Introduction to Term Lists
EndNote’s term lists are used to store terms such as keywords, author names, or journal names. You can use these stored terms when entering references to improve consistency and accuracy of information in your library. You can also use the Journals term list to store abbreviated journal names that EndNote can substitute for the full journal name in a bibliography, or to substitute the full name for an abbreviation.
To get a general sense of how the term lists work, here’s a brief overview of how term lists can be built and used for someone with a new EndNote library. With the default term list settings in the preferences, updating of terms and auto-completion happen automatically. If you do not like this behavior, you may turn off these settings (see Term Lists Preferences).
Term Lists are Automatically Maintained
When you create a new EndNote library, there are three empty term lists already set up and ready for you to use: Authors, Journals, and Keywords. As you enter new references into your library (whether by typing, importing, or pasting them) EndNote updates the term lists automatically so that the Authors, Journals, and Keywords lists include all of the author names, journal names, and keywords entered into your references.
Term Lists Help with Data Entry
When you use the New Reference command in the References menu to create new references, you will notice two other features associated with the term lists. As you begin entering an author name, EndNote attempts to complete the name for you by suggesting the closest matching name in the Authors term list. If you enter a new name that is not already in your Author list, the name appears in red text to indicate that it is a new addition to the term list. When you save the reference, that new term is added to the list.
When you are searching for references, you can also open a term list to pick the exact term or name for which to search.
Term Lists: Associating Additional Fields
- Journals Term List: By default, the installed Journal term list is linked to the Journal Article reference type. This list allows EndNote to substitute abbreviations for full journal names, or full names for abbreviations, in bibliographies. See The Journals Term List for more information.
- Authors Term List: There are several fields associated with the Authors term list. They include the Primary Author, Secondary Author, Tertiary Author, Subsidiary Author, and Translated Author fields. You can associate additional fields to the Author term list if you require them.
- Keywords Term List: This term list is associated with the Keywords field in an EndNote reference. You can associate additional fields with the Keyword term list if you require them.