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How to Google Better
Library Skills Workshop - Practical Exercises
Susan McCourt, Elaine Shallcross and Janet MacKay 2011/12
There is a lot of information available on the Internet but much of it is of poor quality. When you are gathering
material for assignments it is important that you evaluate what you find and use only the highest quality,
authoritative information derived from this source. You are strongly advised to begin your research by
searching electronic databases containing relevant peer-reviewed journal literature.
The aim of this workshop is to introduce you to the main tools for Web searching, in particular Google and
Google Scholar, and give some tips on how to search effectively.
Section
Page
1. Planning your search
1
2. Web searching using Google
3. Evaluating information you find using
Internet search engines
4. Web searching using Google Scholar
Section
5. Web searching using Subject Gateways
Page
– PINAKES & Intute
4-5
1-2
6. Plagiarism & copyright
5
2-3
7. Help and advice
5
3-4
Appendix: Tips on how to plan your search
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1. Planning your search
This is an important step in the research process whether you are searching the library catalogue,
subscription databases or using an Internet search engine. Tips on how to design your own search are in the
Appendix on page 6, for this workshop please go directly to section 2 – Web Searching using Google.
2. Web searching using Google
Google is an extremely popular search engine with access to many billions of pages. It has a good ranking
system which generally means that the most relevant pages appear at the top of the returned list. It is also
possible to search for images that can be used to illustrate pieces of work. Always select Advanced Search
– this option will allow greater precision in your searching.
When you plan a search of the Web using Google, remember to apply the search rules in order to retrieve
the best quality, relevant results.
Search rules for Google:
Boolean Operators
AND
Google automatically links keywords with AND.
The order in which you type the keywords is important and will affect the search
results. For example, if you are looking for information on holidays in Scotland –
type in vacation scotland. You can be even more specific and search vacation
scotland golf if you are planning a golfing holiday in Scotland.
OR
Use OR to find pages that include either of two search terms, make sure that it is
written in uppercase, e.g. vacation paris OR rome
Word variations
(truncation)
Google uses stemming technology which enables it to search automatically for all
possible endings for a keyword, e.g. diet finds diet, diets, dietary
Phrase search
Use quotation marks when you are looking for occurrences of an “exact phrase”,
e.g. “I have a dream…” in relation to the famous speech by Martin Luther King
Jnr.
Synonym search
A tilde (~) sign placed immediately in front of a keyword will instruct Google to
look for that word and also its synonyms, e.g. ~food ~facts finds food facts and
nutrition and cooking information.
Exercise 1
Example topic:
“Chocolate health food or health risk. Discuss”
©University of Aberdeen, Library, Special Collections and Museums, 2011/12
1
Search instructions
1. Go to www.google.com
2. On the Basic Search screen type in the following keywords exactly as they are written below and take
note of the results.
chocolate health food or health risk
NOTE: you do not need to link keywords with AND, Google does this automatically.
Click on Search.
How many results are retrieved? ______________
------Go back and type another search in the Basic Search box and type the following:
(chocolate OR cocoa OR “dark chocolate”) AND (diet OR nutrition)
Click on Search.
How many results are retrieved? ______________
3. There are far too many hits so we need to be more specific about what we are looking for.
Click on the
in the top right-hand corner and click on Advanced Search.
You will see that your keywords from the previous search are displayed in the first search box – delete
these.
In the Find pages with… all these words box type (exactly as written):
flavonoid
In the Find pages with…any of these words’ box type (exactly as written):
Chocolate OR cocoa OR “dark chocolate”
In the Then narrow your results by...last update: drop-down menu select past year
In the Then narrow your results by...site or domain: box type ac.uk
Click on Search.
How many results are retrieved? _______________
Despite searching across selected domains, e.g. academic institution (.ac.uk for the UK; .edu for the USA)
or government departments (.gov.uk for the UK or scotland.gov.uk for Scotland) you must apply the
evaluation criteria listed in section 3 below to assure yourself that the information you have selected to use
is authoritative and reliable.
3. Evaluating information you find using Internet search engines
Search engines collect information indiscriminately – there is no human intervention in the selection of
content. Subject Gateways have (see section 5, page 4), so results should be good quality and have a much
higher degree of relevance. The down side is that they search across fewer pages – simply because
someone has to physically process each entry.
It is essential that information derived from unregulated sites is evaluated using a set of criteria. The
following checklist lists the main ways to evaluate information derived from the Internet:
Accuracy
Is the page free from spelling errors/factual errors? Is there an editorial policy stated
on content?
Authority
Are there contact details available for author or publisher? Look in the About us or
Contact us links on the home page. Look at the URL – does it belong to an
authoritative source, e.g. British academic institution (ac.uk); government site
(gov.uk), (scotland.gov.uk); non-profit organisation (.org)
Coverage
Assess the topics – is there a wide coverage, does the site try to be comprehensive
or specific? Is reliable evidence used to support the information, e.g. references to
research, government documents, reports of enquiries.
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Currency
Is the Web page up to date? Check for a date at the bottom of the page – does it
state when the page was created, or published on the Web or when it was last
revised? Undated pages do not carry any authority.
Objectivity
Is there any bias in the way the Web page is written? Is it written by an interest
group? Does the page present both sides of an argument? Is it sponsored - if it is –
by whom?
Other things to check:
Awards
Has the site won a quality award? e.g. Scirus
How you found the
page
Did you find it by using a subject gateway? These tools contain evaluated material
added by subject specialists and are therefore more reliable.
Contact information
This tends to indicate that a site is confident in its information.
Links
Does the site have links to and from reputable Web sites? Do all the links work?
4. Web searching using Google Scholar
Google Scholar should not be your first source of information because the resources it searches are
nowhere near as comprehensive as those on databases that we pay for such as Scopus, Web of
Knowledge, EBSCOHost, CSA Illumina, Medline etc.
Google Scholar may be because it searches scholarly literature which may extend farther back in time than
many of our subscription databases. Material accessible through Google Scholar includes peer-reviewed
papers, theses, books, preprints, abstracts and technical reports from academic publishers, professional
societies, institutional repositories and universities.
Google Scholar displays your search results according to how relevant they are to your query, placing the
most useful resources at the top of the list. This search engine utilises the SFX linking service (through the
FullText@Aberdeen link), presenting a menu of options for access to electronic resources available to the
University through subscription databases.
STEP 1: Set up the SFX linking service & export link to RefWorks
To display the FullText@Aberdeen link within your search results (to link to full text where we pay for it) and
enable a one-step export to your RefWorks account you should:
1. Go to Google Scholar at http://scholar.google.co.uk/
2. Click on Scholar Preferences located the right hand side of the Search button.
3. Scroll down the page to the Library Links section and select University of Aberdeen FullText@Aberdeen.
4. Continue on down the page to the Bibliography Manager section and select Show links to import
citations into RefWorks.
5. Then click on the Save Preferences button.
Exercise 2
Example topic:
“Chocolate - health food or health risk?”
Search instructions
On the Google Home Page click on the more link located at the top of the page above the search box, then
select Scholar from the drop-down menu, or go to http://scholar.google.co.uk/
1. Click on the Advanced Scholar Search link located to the right hand side of the search box.
2. In Find articles… with all of the words box type:
(diet OR nutrition) AND (flavonoid OR antitoxidant OR “trans fatty acid”)
3. In the Find articles… with at least one of the words box type:
chocolate cocoa “dark chocolate”
4. Scroll down the page to the Collections… Articles and patents section and tick the check-box for
Medicine, pharmacology, veterinary science. Exclude the rest.
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5. Click on Search Scholar.
How many results are retrieved? __________________________
Next – we can exclude all references to animals used in studies that aren’t human.
6. Click on the Back arrow on your Web browser toolbar.
7. In the Find articles… without the words search box type: rat mouse rabbit
NOTE: Google & Google Scholar searches are not case-sensitive so you do not need to worry about
typing uppercase letters.
Keep all keywords in the other search boxes as before.
Click on Search Scholar.
How many results are retrieved? __________________________
Next - we can limit our search to articles published in the last year.
8. Click on the Back arrow on your Web browser toolbar.
Scroll down the section Date: return articles published between … and type 2010 in the first box,
leave the second box empty.
Click on Search Scholar.
How many results are retrieved? __________________________
9. Select an entry with a FullText@Aberdeen link and click on it.
The SFX menu of services for this record is displayed, including full text availability.
5. Web searching using Web gateways – Intute and Pinakes
Intute is a database of hand selected Web resources for education and research across all subject areas –
Arts & Humanities; Health & Life Sciences; Science, Engineering and Technology and Social Sciences. They
comprise smaller collections of high quality material selected by subject specialists and run by subject
specialists and are browse-able and searchable. The information contained in them is evaluated – but it is
advisable to check against your own evaluation criteria.
Exercise 3
Search instructions
1. Intute - go to www.intute.ac.uk/
2. Conduct a Search across your subject area or Browse by subject.
1. Alternatively, select Intute: Health & Life Sciences.
Browse for websites that may be relevant to our example research topic on chocolate.
Use diet as a keyword to search for potentially useful websites.
3. Intute offers excellent Internet skills training at www.vtstutorials.ac.uk
PINAKES is a catalogue of links to many of the major subject gateways. As with Intute it is a good place to
start your search because it contains subject gateways arranged under broad subject areas - useful if you
are unsure of the relevant resources to search.
Exercise 4
Search instructions
2. Go to www.hw.ac.uk/libwww/irn/pinakes/pinakes.html
3. On the PINAKES Home Page scroll though the A-Z index of subject gateways.
Click on those related to your subject interest or to our example search.
4. Scroll down below the A-Z list and investigate the usefulness of the Multi-Subject Gateways.
REMEMBER – a keyword search on a subject gateway applies only to
a description of a resource rather than within the resource itself.
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Refer to the Tools for Searching the Web sheet for more information on individual Subject Gateways.
6. Plagiarism & Copyright
Plagiarism: Plagiarism is a serious academic offence. It is now technically easy to cut and paste and drop
significant portions of web-based text into an essay you are preparing - but by doing this (even if you
acknowledge the work in your bibliography and enclose the text in quotation marks) you may be regarded as
plagiarising another person’s work.
Copyright: most printed and electronic documents are protected by copyright legislation. You are allowed to
photocopy or print off journal articles for research purposes but must not mass photocopy/download/print all
articles from one issue of a journal (paper or electronic format). Publishers monitor usage of their full text
titles and any inappropriate use of material are reported to us and could result in the University being denied
access to full text electronic services in the future.
7. Help and advice
If you have any problems with accessing our electronic resources, please contact the IT Service Desk.
Information Consultants can also help with any difficulties encountered locating and searching databases
and other information sources.
IT Service Desk
servicedesk@abdn.ac.uk
tel. 01224–273636 (also Out of Hours Service
number)
Consult:
Information Guides: available online at
www.abdn.ac.uk/library/support/guides/
Online Help screens for each individual resource.
Information Consultants:
Arts& Humanities
Janet MacKay
j.i.mackay@abdn.ac.uk
tel: 01224-272572
Medicine & Biomedical Sciences
Mel Bickerton
m.bickerton@abdn.ac.uk
tel: 01224-437876
Life and Physical Sciences, Engineering
Susan McCourt
s.mccourt@abdn.ac.uk
tel: 01224-273287
Law and Business Studies
Elaine Shallcross
e.shallcross@abdn.ac.uk
tel: 01224-273848
Education, Music and Social Sciences
Claire Molloy
c.a.l.molloy@abdn.ac.uk
tel: 01224-274813
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APPENDIX: Planning your search
Designing your search strategy is an important step in the research process whether you are searching the
library catalogue, subscription databases or using an Internet search engine.
STEP 1: Decide on the different concepts (ideas) that you are looking for in your topic – in our chocolate
example you can see that we have at least 3 different ideas (see table below): chocolate – nutrition STEP 2: Note all keywords and phrases that describe each one of these ideas. Note also differences in
spelling between UK and US English and acronyms (abbreviations).
STEP 3: List domain names of websites that you may use to obtain information, e.g. Scottish government
departments will have scotland.gov.uk, UK government departments will have gov.uk, higher education
institutions in the UK have ac.uk, and in the USA edu. NGOs may also be a good source of information.
An example search is used in this workshop to better demonstrate the techniques of searching the Web
which you are advised to follow to allow yourself plenty of time to follow through on the exercises.
Example topic:
“Chocolate – health food or health risk?”
Idea/Concept 1
Idea/Concept 2
AND
Idea/Concept 3
chocolate
cocoa
nutrition
diet
“dark chocolate”
If I find too many references are there any extra ideas I can use to limit
results?
e.g. cardiovascular, heart, “blood pressure”, cholesterol
e.g. flavonoids, trans fatty acids, antioxidants
OR
Boolean operators and / or allow you to join terms together to widen (using or) or narrow (using and) a search
and therefore be more precise in the information you retrieve. However, not all Web search tools support Boolean
searching.
Online Help screens will give instructions on how to search. Most of the exercises in today’s workshop
concentrate on using the search engine Google. Similar to any electronic database, Google has its own set of
search rules which you must apply in order to get the best possible results.
Use this table to plan your own search:
Idea/Concept 1
Idea/Concept 2
AND
Idea/Concept 3
OR
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