journal. Use the Company field to restrict to a specific company.

at(movie review-favorable) AND "Blair Witch Project"

Finds favorable movie reviews of the movie Blair Witch Project.

stype(newspaper) AND at(obituary) AND John F. Kennedy Jr.

Finds newspaper obituaries about John F. Kennedy Jr.

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