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Biology: Environmental Issues Research

This guide was created for Biology courses researching environmental issues.

Internet Search Tips

Finding credible information on the internet can be tricky.  These search tips can help focus your search to more credible and current sites. 

1. Limit Your Results by Domain

Use Site:[.domain] along with your keywords in the Google search box to only find sites from that specific domain.  Example: site:.edu

                                         Google search for Microplastics AND ocean site:.edu

Websites that end with .gov and .edu sites may have more reliable information. If you are using a .org or a .com site, make sure you are evaluating the site for credibility.  (See the Evaluating Sources page of this guide for more information).

 

2. Limit Your Results by Date

  1. After your search results appear, click the Tools button (typically found underneath the search box, but above your results).
  2. An Any Time menu will appear above your search results.
  3. Open the menu and select a date range. You can also select Custom Range and enter custom dates (ex: 2016 - 2021).

                                      Google Search for Microplastics and Ocean showing the steps to limit by date (click Tools, click Any Time menu)

 

Once you have applied a date limit, you will notice each of your results displays a date next to it.  This is a nice way to make sure you are not finding information that is too old.

                                       Search results after date limit highlighting website dates in the result list.

 

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