## The role of GenAI

In the previous steps, you have seen that searching for information is a combination of good search terms and good resources. In this step, you have learned to use those search terms in such a way that you search as efficiently and effectively as possible, particularly by cleverly combining the search terms with AND, OR, and NOT. Do you still find this difficult? A chatbot can help you formulate a search query.

ChatGPT 5.1 via HvA AI-chat, dd. 2026-03-13

It is, however, useful to know the basics of this way of searching. Only then can you check whether the chatbot is providing a good search query. This is not always the case!

If you use a chatbot to search directly on the internet, you will run into a few limitations:

The chatbot “translates” your prompt into a search action to search the internet. However, you have no insight into the word variants into which the chatbot translates your search query. If you do want that, you must include all your word variants in the prompt.

The chatbot does provide sources with the answer but does not state the exact place where it found this answer. In the introduction you were able to read why this is.

In short, careful searching with a chatbot does require some time and preparation. Here are some more tips:

Try out various chatbots: you will see that each chatbot performs differently.

Ask in your prompt for the chatbot to make its reasoning steps explicit or make use of the “thinking mode” if the chatbot offers this. You can then see where you can make possible improvements to your prompt, or where you can ask for clarification.

Include additional information in your prompt so that you get an answer that is more tailored to your question. Think of the level of the desired literature, the amount, or the form in which you wish the literature to be presented.

Finally, check whether the given sources actually exist!