Searching effectively for the evidence

You'll probably notice that there is a large variety in the words people have chosen to describe the picture:

• Specific words e.g. names of specific plants
• Broad descriptions e.g. plants, flowers, garden
• Things that are in the picture, e.g. fence, plant pots
• Words that tell you about the picture e.g. natural, bright

These words are all describing the same picture, and in the same way research on the same topic could be descibed in a number of different ways.  When you do a search, you need to make sure that you find all the relevant evidence by thinking carefully about the terminology that might have been used.  Take dental caries as an example.  Any of the following terminology could have been used:

• caries
• tooth decay
• dental decay
• cavities

If you searched just for caries, you might miss out on research that talks about tooth decay.