Brainstorm alternatives (like synonyms, related terms, or alternative spellings) for your key concepts.
These will be used as search terms.
Key concept 1: Social media
- Social network(s)
- Social networking
Key concept2: Civil unrest
- Conflict
- Revolution
- Riot
- Rioting
- Peer-reviewed articles
- Published in the last 5 years
And: Combines key concepts together to find articles that contain both concepts.
Or: Combine alternative search terms for the same conceptto find articles that contain either term.
Wildcard*: Finds variations in spelling, prefixes, and suffixes (riot* will findriot, riots, rioting)
Phrase search " ": enter search terms made up of multiple words in quotation marks to preserve word order ("social media" will lookfor these two words side by side)
("social media" OR "social network*" OR twitter OR facebook)
AND
("civil unrest" OR conflict OR revolution OR riot*)
Check if you articles are:
- Relevant to your topic and discipline
- Peer-reviewed
- Published in the last 5 years
Too few articles? Try...
- Brainstorming more/better alternative search terms
- Deleting the least relevant term from your search (if you have multiple terms)
- Using the wildcard*
Too many articles? Try...
- More keywords (example: focus on a country/region, time periods, or group of people)
Too few articles?
- Incorporate examples of other social media platforms, e.g. Facebook
- Expand your topic beyond social media to look at the impact of the Internet on civil unrest
Too many articles?
- Focus on one social media platform
- Look for articles on specific instances of unrest
- Narrow your focus to a particular country that experienced a revolution