Proximity
operators are word
abbrevations and symbols that enable to specify the relative
location of two or more words or phrases that you want to search
for in a record.
The should be used when you
expect that such words or phrases are likely to occur (because of
the way we use language) close to each other, whether in the same
sentence or the same document.
Essentially,
proximity
operatorsnarrow
(increase the Precision of) your search.
General
Usage
If you are searching in
Full
Text, ProQuest will look
for the words and phrases that you are searching for in the Title,
Abstract, or Text.
If you are
not
searching in Full
Text, ProQuest will search
in the following Citation Fields: Author, Title, Abstract, Subject
Headings, Publication Title (Source), Personal Name, Company Name,
Product Name, and Geographical Name.
Proximity
operators in ProQuest
w/n
(within/number)
Narrows (increases the
Precision of) your search by find records that contain words or
phrases that are within a specified number
(
n ) of words from each
other
Example: lawsuits
w/7
doctors
not w/n (not
within/number)
Narrows (increases the
Precision of) your search by elimitating records that contain
specified words or phrases within a specified number
(
n ) of words from a
second word or phrase.
Example: flight
not
w/2
recorder
pre/n (precede
by/number)
Narrows (increases the
Precision of) your search by searching for records that contain
a specified word or phrase a specified number
(
n ) of words from a
following word or phrase.
Special Case:
Using
pre/0 can be used
between each of a series of words to make them into a phrase.
Example:
oldpre/0manpre/0andpre/0thepre/0sea
Of course, a phrase can be
created by putting double quotes (
"
" ) around the
phrase.
/doc (within
document)
Expands (increases the
Recall of) your search by looking for specified words or
phrases anywhere in each record.