 In this video, we'll have a look at how field searching works. Databases are made up of many, many records, each record corresponding to an item such as a book or journal article. Records are comprised of fields containing information such as title, authors, publication date, volume and issue number, page numbers, source type, digital object identifier or DOI, and publisher. When you run a keyword search in a database, the database looks for the words you entered in the record, often in particular fields. Databases usually default to searching fields that best reflect the subject of an item, including the title and abstract, if there is one. But databases also typically give you the option to select a particular field you'd like to search through drop-down menus situated next to the search boxes. You may find that most of the time you can leave the drop-down on its default setting, which is optimized for searching by topic. However, there may be occasions when field-specific searches are just what you need to find what you're looking for. For example, you may be looking for sources authored by a particular individual. In that case, select author from the drop-down menu and enter the person's name. Keep in mind that in some search tools, it's necessary to enter the author's last name first. Or you may be tasked with finding an article from a certain journal. Most databases will allow you to search or browse articles by journal title. Some databases offer dozens of fields through which you can limit a search. Other examples include author affiliation, DOI, tests and measures, grant information, and subject-subject term or subject heading. We'll be talking more about the subject terms in another video. In some cases, you may need to use a field code rather than a drop-down menu to specify the field you'd like to search. If you ever need help with this, be sure to contact your subject librarian. Also, keep in mind that you can combine a search of one field with a search of another. In this way, you could, for instance, search for articles on lichens published in the Journal of Ecology. Keep in mind that field searching can significantly reduce a results list depending on how you use it. You might then find that it's best used after you've run an initial search and are looking to narrow your results. Otherwise, you might inadvertently limit your results more than necessary and misrelevant sources.