What is the difference between truncation and wildcards

Phrase searching 2. Westlaw Next 1. Westlaw Next: Advanced Search 1. Westlaw Next: Search page 2. Web of Science 2.

Web of Science: Basic Search page 2. Truncation searching ensures that plural versions of your search term are included in your results. Wildcards are symbols used to replace letters in words where there are unknown or multiple possible characters. The letters are often replaced by the question mark? Again, check the help pages of the database to verify the which symbol to use. It looks like you're using Internet Explorer 11 or older.

Ask Another Question. Ask Us. Answered By: Jackie Stevens. Last Updated: Dec 15, Views: What are boolean operators? How do they operate? How do I construct a search strategy in FiNDit? How do I search for a phrase instead of just individual words?

Again, if you have retrieved too many references, you may want to limit your search to a shorter date range, or to only retrieve review articles. Specialist databases may have limits particular to the topic. For example, a health and medical database may contain limits specific to patient types, gender and specialisms. Preparing your search: truncation, wildcards and other functions Using truncation and wildcards The easiest way to search for words that look similar is to use truncation, or a wildcard.