Look for the instructions or guide page of the index you are using. It will tell you how the index is organized. Once you understand how a print index is organized, the volume in which you start your search will depend upon what you are looking for.

• Idea or concept: If your project is about an idea or concept start your search in volume one of the index and continue through the current year.
• Event: If your project is about a specific event, start your search with the year in which the event took place, or the first volume of the index whichever comes later.
• Person: If your project is about a person, start your search with the date the person was born, rose to prominence, or the first volume of the index whichever one comes last.
• If all you need are 2 or 3 articles on a topic from a particular time frame, scan the entries for your topic for that range of years. Select items that will represent the different points of view toward your topic, the change in attitudes about your topic, or illustrate the particular point you intend to make.
  For example: If your project requires information on "child care" from the 1950s you would need to search the appropriate print indexes for all of the 1950s as well as the early 1960s because articles did not always get indexed in the same year that they were published.

NOTE: If you have access to the electronic version of an index, your search of the print volumes should go from whichever volume you start your search with through the volume which overlaps the beginning of the electronic version of the index.