Wildcards are symbols substituting for one or more letters in your search term. Using wildcards will enable you to broaden your search by exploring multiple word endings, different forms or even different spellings of the searched term. You can even match words that you're not sure how to spell!

There are three wildcard operators which you can use in Expanded Academic ASAP:

An asterisk ( * ) stands for any number of characters, including none, and is especially useful when you want to find all words that share the same root. For example, export* matches exports, exporters, exporting, etc.
An asterisk can also be used within a word. For example, if someone is not sure how to spell Shakespeare, he/she could enter Sh*p*re.
On the other hand, one needs to be careful with some of the different word forms and endings. For example while searching for articles about angels and entering the term angel* (to see various forms such as: angel, angelic, etc.) one would also get articles about Los Angeles.

A question mark (?) stands for exactly one character and is especially useful for finding certain words with variant spellings. For example, defen?e finds both defense (American) and defence (British and Canadian). A question mark (?) could also come handy if you're uncertain of a spelling. For example, a search like relev?nce means you can match the word relevance even if, like many of us, you can't remember whether it's spelled with ance or ence.
Multiple question marks in a row stand for the same number of characters as there are question marks. In such cases we recommend using the asterisk ( * ), because, for example, psych????y matches either psychology or psychiatry but not psychotherapy.

An exclamation point ( ! ) stands for one or no characters and is especially useful when you want to match the singular and plural of a word but not other forms. For example, product! matches product and products but not productive or productivity. The exclamation point can also be used inside a word to match certain variant spellings. For example, colo!r matches both color (American) and colour (British).