Database Guides: EconLit

It is important to use the right words in your searches to make sure you're searching effectively.

• Try searching! See what terms work and what terms don't work. Always remember to use synonyms when searching to make sure you get the most results! For example, if you are research a topic in labor economics, you might want to search for not only "worker," but also "laborer" and "employee."
• Check out this page of JEL subject codes to see what kind of language economists use when publishing. These make especially great search terms for subject searching! Click here for the American Economic Association's full page of EconLit search hints.
• Once you have perfected your key words, make sure to use Boolean operators for the best searches!

• AND combines terms so that your search contains both search terms. For example, the search "financial markets" AND stocks will include results with both "financial markets" and stocks.
• OR broadens your search to include either of your search terms. For example, the search laborer OR worker will include results with either laborer or worker.
• NOT excludes terms from your search. For example, the search "interest rate" NOT "discount rate" will include results with the term "interest rate" and exclude the term "discount rate."

In addition to the Boolean operators AND, OR, & NOT, there are several other tricks you can use to further improve the quality of your searches on EconLit.

• Nesting through the use of parentheses allows you to use multiple operators and key words. For example, the search (race OR ethnicity) AND discrimination will return results that include both race and discrimination AND ethnicity and discrimination.
• The wild card (*) allows you to search for multiple versions of the same word. For example, the search wom*n will return results including either woman or women, and the search child* will return results including child, children, childhood, childish, etc.
• Quotation marks allow you to search for search phrases that are more than one word. For example, the search financial markets will return results including either financial or markets, but the search "financial markets" will only include results that have "financial markets." (In other words, the use of quotation marks preserve the multi-word phrase in its intended order, but make sure not to use it for entire sentences!).

• TX All Text, which searches the full-text of articles.
• AB Abstract, which searches the abstracts of articles.
• SU Subjects, which searches the subjects designated to articles. For example, an article titled "The Impact of Immigration on the Labor Market" has subject designations including "economics of minorities," "non-labor discrimination," and "wage level and structure." Click here to see a complete list of subject codes from the Journal of Economic Literature.
• TI Title, which searches the titles of articles.

Try searching on EconLit for a full list of fields available to search, or click here to read more about search fields from the American Economic Association.