Part III Supplements
13.3 A Session with INSPEC
13.3.3 Information Structure
Basic knowledge about how the bibliographic information is structured in the database will help you improve both searching the database and reading the infor- mation the database provides you with. The bibliographic information is presented in a structured and standardized way, which means that every record has a similar look to it, even though the information that each record contains is unique. The records are structured according to certain fields. Each field contains a certain kind of bibliographic information. Thus, information about authors is found in
Boolean team For what purpose
AND To make sure a term is included
OR To include alternative terms
NOT To exclude term(s)
the author-field, title information in the title-field, etc. From an information search- ing perspective some fields are more interesting than others. Familiarity with the following fields will most likely improve your ability to search for information in INSPEC (note that the abbreviations used in the list are the same as those used in the database):
● AB – Abstract. contains a short summary of the original document.
● AU – Author. contains the name(s) of the individual(s) responsible for the intel- lectual content of the original document.
● DE – Descriptors. contains standardized terms from a set list of index terms.
Terms can also be phrases, i.e. contain more than a single word. When searching for phrases they shall be hyphenated (for example decision-making).
● ID – Identifiers. contains free-language words and phrases assigned by INSPEC indexers. Identifiers are generated from the title, abstract, full text of the article, and from the indexer’s specialized knowledge. They give a more detailed description of the relevant content of the document than provided by the original title or by the abstract.
● IS – ISSN. contains the International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) of the original periodical described in the record. Every periodical publication, such as a journal, has its own unique serial number. This number can be very useful when you are trying to locate a particular publication.
● SO – Source. contains the bibliographic citation for original documents. The bibliographic citation provides you with details about the title of the publication that the text was published in, the publication year, volume, issue number and pages.
● SU – Subject Terms. enables you to search in the Descriptors (DE) and Identifiers (ID) fields simultaneously.
● TI – Title. contains the title of the original document.
To be able to utilize your familiarity with the various fields you also need to know that it is possible to formulate queries that combine terms that appear in dif- ferent fields. Like most bibliographic databases, INSPEC offers the user more than one search interface. Here you will be introduced to three different interfaces. It is likely that the first interface you meet is the most basic or simple interface, so let us start with that. It contains just one search box into which you can type the term(s) you want to use for your search. The basic search interface also gives you the opportunity to use a drop down-menu to specify in which field you want the term(s) to appear.
For example: a simple search for the terms interactive AND multimedia without any specification about where the terms are supposed to appear in the record will produce a result with nearly eight thousand records. To refine your query and thus be more detailed about what you are looking for, you can take advantage of the advanced search interface. Here you can type your terms into separate boxes. Each box is paired with a scroll down-menu. At this stage you can also decide how you want the boxes to relate to each other, by choosing from the suggested Boolean commands. If you chose to type the term interactive in the first box and the term multimedia in the second box, you will also have the opportunity to specify where
116 13 Information-Seeking and Use
you want each term to appear in the record by choosing a particular field in the drop down-menu. If you also choose to click the radio-button that connects the two boxes with the Boolean command AND, it will result in a search string that can be described like this:
● interactive IN SU [the term must appear within the subject term-field] AND multimedia IN ID [the term must appear within the identifiers-field]
Even if this search string does not result in a very precise list of records, it is worth noticing that the amount of hits compared with the search we performed with the basic interface is reduced by 50%. This could be said to be an effective way of reducing the number of records that your query will result in. It is also a way of finding records that refer to texts that are about the subject you want to know more about, but do not have titles that match the terms that you use.
Very often even a query produced in the advanced interface needs to be refined further. That could be done in many ways. Most queries can be narrowed by thinking through the information need at least one more time. In this case – about interactive multimedia – you could ask yourself: am I interested in interactive multimedia in a particular setting or context? Could I relate any particular user group to my interest?
Very often this kind of further questioning results in more focused terms. Most search sessions are more time consuming than expected. A variety of terms and combinations of terms need to be tested. The advanced search interface only allows the searcher to combine three (or less) different terms. That brings us to the third interface that shall be presented here, the search history-interface.
The search history-interface can be used for different reasons. Since the search his- tory contains documentation about all the queries you have performed during a session it can help you to remember which terms, and combinations of terms, you have used.
But the search history-interface also allows you to extend a search string, to build upon an already performed query, or to combine two or more different queries.
If the first of the two following queries does not result in a satisfactory list of hits you can chose to extend it by adding yet another term. It would then look like the second query in the subsequent list.
1 interactive in su AND multimedia in id 2 #1 AND computer-games
The last of the above examples should be interpreted as query number one (which in INSPEC as well as in many other bibliographic databases is symbolized with the sign #) being combined with the term computer-games.
It is common that you have to try numerous combinations before reaching satis- factory results, which may take some time. Many databases, like INSPEC, allow you to save your search history, so that you can upload it the next time you start a session. You will thereby be able to continue where you ended the earlier session.
In this section you have been introduced to three different interfaces. Especially by using the advanced interface – combined with extended searches performed via the search history-interface – you will most likely be able to find a lot of useful references. Before entering the next section it should be mentioned that there are
more ways to use INSPEC effectively. For example, searches can be performed by using features such as the index and thesaurus.