For systematic, etc. reviews, the search strategy is also the research method. You'll need to be meticulous in creating and keeping track of all of the details that go into it (see Building a Search Strategy for a list) so that you can give a clear report in your paper.
Consider keeping a "lab notebook" with all of the decisions you make about your search strategy. These notes could come in handy if a peer reviewer for a journal ask questions or makes a challenge.
You can save yourself some time and frustration if you plan your search strategy before you start looking for articles. It's like having a shopping list before going to the grocery store. Of course you may be fuzzy on some of these items to begin with, and that's OK. You can continue to refine your search strategy as learn more about your topic.
What's in a search strategy?
For more about all of these elements, look at the boxes below and in the blue tabs on the left.
Keywords and Subject Headings
Keywords
When you search with keywords, you are trying to find words that authors have used in their titles and abstracts or somehow otherwise appear in the article's entry in a database. Therefore you need to brainstorm all of the possible ways authors could refer to your concept:
"endurance" OR "physical fitness"
"education" OR "training" OR "school" OR "learning"
Subject Headings
You can also search using subject headings. Subject headings are keywords assigned by the databases to describe the concepts in an article and to try to take some of the guesswork out of the job of coming up with keywords. Try searching with subject headings and see how your results differ from searching with just keywords.
Still unsure about subject headings? Watch this video for another explanation as well as tips on how to find them.
Finding the Right Keywords
Using Titles and Abstracts to Identify Keywords
Because you are looking for words that appear in titles and abstracts, it follows that you need to know which words authors are using to talk about your topic. This can present some problems when you are at the beginning of a project, because you may not know much about your topic and the way people are talking about it yet. That's why your first few searches are less about finding the perfect articles and more about reading titles and abstracts so that you can find the right keywords.
As you read through the titles and abstracts, start collecting words you think might be good search terms.
Using Systematic Reviews to Identify Keywords
You will have already searched to see whether a systematic review has already been published on your topic, but you may want to take a closer look at the results you found. The methods section of systematic reviews that include elements of your own research question may be great places to start gathering keywords.
