Comparing Search Strings

About this vignette

CiteSource provides three custom metadata fields for labeling citation records: cite_source, cite_label, and cite_string. Most workflows use cite_source to identify the database and cite_label to track the review stage (search, screened, final). The cite_string field provides a third dimension for cases where you need to distinguish between variations of a search strategy within the same source.

The most common use case is within-source string comparison: you are testing multiple query formulations in a single database before finalizing your search strategy, and you want to compare how each performs without conflating the query variation with the source identity. Encoding the variations as separate cite_source values would work, but it loses the ability to aggregate results at the database level. Using cite_string keeps the database identity intact while enabling a separate axis of analysis.

In this example, five search strings were run in Web of Science. We use cite_source to record the database and cite_string to label each query variation, then compare their performance against a set of benchmark studies.

Installation and setup

#install.packages("CiteSource")
library(CiteSource)

Import citation files

file_path <- "../vignettes/new_benchmark_data/"
citation_files <- list.files(path = file_path, pattern = "\\.ris", full.names = TRUE)
citation_files

Assign metadata using all three fields

The key difference from a standard import: cite_source is the same database (“WoS”) for all search strings, while cite_string differentiates the query variations. The benchmark file gets cite_source = NA and cite_label = "benchmark".

imported_tbl <- tibble::tribble(
  ~files,              ~cite_sources,  ~cite_labels,  ~cite_strings,
  "benchmark_15.ris",  NA,             "benchmark",   NA,
  "search1_166.ris",   "WoS",          "search",      "string 1",
  "search2_278.ris",   "WoS",          "search",      "string 2",
  "search3_302.ris",   "WoS",          "search",      "string 3",
  "search4_460.ris",   "WoS",          "search",      "string 4",
  "search5_495.ris",   "WoS",          "search",      "string 5"
) |>
  dplyr::mutate(files = paste0(file_path, files))

raw_citations <- read_citations(metadata = imported_tbl, verbose = FALSE)

Deduplicate and create comparison data

unique_citations <- dedup_citations(raw_citations)
n_unique         <- count_unique(unique_citations)

# Compare by string rather than source
string_comparison <- compare_sources(unique_citations, comp_type = "strings")

Review initial record counts

initial_records <- calculate_initial_records(unique_citations)
create_initial_record_table(initial_records)

Visualize overlap between strings

plot_source_overlap_upset(string_comparison, groups = "string", decreasing = c(TRUE, TRUE))

plot_source_overlap_heatmap(string_comparison, cells = "string")
plot_source_overlap_heatmap(string_comparison, cells = "string", plot_type = "percentages")

Compare string contributions

plot_contributions() shows unique and shared record counts for each string. Strings with a high proportion of unique records are contributing coverage that the other strings miss; strings with mostly shared records may be redundant.

plot_contributions(n_unique, facets = cite_string, center = TRUE)

Benchmark coverage by string

Filtering to the benchmark records and using the record-level table shows exactly which benchmark studies each string found — and which were missed entirely.

unique_citations |>
  dplyr::filter(stringr::str_detect(cite_label, "benchmark")) |>
  record_level_table(return = "DT")

Detailed contribution table by string

detailed_records <- calculate_detailed_records(unique_citations, n_unique)
create_detailed_record_table(detailed_records)

When to use cite_string vs cite_source

For most reviews, cite_source and cite_label are sufficient. cite_string becomes valuable when you are doing pre-search validation with multiple query variants, or when you want to distinguish supplementary search methods from the primary database searches while keeping both associated with the same source.