Search (3 results, page 1 of 1)

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Abstract

The performance and capabilities of Web search engines is an important and significant area of research. Millions of people world wide use Web search engines very day. This paper reports the results of a major study examining the overlap among results retrieved by multiple Web search engines for a large set of more than 10,000 queries. Previous smaller studies have discussed a lack of overlap in results returned by Web search engines for the same queries. The goal of the current study was to conduct a large-scale study to measure the overlap of search results on the first result page (both non-sponsored and sponsored) across the four most popular Web search engines, at specific points in time using a large number of queries. The Web search engines included in the study were MSN Search, Google, Yahoo! and Ask Jeeves. Our study then compares these results with the first page results retrieved for the same queries by the metasearch engine Dogpile.com. Two sets of randomly selected user-entered queries, one set was 10,316 queries and the other 12,570 queries, from Infospace's Dogpile.com search engine (the first set was from Dogpile, the second was from across the Infospace Network of search properties were submitted to the four single Web search engines). Findings show that the percent of total results unique to only one of the four Web search engines was 84.9%, shared by two of the three Web search engines was 11.4%, shared by three of the Web search engines was 2.6%, and shared by all four Web search engines was 1.1%. This small degree of overlap shows the significant difference in the way major Web search engines retrieve and rank results in response to given queries. Results point to the value of metasearch engines in Web retrieval to overcome the biases of individual search engines.

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Abstract

Metasearch engines are an intuitive method for improving the performance of Web search by increasing coverage, returning large numbers of results with a focus on relevance, and presenting alternative views of information needs. However, the use of metasearch engines in an operational environment is not well understood. In this study, we investigate the usage of Dogpile.com, a major Web metasearch engine, with the aim of discovering how Web searchers interact with metasearch engines. We report results examining 2,465,145 interactions from 534,507 users of Dogpile.com on May 6, 2005 and compare these results with findings from other Web searching studies. We collect data on geographical location of searchers, use of system feedback, content selection, sessions, queries, and term usage. Findings show that Dogpile.com searchers are mainly from the USA (84% of searchers), use about 3 terms per query (mean = 2.85), implement system feedback moderately (8.4% of users), and generally (56% of users) spend less than one minute interacting with the Web search engine. Overall, metasearchers seem to have higher degrees of interaction than searchers on non-metasearch engines, but their sessions are for a shorter period of time. These aspects of metasearching may be what define the differences from other forms of Web searching. We discuss the implications of our findings in relation to metasearch for Web searchers, search engines, and content providers.

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Abstract

Detecting query reformulations within a session by a Web searcher is an important area of research for designing more helpful searching systems and targeting content to particular users. Methods explored by other researchers include both qualitative (i.e., the use of human judges to manually analyze query patterns on usually small samples) and nondeterministic algorithms, typically using large amounts of training data to predict query modification during sessions. In this article, we explore three alternative methods for detection of session boundaries. All three methods are computationally straightforward and therefore easily implemented for detection of session changes. We examine 2,465,145 interactions from 534,507 users of Dogpile.com on May 6, 2005. We compare session analysis using (a) Internet Protocol address and cookie; (b) Internet Protocol address, cookie, and a temporal limit on intrasession interactions; and (c) Internet Protocol address, cookie, and query reformulation patterns. Overall, our analysis shows that defining sessions by query reformulation along with Internet Protocol address and cookie provides the best measure, resulting in an 82% increase in the count of sessions. Regardless of the method used, the mean session length was fewer than three queries, and the mean session duration was less than 30 min. Searchers most often modified their query by changing query terms (nearly 23% of all query modifications) rather than adding or deleting terms. Implications are that for measuring searching traffic, unique sessions may be a better indicator than the common metric of unique visitors. This research also sheds light on the more complex aspects of Web searching involving query modifications and may lead to advances in searching tools.