Prince George's Community College

301 Largo Road
Largo, Maryland 20774

Many search engines and directories have some similar characteristics and features. Grasping the basic search techniques of a few good search services will enhance your results. Taking the time to learn advanced search components and help screens of these tools will also improve your search outcome. Keep your search strategy specific and focused, but be flexible in using synonymous terms and broaden your search when necessary. The following basic search strategies can be used with most search engines.

This type of search allows the searcher to enter or one or more terms that represent a concept to search.

counterterrorism intelligence

The search will find sites with either one word, or both words in any order. Keyword searching yields many documents and it can be the least efficient way of finding information.

Enclose a phrase or words in double quotations when exact word order is required. This type of search is one of the most efficient and effective ways to narrow down results. Using this type of search finds sites, titles, and names when all or exact parts are known.

"american counterterrorism" or "american counter terrorism"
"united states counterterrorism" or "united states counter terrorism"
These search strategies return sites and/or titles with these words.

"Tom Ridge"
This search returns sites with the name and/or documents with the name.

The three logical operators AND, OR, and NOT link terms and concepts together.

counterterrorism AND intelligence
This search strategy returns sites and/or titles with both words.

"counterterroism intelligence" AND "Tom Ridge"
Using AND can return sites and/or titles with the phrase and person's exact name.

"counterterroism intelligence" AND "homeland security"
Using AND can return sites and/or titles with both phrases.

"counter terrorism" OR counterterrorism
The operator OR will find sites and/or titles containing either or both words.

(counterterrorism OR counter terrorism) AND intelligence AND "united states"
This search will find either or both words with intelligence and United States in sites and/or titles. When more than one operator is used in a search, use parentheses to nest Boolean Operators to establish hierarchy of the Boolean logic.

(united states NOT american) AND counterterrorism
(united states AND NOT american) AND counterterrorism
Using NOT or AND NOT will find all sites and/or titles with United States and counterterrorism and exclude American.


Use a plus (+) before a word or phrase that is to be included in a site, title, and/or document. Using a minus (-) in front of a word or phrase excludes these concepts from the site, title, and/or document. This type of search retrieves fewer results.

+counterterrorism +intelligence +"united states"
This search will find sites and/or titles with counterterrorism, intelligence, and United States.

-american +counterterrorism +intelligence +"united states
This search will find sites and/or titles without American but will include counterterrorism, intelligence, and United States.

Use an asterisk (*) or question mark (?) to indicate missing letters if you are uncertain of the spelling or want a variant spelling of the word(s).

counterterrorism AND American*
counterterrorism AND American?