Vocabulary Control

Vocabulary control is the process of developing, preserving, and applying a controlled vocabulary in which a specific system requires the usage of a small number of terms to index documents and search for them. It can be described as a list of terms that illustrate their connections and are used to denote the document's particular topic.By clearly assigning index terms—that is, words or notations—to the documents and managing the semantic and frequently syntactic links between these index terms, an information system can benefit the user, at least in the case of alphabetical (word) systems. Controlled vocabulary is used because the words (which could be subject headings or descriptors) are taken from established subject heading lists or thesauri, and the notations are taken from established classification schedules. A regulated vocabulary is one in which each topic is represented by a single term or notation. One example of a regulated alphabetical vocabulary is the Library of Congress List of Subject Headings, whereas another example of a notational vocabulary is the Dewey Decimal Classification (all notational vocabularies must be controlled).