Searching the Databases

Boolean operators can be used to expand or decrease search results. 

"And" searches for results where two terms appear together.

"Not" excludes a term from the search.

"Or" finds results where either of two terms appear together or separately.

These boolean operators are best explained by way of a venn diagram.  See the image below for understanding of how they work. 

• The "And" operator is often implied in databases. Therefore it may not necessary in some circumstances to include it. 
• Search strings that include lots of Boolean operators can often skew the results.
• Boolean operators are often displayed on a drop menu beside a database search bar.