INFORMATION SOURCES

PROXIMITY SEARCHING AND GOOGLE SEARCHING HINTS

Compiled by Evangel University Library Staff
September 2010
If you do online searching, the following information on Proximity Searching may save hours of
time and lots of frustration.
Why use Proximity Searching?
Many times researchers have two concepts or words which appear to be related and should be
found close together in journal articles or documents on the Internet. To limit a search to only
those articles or documents, researchers need to use Proximity Searching.
1. If the ProQuest Full Text Journal databases are being used, the researcher should go
to Advanced Search and then click on the drop down list of Boolean terms. Especially
note the ones, Near/3 and Pre/1, because these are useful for Proximity Searches.
Near/3 is used when two words should be found within 3 words of each other but you do
not care which one is first.
Pre/1 is used when the two words should be adjacent to each other and in the order
given.
When another spacing is needed within Advanced Search, ProQuest Help gives this
information (this asks the user to click the drop-down menu under Citation and Abstract
to locate Citation and Document Text).
W/# Use to find documents where the words are within some number of words apart
(either before or after). Use when searching for keywords within Citation and Document
Text or Document Text. Example: computer W/3 careers.
W/PARA This finds documents where these words are within the same paragraph
(within approx. 1000 characters). Use when searching for keywords within Document
Text. Example: internet W/PARA education.
W/DOC Use to find documents where all the words appear within the document text.
Use W/DOC in place of AND when searching keywords within Citation and Document
Text or Document Text to retrieve more comprehensive results. Example: Internet
W/DOC Education
NOT W/# Use to find documents where these words appear but are not within some
number of words apart (either before or after). Use when searching for keywords within
Citation and Document Text or Document Text. Example: computer NOT W/2 careers.
PRE/# Use to find documents where the first word appears some number of words
before the second word. Use when searching for keywords within Citation and
Document Text or Document Text. Example: world pre/3 web.
2. If Academic OneFile, General OneFile, InfoTrac, etc. (Gale Cengage Learning)
databases are being used, the Help screens say:
Proximity Operators
Proximity operators are used between two search terms to indicate that the terms must
occur in a record within a specified distance of each other for that record to match. Words
that are close to each other are more likely to be related than words that are far apart.
A proximity operator has two components:
a) A letter that indicates the direction
b) A number that indicates the distance in words
There are two proximity operators:
Wn
The W (within) operator specifies that the word that follows the operator must
occur within n words after the word that precedes the operator for a record to
match. For example, the search expression shared w3 values matches any

records in which the word values occurs three or fewer words after the word
shared.
Nn
The N (near) operator specifies that the words on either side of the operator must
occur within n words of each other in either direction for a record to match. For
example, the search string memory n5 repressed matches any records in which
the words memory and repressed occur within five or fewer words of each other
in either direction.
You can use proximity operators only when searching indexes made up of individual
words, such as a title index. They are most useful in indexes of large areas of text, such
as keyword and full-text indexes.
Note that proximity operators can be used only between two words, not between a word
and an expression within nesting operators (parentheses):
Invalid expression: fleas n10 (dogs or cats)
Valid alternative: fleas n10 dogs or fleas n10 cats
3. For searches using EBSCO databases, you can use a proximity search to search for two
or more words that occur within a specified number of words (or fewer) of each other in
the databases. Proximity searching is used with a Keyword or Boolean search.
The proximity operators are composed of a letter (N or W) and a number (to specify the
number of words). The proximity operator is placed between the words that are to be
searched, as follows:
Near Operator (N) - N5 finds the words if they are within five words of one another
regardless of the order in which they appear. [Any number from 1-20 may be used.]
For example, type tax N5 reform to find results that would match tax reform as well as
reform of income tax.
Within Operator (W) - In the following example, W8 finds the words if they are within
eight words of one another and in the order in which you entered them. [Any number
from 1-20 may be used.]
For example, type tax W8 reform to find results that would match tax reform but would
not match reform of income tax.
Note: These operators will not work when parentheses are used to separate search
terms. For example: (tax or tariff) N5 reform will not find results. You must use (tax N5
reform) or (tariff N5 reform).
4. If the Literature Resource Center database is being used, the researcher should click
Search Hints and scan down to Search Operators (Proximity Searching) for instructions.
5. Those searching NetLibrary for full text virtual books may use NEAR between a two
word search. This provides results where the two words are in the same sentence. The
search engine defaults the NEAR Boolean function to 5 as in NEAR5 and searches for
the combination within 5 words forward and backward. The user can change the number
of words they want to specify for the NEAR functionality as in NEAR20.
6. Those searching CREDO Reference for information in reference books should use the
Advanced Search and choose With the exact phrase if there are sequential words, i.e.,
personal names, events (ex.: Civil War), etc.
7. Googles Help Screen suggests for Proximity or Wildcard searches: use an asterisk (*)
to locate two words close together: i.e., red * blue will locate documents with the words
separated by only one or two words. Additional asterisks may be added if needed for
possible intervening words.

8. The Exalead search engine www.exalead.com may also be used. Enter NEAR
between two terms to find them within 16 words of each other. (Randolph Hock. Extreme
nd
Searchers Internet Handbook, 2 ed., 2007, p.128)

9. Google Special Search Syntaxes (for additional help see www.GoogleGuide.com).

(Here are examples of a specific search syntax combined with a sample topic.)
site:art.com This finds resources from a specific Web site [do not leave spaces between
the colon and anything following it here or in any of the following forms]
intitle:Stanton MacDonald Wright This finds major words or phrases used in web page titles
(use quotation marks to search for the phrase as a whole).
+site:edu This limits the search to only sites with edu in their URLs (usually a college or
university Web site in the U.S.); use +site:ac for colleges or universities outside the U.S.
The plus (+) says the search term must be in the document retrieved or its address.
inurl:library find word(s) just in Web site URL
intext:
find words in the text
inanchor:
find a specific Web page, e.g., inanchor:CNBC would find www.cnbc.com
link:
find pages that link to the specified page, e.g., link:http://www.mit.edu
cache:
provides a copy of a page from the last time Google indexed it
related: find pages related to the URL entered works better with site indexed
stocks: e.g., stocks:amzn -- uses the stock symbol to find a specific offering
[Below are additional tips from the more complete Google Help: Cheat Sheet
www.google.com/intl/en/help/cheatsheet.html]
Date: Search only a range of months: Olympics date:3 (search for Olympics references
within past 3 months; 6 and 12-month date-restrict options also available)
info: Info about a page info:www.stanford.edu (find information about the Stanford
University website)
[#]..[#] Search within a range of numbers DVD player $100..150 (search for DVD
players between $100 and $150); 2004..2006 would locate sites with dates from 2004
through 2006.
safesearch: Exclude adult-content: safesearch:sex education (search for sex education
material without returning adult sites)
~
Search for word and its synonyms: ~auto (this will find the word auto and its
synonyms: truck, car, etc.)
define:
Locate definitions of a word: define:computer (will find definitions on
the Internet)
Example of two or more special syntaxes combined in one search:
intitle:hydrocephalus site:edu This finds the word, hydrocephalus, in the title of
the Web pages only in education Web sites.(Other domain markers besides .edu
are .gov., .mil., .com, etc. (see NORID below for all domain markers). Please
remember you can limit the search to sites in a specific country, i.e., .au (Australia), .ca
(Canada). For all the country domain markers go to Norid: Domain Name Registries
Around the World http://www.norid.no/domenenavnbaser/domreg.html. It contains
Generic top level domains (gTLD) and Country code top level domains (ccTLD)
Cheat Sheets for other major search engines:
http://websearch.about.com/library/blbingsearch.htm
Need help Choosing a Search Engine? Use:
Phil Bradley's Finding Information: Search Engines http://www.philb.com/whichengine.htm
NoodleTools: Choose the Best http://www.noodletools.com/
Find Books online? Use:
Internet Archive www.archive.org Limit to Text Search
Google Books http://books.google.com/bkshp?hl=en&tab=wp
OAIster http://www.oister.org, a collection of other sources.