PROXIMITY OPERATORS IN GALE INFOTRAC IN LIRN

In InfoTrac resources in LIRN, during your keyword searches, you may use proximity commands, such as w1 w3 n5 n10 (etc.) to find articles with two of your keywords close to each other in the article.

This may improve your search results, since keywords that are close to each other in an article may be related and discuss the ideas of your topic for research.

There are two proximity operators:

      n   (near: First search word is within a specified distance in either direction from second word.)

      w   (within: Second search word follows second search word, within a specified distance.)

EXAMPLES:

malaria n10 mosquitoes   The long and historical relationship between malaria and mosquitoes probably guarantees that, if these words occur in a periodical article within one or two sentences of each other, the paragraph will include information not just about malaria, but also about the contribution of mosquitoes to malaria.

A search, malaria n10 mosquitoes, will find articles wherein the word malaria must occur within ten or fewer words away from the word mosquitoes, in either direction.  An example is this sentence: "Immunization by irradiated mosquitoes can protect against malaria."

family w1 values    Use w1 in searches, to find articles with the exact phrase you need. Exact phrases often involve novel relationships between two different words, and express a new idea, ie. repressed memory, assisted suicide, etc. With the search expression, family w1 values you will find articles with the phrase family values.
Why does w1 find an exact phrase? In this example, the second word values follows the first word family by one word.

war w2 terrorism   You may use w2 in searches, to match common phrases with more than two words, such as "war on terrorism." This search might also find "war and terrorism."

Sink w2 swim will find the expression "sink or swim" among others.

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Proximity operators ( ? ! * ) are best not used with logical operators and, or or not.

9-27-10