The University of Adelaide Library

Library tutorial for wine marketing

Section 5. Searching for information: Finding books

Use the Library catalogue's subject options to find books on a topic.

Getting a good search result depends on using appropriate search terms. If you can't think of terms, use the sources described in section 4.
Use a range of broader, narrower and related terms e.g. search for wine tourism but also for tourism (broader term) or gastronomy (related term)
In your search results, look at the words used in book titles, contents, subject headings. Use these words as search terms to extend your result.
Sort results by date since recent books often refer to earlier work.
Note any useful citations listed in books you read.

The options for subject searching are:

keyword (search engine style).
keyword (use and, or, not, " ")
guided keyword search
subject headings

1. Keyword (search engine style)

This option works for quick or simple searches. It searches by connecting your search terms with an AND automatically, saving you from typing that connecting word. It can be useful when you know, say, an author of a book but only some words from its title.

But for more detailed or complex search statements, when you are searching for material on a subject, it is better to use one of the other options that follow.

2. Keyword (use and, or, not," ")

Use the truncation symbol ? to search for plurals etc: enter child? to search for child, children, childhood
Choose synonyms or alternative terms to represent each concept in your topic. Use the Boolean operators and, or, not to combine search terms:

and will find records containing both terms:fire and vegetation

or will find records containing either term: fire or burning

not will exclude records containing unwanted terms: vegetation not grassland

brackets group similar terms so that they are processed in the correct order: (fire or burning) and vegetation

See Boolean searching if you do not understand how and, or and not work (web page will open in a new window. To return to this tutorial, close this window).

Use quotes to search adjacent words: "relationship marketing "
Use quotes to search hyphenated words which the catalogue treats as two words; the hyphen can be absent or present; use or to enter the single word version as an alternative:"pre war" or prewar, "hand-book" or handbook.

3. Guided keyword search

You can do the same kinds of searches in the Guided Keyword Search and the Basic Search's Keywords (using and, or, not) option. The Guided Keyword Search has the advantage of easier searching with drop down menus to combine your search terms and to restrict searches to fields such as title.

At Search for box, type the word(s) or phrase you want to search.

Do not type and, or or not within a box.

Use ? to truncate words: consumer? to search consumer, consumers, consumerism.

Click the right arrow and select:

any of these to find records containing at least one of the words in the box e.g. use it for synonyms, different spellings and alternative terms

all of these to find records containing all of the words in the box

as a phrase to find records containing the words next to each other.

At Search by box, click the right arrow and select the field to search. Use:

Any Keywords to search the whole record or

one of the listed fields to restrict searches to a single field such as Title.

Combine the first line of terms with the second.

Choose AND if you want records that contain both groups of terms

Choose OR if you want records that contain either one or other of the groups of terms

Choose NOT if you do not want records that contain the second group of terms. This may also remove records of interest if they happen to contain terms you want as well as those you don't.

4. Subject Heading option

The Subject Heading option searches the subject headings that the Library assigns to catalogue records for books. Unlike the Keywords option, it does not search for terms in book titles or elsewhere in the catalogue record.

Subject heading searching is useful when

keyword searching would be ambiguous e.g. 'evolution' as a keyword could produce books on evolution of political systems or books on evolution of biological organisms
you are searching for broad concepts like marketing and need suggestions for appropriate related terms
you are searching for books about people or organisations but not by them

Subject headings are standard terms added to catalogue records to describe the contents of books.

Subject headings are derived from a thesaurus, the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) list.

Search for a book you know to be useful and click a subject heading link in its record, to view other similar books.

In the example below, you could click on Advertising or Sales promotion, or Communication in marketing.

Another way is to enter a term in the Basic Search Subject Heading option to get a list of subject headings beginning with that term. Keep trying alternative terms as needed. You can click the Info button that's against some headings to get suggestions for related search terms.
If it is convenient, consult the LCSH thesaurus kept near the public PC's in the Waite or Roseworthy Libraries

5 . Limits

Consider limiting your results by language, date, type of material. Use Limit or More Limits on the search screen or Post Limit on the results screen.

Back to tutorial main page | Continue to Section 6: Searching for information: Finding journal articles