LibGuides: Four-Step Legal Research Process: Advanced Searching

What is Advanced Searching?

Advanced searching refers to using more specific, refined techniques to find legal information, allowing you to tailor your search beyond simple keyword or basic searches.

Key Elements of Advanced Searching:

Boolean Logic: Combining search terms with AND, OR, and NOT to narrow or broaden your search.
Field Search: Targeting specific sections of legal documents (e.g., case name, headnotes, statutes, etc.).
Filters: Refining results by things like jurisdiction, court level, or date.
Proximity & Wildcards: Searching for terms within a certain distance or including variations of a word.

Why Use Advanced Searching?

Precision: It helps you find exactly what you need without sifting through irrelevant results.
Efficiency: You can save time by narrowing down the search to the most relevant cases, statutes, or other legal sources.
Customization: Advanced searching lets you tailor your search strategy to specific legal research needs.

Advanced searching includes both natural language searching, which allows for intuitive, conversational queries, and terms & connectors searching, which offers greater precision through structured, Boolean-based queries.

Advanced Searching on Westlaw

On Westlaw, advanced searching includes a range of sophisticated tools including:

Boolean logic to connect or exclude specific terms.
Field searches to limit results to specific parts of a case or document, like searching within the "Headnote" or "Opinion."
Natural language searching that lets you use full sentences or questions (for example, "What is the statute of limitations for personal injury claims in California?").
Proximity searches, where you can specify how close certain terms must be to each other.
Filters like jurisdiction, court level, or time period to help narrow results.
Custom queries using advanced syntax, which enables highly specific searches based on your research needs.

Advanced Searching on Lexis

On Lexis, advanced searching allows you to use specialized features including:

Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) to combine or exclude certain terms.
Proximity searching, where you search for terms that are within a certain number of words of each other.
Field searches, which let you search specific parts of a document (like the title, headnote, or case name).
Filters to limit search results by jurisdiction, date, or document type.
Wildcards (* or ?) to account for variations in spelling or word forms.

Natural Language vs. Terms & Connectors Searching

	Natural Language Searching	Terms & Connectors Searching
Ease of Use	Easy and intuitive for beginners; simply type as you would any regular question.	Requires understanding of Boolean operators and connectors.
Precision	Less precise; may return broad or irrelevant results.	More precise but can miss relevant results if not structured correctly.
Complex Queries	Not ideal for complex legal issues; may oversimplify.	Ideal for complex, specific searches, but requires proper query structuring.
Contextual Understanding	Can interpret some context but may miss subtle nuances.	Relies on exact terms; misses contextual relevance if connectors aren’t used correctly.
Refining Searches	Limited ability to refine search results after the query.	Highly customizable with advanced filters, but may be time-consuming.
Learning Curve	Quick to learn, but less control over results.	Steep learning curve, but offers more control over the search results.
Handling Ambiguity	May misinterpret ambiguous queries, leading to irrelevant results.	Can miss relevant results if Boolean operators are incorrectly used.
Scope of Results	May return overly broad or vague results, including less relevant sources.	Tends to return more relevant results but may miss broader context.
Contextual Relevance	May bring contextually relevant results but lack precision.	Results highly depend on the exact terms used, risking missing contextual relevance.

For more on terms & connectors searching, view our Terms & Connectors Research Guide.