Systematic Review and Evidence Synthesis

Addressing antiquated, non-standard, exclusionary, and potentially offensive terms in evidence syntheses and systematic searches

Some searches, due to the nature of their topics, must include antiquated, non-standard, exclusionary, and offensive terms in order to identify all published literature on that topic. This is particularly true of searches supporting evidence syntheses, where a robust and sensitive search is critical to the validity of the review. Reviewers, editors, and readers may question the inclusion of these terms, especially exclusionary and offensive terms, because of their potential to cause harm and trauma.

This document, developed by a team of librarians at the University of Michigan, provides guidance and suggested language for reporting when the topic of a review may require searching on possibly offensive terms to identify all potentially relevant studies.


Townsend, W., Anderson, P., Capellari, E., Haines, K., Hansen, S., James, L., MacEachern, M., Rana, G., & Saylor, K. (2022, September 9).  Addressing antiquated, non-standard, exclusionary, and potentially offensive terms in evidence syntheses and systematic searches. https://dx.doi.org/10.7302/6408

Last Updated: Mar 7, 2024 4:10 PM