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Research Guides

Comprehensive Searching in the Social Sciences

A comprehensive search – a search that captures most of the relevant studies – is a sensitive search.

A precise search

  • Captures some but not all relevant studies
  • Limits the number of irrelevant results
  • Requires less time to filter and screen

A sensitive search

  • Captures most of the relevant studies
  • Introduces more irrelevant results
  • Takes more time to filter and screen

 Diagram illustrating the scope of a precision search compared to a sensitive search. Diagram features blue circular dots representing irrelevant results, red square dots representing relevant results, an orange circle representing a precise search and a green dotted line circle representing a sensitive search. The orange circle is a smaller circle within the larger green circle. The orange circle contains mostly red square dots (relevant results), with only a few blue dots (irrelevant results) and represents a precision search. The larger green circle contains more blue dots (irrelevant results), but it also contains red dots (relevant results) that are outside of the scope of the orange circle. A few blue dots (irrelevant results) are located outside the scope of both circles

As illustrated in the image above, a precise search captures fewer irrelevant results but misses important sources. While a sensitive search captures most relevant results, it also captures more irrelevant sources. If your results are mostly or all relevant, it’s likely that your search is too precise and missing things.

How to improve search sensitivity

If your search is too precise, increase your search sensitivity by:

  • Removing a concept from your search
  • Using both keywords and subject headings
  • Adding additional synonyms and related terms for each concept
  • Building your search in more than one database