{"id":167,"date":"2017-04-21T06:40:12","date_gmt":"2017-04-21T06:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ueflibraryscifor.wordpress.com\/?page_id=167"},"modified":"2026-03-24T14:53:45","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T12:53:45","slug":"refining-the-query","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/","title":{"rendered":"Refining a query"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>You can start the information search by doing some <strong>preparatory queries.<\/strong> Hence you can try your search concepts, how common or rare they are within the database. You can collect some alternative terms from the results or you can just get a feel to the topic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"640\" height=\"426\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1513\" style=\"object-fit:cover\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg 640w, https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>On the grounds of the first queries you can deduce what to do next in order to get better results. The means to refine the search query are as follows:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>number of concepts (that is: number of AND-operations)<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>search terms describing the concepts<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>fields to be searched<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>in\/excluding truncation<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>in\/excluding phrases<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">If you get too much and\/or irrelevant results:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>add a defining concept<\/strong> using the AND-operator<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>if the search term appears to be too general, try to find <strong>more specific term<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>use the<strong> title and\/or subject<\/strong> fields only<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>use <strong>a phrase<\/strong> instead of an AND-operation<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>in addition, you can <strong>filter<\/strong> the result set by database tools<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">If you get too few results:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>check possible <strong>typing errors<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>remove<\/strong> the least significant concept<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>figure out <strong>alternative and broader terms<\/strong> to you search concepts and add them with OR-operator<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>look for <strong>all fields<\/strong> within the record<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>split the phrase<\/strong> to an AND-operation<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>use <strong>truncation<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Example of a search modification:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"821\" height=\"645\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2024\/07\/SF_modified.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2525\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2024\/07\/SF_modified.png 821w, https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2024\/07\/SF_modified-300x236.png 300w, https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2024\/07\/SF_modified-768x603.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 821px) 100vw, 821px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>The first, simple query is at the bottom. Different actions are coded with colors, see their impact on the number of results.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The definition of a \u201cgood\u201d or \u201ccomprehensive\u201d or \u201cproper number of\u201d results is depending on the purpose of the search.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When you need <strong>a limited number of truly relevant results<\/strong>, you make a very focused query and try to cut down the number of irrelevant publications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When you like to have <strong>an extensive result containing \u201ceverything\u201d<\/strong> on the topic, you\u2019ll make a query containing all the possible alternative terms of a certain concept and all the possible combinations for them. <strong>A systematic literature review<\/strong> needs this kind of extensive search. The number of results can be rather large and you\u2019ll need to read and look through the results in order to select the actually valuable publications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-background is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\" style=\"background-color:#8dd2fc70\">\n<p><strong>To Do:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>After performing a query, assess the results<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Try different means to re-write the query, either for more results or for more relevant results<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-right\">Next page: <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/uef-primo-start-here\/\">Start from UEF Primo<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You can start the information search by doing some preparatory queries. Hence you can try your search concepts, how common or rare they are within the database. You can collect some alternative terms from the results or you can just get a feel to the topic. On the grounds of the first queries you can [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":0,"parent":2243,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-167","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Refining a query - Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library<\/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\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Refining a query - Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"You can start the information search by doing some preparatory queries. Hence you can try your search concepts, how common or rare they are within the database. You can collect some alternative terms from the results or you can just get a feel to the topic. On the grounds of the first queries you can [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-03-24T12:53:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"640\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"426\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/\",\"name\":\"Refining a query - Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2017-04-21T06:40:12+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-03-24T12:53:45+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg\",\"width\":640,\"height\":426},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Queries\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"Refining a query\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/\",\"name\":\"Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Refining a query - Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Refining a query - Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library","og_description":"You can start the information search by doing some preparatory queries. Hence you can try your search concepts, how common or rare they are within the database. You can collect some alternative terms from the results or you can just get a feel to the topic. On the grounds of the first queries you can [&hellip;]","og_url":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/","og_site_name":"Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library","article_modified_time":"2026-03-24T12:53:45+00:00","og_image":[{"width":640,"height":426,"url":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/","url":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/","name":"Refining a query - Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg","datePublished":"2017-04-21T06:40:12+00:00","dateModified":"2026-03-24T12:53:45+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/55\/2022\/08\/olive-tree-g814f7536f_640-1.jpg","width":640,"height":426},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/refining-the-query\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Queries","item":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/queries\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Refining a query"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/#website","url":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/","name":"Information skills and sources in science and forestry \/ \/ UEF Library","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/167","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/127"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/167\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2782,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/167\/revisions\/2782"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uef.fi\/ueflibraryscienceforestry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}