The Boolean Is Dead, Long Live the Boolean! Natural Language versus Boolean Searching in Introductory Undergraduate Instruction

Fuente: ERIC Institute of Education Sciences
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Lowe, M. Sara, Maxson, Bronwen K., Stone, Sean M., Miller, Willie, Snajdr, Eric, Hanna, Kathleen
Format: Recurso educativo Open Access
Language:en
Published: 2018
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1867181737397714944
author Lowe, M. Sara
Maxson, Bronwen K.
Stone, Sean M.
Miller, Willie
Snajdr, Eric
Hanna, Kathleen
author_facet Lowe, M. Sara
Maxson, Bronwen K.
Stone, Sean M.
Miller, Willie
Snajdr, Eric
Hanna, Kathleen
Lowe, M. Sara
Maxson, Bronwen K.
Stone, Sean M.
Miller, Willie
Snajdr, Eric
Hanna, Kathleen
collection Education Resources Information Center
contents The Boolean Is Dead, Long Live the Boolean! Natural Language versus Boolean Searching in Introductory Undergraduate Instruction Lowe, M. Sara Maxson, Bronwen K. Stone, Sean M. Miller, Willie Snajdr, Eric Hanna, Kathleen Undergraduate Study Natural Language Processing Online Searching Search Strategies Information Retrieval Introductory Courses Undergraduate Students College Freshmen Information Literacy Scoring Rubrics Databases Librarians Library Instruction Users (Information) Information Skills Boolean logic can be a difficult concept for first-year, introductory students to grasp. This paper compares the results of Boolean and natural language searching across several databases with searches created from student research questions. Performance differences between databases varied. Overall, natural search language is at least as good as Boolean searching. With evidence that students struggle to grasp Boolean searching, and may not use it even after instruction, it could be left out of first-year instruction, freeing up valuable class time to focus on concepts such as question development and source evaluation. As the Framework for Information Literacy does not specifically address Boolean operators, the authors suggest it should have less prominence in first-year Information Literacy instruction.
format Recurso educativo Open Access
id eric_EJ1178106
institution ERIC Institute of Education Sciences
language en
publishDate 2018
record_format eric
spellingShingle The Boolean Is Dead, Long Live the Boolean! Natural Language versus Boolean Searching in Introductory Undergraduate Instruction
Lowe, M. Sara
Maxson, Bronwen K.
Stone, Sean M.
Miller, Willie
Snajdr, Eric
Hanna, Kathleen
Undergraduate Study
Natural Language Processing
Online Searching
Search Strategies
Information Retrieval
Introductory Courses
Undergraduate Students
College Freshmen
Information Literacy
Scoring Rubrics
Databases
Librarians
Library Instruction
Users (Information)
Information Skills
The Boolean Is Dead, Long Live the Boolean! Natural Language versus Boolean Searching in Introductory Undergraduate Instruction Lowe, M. Sara Maxson, Bronwen K. Stone, Sean M. Miller, Willie Snajdr, Eric Hanna, Kathleen Undergraduate Study Natural Language Processing Online Searching Search Strategies Information Retrieval Introductory Courses Undergraduate Students College Freshmen Information Literacy Scoring Rubrics Databases Librarians Library Instruction Users (Information) Information Skills Boolean logic can be a difficult concept for first-year, introductory students to grasp. This paper compares the results of Boolean and natural language searching across several databases with searches created from student research questions. Performance differences between databases varied. Overall, natural search language is at least as good as Boolean searching. With evidence that students struggle to grasp Boolean searching, and may not use it even after instruction, it could be left out of first-year instruction, freeing up valuable class time to focus on concepts such as question development and source evaluation. As the Framework for Information Literacy does not specifically address Boolean operators, the authors suggest it should have less prominence in first-year Information Literacy instruction.
title The Boolean Is Dead, Long Live the Boolean! Natural Language versus Boolean Searching in Introductory Undergraduate Instruction
topic Undergraduate Study
Natural Language Processing
Online Searching
Search Strategies
Information Retrieval
Introductory Courses
Undergraduate Students
College Freshmen
Information Literacy
Scoring Rubrics
Databases
Librarians
Library Instruction
Users (Information)
Information Skills
url https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1178106