How to Find a Phrase

Keywords can be grouped together and searched as a phrase. Searching for keywords as a phrase causes the catalog to only retrieve items that contain the words adjacent to each other in the same field. Doing this will narrow down your search, and find fewer items, which are hopefully more on topic.

For example, if you are looking for information about mental illness, rather than searching for mental and illness which would retrieve records with the words mental and illness anywhere in them, you could search for the phrase mental illness, which would only find records that contained the words mental and illness next to each other in the same field.

Each type of keyword search in the Catalog has its own specifications for searching keywords as a phrase. They are outlined below.

  • Basic Search Mode - type the phrase in quotes. For example "mental illness"
  • Advanced Search Mode - type the phrase without quotes mental illness, then select as a phrase from the menu following the Search For box

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Last Revised: MS - 8/10/2007