{"id":87,"date":"2017-05-24T14:52:48","date_gmt":"2017-05-24T11:52:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibrarypostgrad\/?page_id=87"},"modified":"2021-05-07T12:41:45","modified_gmt":"2021-05-07T09:41:45","slug":"proximity-operators","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibrarypostgrad\/proximity-operators\/","title":{"rendered":"Proximity Operators"},"content":{"rendered":"

Proximity searching means that you are searching for words that are close to each other,<\/strong> but not necessarily next to each other. The maximum number of intermediate words between the search words can be chosen.<\/p>\n

The idea is that when the words appear near, they are more likely to have a contextual connection. Using the normal AND-operator may return irrelevant results, especially when you are searching longer text paragraphs, like abstract or full-text \u2013 the terms can occur on a page or in an article without any actual association.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, phrase searching can sometimes be a too limiting search condition, because it doesn\u2019t allow any extra words between the search terms, even when there could be some.<\/p>\n

An example from Web of Science database<\/em>. The distance between the search terms is from zero to three. Command:<\/p>\n

infrared NEAR\/3 spectroscopy<\/em><\/p>\n

The outcome contains results like these:<\/p>\n

\"\"

The command NEAR\/3 allows the maximum of three additional words between the actual search terms. As seen in the example, the number of extra words can vary between 0 to 3. You can choose the number of extra words yourself.<\/p><\/div>\n

Thus proximity search is a kind of an intermediate form between AND-operation and phrase searching.<\/p>\n

The form of proximity operators<\/strong> is not uniform like Boolean operators. Many databases use the command:<\/p>\n

NEAR\/n<\/strong> or N\/n<\/strong> or Nn<\/strong> (where n= max number of words between<\/em>)<\/p>\n

Some other possibilities:<\/p>\n

SAME<\/strong> or W\/n<\/strong> or PRE\/n<\/strong> or ADJ<\/strong><\/p>\n

Check the valid syntax from each database\u2019s Search tips.<\/p>\n

Watch a video (1:23)\u00a0 by University of British Columbia. <\/em>This is an example of Web of Science<\/em> database. The link in the picture takes you to Youtube:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\n(5\/2021 LP)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Proximity searching means that you are searching for words that are close to each other, but not necessarily next to each other. The maximum number of intermediate words between the search words can be chosen. The idea is that when the words appear near, they are more likely to have a contextual connection. Using the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-87","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nProximity Operators - Research Information Retrieval and Management<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibrarypostgrad\/proximity-operators\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Proximity Operators - Research Information Retrieval and Management\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Proximity searching means that you are searching for words that are close to each other, but not necessarily next to each other. 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