A few weeks back I wrote about using subject searching as an electronic research technique.…
In my legal research class today we talked some about proximity searching. Proximity searching is an important tool when conducting electronic legal research. Lexis and Westlaw have fairly intuitive proximity connectors (trespass /s injury = “trespass” within the same sentence as “injury”, trespass /2 injury = “trespass” within 2 words of “injury,” etc.), which makes them easier to use. Unfortunately, one of my favorite resources, HeinOnline, doesn’t follow this model. Proximity searching looks more like this in HeinOnline: text: “mediation water conflict”~15 (searching for mediation and water and conflict within 15 words of one another). It’s easy to figure out after using it for a bit, but it’s important to remember that you have to use a different search syntax when using HeinOnline.
Check out these posts from the HeinOnline Weblog for further explanation:
How to Use Proximity Searching
How Do I Use Proximity Searching to Find a Phrase Within 10 Words of Another Phrase or Word?”