Search (104 results, page 1 of 6)

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Abstract

Surfing the World Wide Web used to be cool, dude, real cool. But things have gotten hot - so hot that finding something useful an the Web is no longer cool. It is suffocating Web searchers in the smoke and debris of mountain-sized lists of hits, decisions about which search engines they should use, whether they will get lost in the dizzying maze of a subject directory, use the right syntax for the search engine at hand, enter keywords that are likely to retrieve hits an the topics they have in mind, or enlist a browser that has sufficient functionality to display the most promising hits. When it comes to Web searching, in a few short years we have gone from the cool image of surfing the Web into the frying pan of searching the Web. We can turn down the heat by rethinking what Web searchers are doing and introduce some order into the chaos. Web search strategies that are tool-based-oriented to specific Web searching tools such as search en gines, subject directories, and meta search engines-have been widely promoted, and these strategies are just not working. It is time to dissect what Web searching tools expect from searchers and adjust our search strategies to these new tools. This discussion offers Web searchers help in the form of search strategies that are based an strategies that librarians have been using for a long time to search commercial information retrieval systems like Dialog, NEXIS, Wilsonline, FirstSearch, and Data-Star.

Content

"Web searching is different from searching commercial IR systems. We can learn from search strategies recommended for searching IR systems, but most won't be effective for Web searching. Web searchers need strate gies that let search engines do the job they were designed to do. This article presents six new Web searching strategies that do just that."

Date

22. 9.1997 19:16:05

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Abstract

Purpose - This paper aims to report the result of follow-up research on end-users' conceptions of information visibility on the web and their conceptualizations of success and failure in web searching. Design/methodology/approach - The data were collected by a questionnaire followed by a brief interview with the participants. The questionnaire was developed based on the information visibility model suggested by the author in the original study. Fifty-two library and information sciences students from Tarbiat Mollem University (TMU) and Iran University of Medical Sciences (IUMS) in Tehran took part in the study. Findings - The model of information visibility can enable web users to gain a better understanding of their information seeking (IS) outcomes and it can assist them to improve their information literacy skills. The model can provide a theoretical framework to investigate web users' IS behavior and can be used as a diagnostic tool to explore the contextual and conceptual elements affecting the visibility of information for end-users. Research limitations/implications - The paper suggests a visibility learning diary (VLD), which might be useful to measure the efficiency of information literacy training courses. Originality/value - The contextual and conceptual approach of the paper provides a deeper insight into the issue of information visibility, which has received little attention by IS and information retrieval researchers until now.

Date

1. 1.2009 10:22:40

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Abstract

Purpose Web search is more and more moving into mobile contexts. However, screen size of mobile devices is limited and search engine result pages face a trade-off between offering informative snippets and optimal use of space. One factor clearly influencing this trade-off is snippet length. The purpose of this paper is to find out what snippet size to use in mobile web search. Design/methodology/approach For this purpose, an eye-tracking experiment was conducted showing participants search interfaces with snippets of one, three or five lines on a mobile device to analyze 17 dependent variables. In total, 31 participants took part in the study. Each of the participants solved informational and navigational tasks. Findings Results indicate a strong influence of page fold on scrolling behavior and attention distribution across search results. Regardless of query type, short snippets seem to provide too little information about the result, so that search performance and subjective measures are negatively affected. Long snippets of five lines lead to better performance than medium snippets for navigational queries, but to worse performance for informational queries. Originality/value Although space in mobile search is limited, this study shows that longer snippets improve usability and user experience. It further emphasizes that page fold plays a stronger role in mobile than in desktop search for attention distribution.

Date

20. 1.2015 18:30:22

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Date

25.12.1998 19:22:31

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Abstract

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to propose the Collaborative Search System that attempts to achieve collaboration by implicitly identifying and reflecting search behaviour of collaborators in an academic network that is automatically and dynamically formed. By using the constructed Collaborative Hit Matrix (CHM), results are obtained that are based on the search behaviour and earned preferences of specialist communities of researchers, which are relevant to the user's need and reduce the time spent on bad links. Design/methodology/approach - By using the Digital Bibliography Library Project (DBLP), the research communities are formed implicitly and dynamically based on the users' research presence in the search environment and in the publication scenario, which is also used to assign users' roles and establish links between the users. The CHM, to store the hit count and hit list of page results for queries, is also constructed and updated after every search session to enhance the collaborative search among the researchers. Findings - The implicit researchers community formation, the assignment and dynamic updating of roles of the researchers based on research, search presence and search behaviour on the web as well as the usage of these roles during Collaborative Web Search have highly improved the relevancy of results. The CHM that holds the collaborative responses provided by the researchers on the search query results to support searching distinguishes this system from others. Thus the proposed system considerably improves the relevancy and reduces the time spent on bad links, thus improving recall and precision. Originality/value - The research findings illustrate the better performance of the system, by connecting researchers working in the same field and allowing them to help each other in a web search environment.

Date

20. 1.2015 18:30:22

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Abstract

A study of the "real world" Web information searching behavior of 206 college students over a 10-month period showed that, contrary to expectations, the users adopted a more passive or browsing approach to Web information searching and became more eclectic in their selection of Web hosts as they gained experience. The study used a longitudinal transaction log analysis of the URLs accessed during 5,431 user days of Web information searching to detect changes in information searching behavior associated with increased experience of using the Web. The findings have implications for the design of future Web information retrieval tools

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Date

22. 5.2005 19:53:09

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Abstract

Purpose - This paper aims to report findings from an exploratory study investigating the web interactions and technoliteracy of children in the early childhood years. Previous research has studied aspects of older children's technoliteracy and web searching; however, few studies have analyzed web search data from children younger than six years of age. Design/methodology/approach - The study explored the Google web searching and technoliteracy of young children who are enrolled in a "preparatory classroom" or kindergarten (the year before young children begin compulsory schooling in Queensland, Australia). Young children were video- and audio-taped while conducting Google web searches in the classroom. The data were qualitatively analysed to understand the young children's web search behaviour. Findings - The findings show that young children engage in complex web searches, including keyword searching and browsing, query formulation and reformulation, relevance judgments, successive searches, information multitasking and collaborative behaviours. The study results provide significant initial insights into young children's web searching and technoliteracy. Practical implications - The use of web search engines by young children is an important research area with implications for educators and web technologies developers. Originality/value - This is the first study of young children's interaction with a web search engine.

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Abstract

Browsing is considered to be unstructured and human-driven, although not a cognitively intensive process. It is conducted using systems that facilitate considerable user-system interactivity. Cued by the content, people immerse themselves in a topic of interest and meander from topic to topic while concurrently recognising interesting and informative information en route. They seem to seek and gather information in a purposeless, illogical and indiscriminate manner. Typical examples of these ostensibly random acts are scanning a non-fiction book, examining the morning newspaper, perusing the contents of a business report and scavenging the World Wide Web. Often the result is the acquisition of new information, the rejection or confirmation of an idea, or the genesis of new, perhaps not-wholly-formed thoughts about a topic. Noteworthy about this approach is that people explore information without having consciously structured queries or explicit goals. This form of passive information interaction behaviour is defined as acquiring and gathering information while scanning an information space without a specific goal in mind (Waterworth & Chignell, 1991; Toms, 1997), and for the purposes of this study, is called browsing. Traditionally, browsing is thought of in two ways: as a physical process - the action taken when one scans a list, a document, or a set of linked information nodes (e.g., Fox & Palay, 1979; Thompson & Croft, 1989; Ellis, 1989), and as a conceptual process, information seeking when the goal is ill-defined (e.g., Cove & Walsh, 1987). Browsing is also combined with searching in an integrated information-seeking process for retrieving information (e.g., Ellis, 1989; Belkin, Marchetti & Cool, 1993; Marchionini, 1995; Chang, 1995). Each of these cases focuses primarily on seeking information when the objective ranges from fuzzy to explicit.

Date

22. 3.2002 9:44:47

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Date

22. 5.2005 19:52:29

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Source

Library and information science research. 22(2000) no.4, S.371-382

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Abstract

This article reviews studies, conducted between 1995 and 2000, on Web search behavior. These studies reported on children as well as on adults. Most of the studies on children described their interaction with the Web. Research on adult searchers focused on describing search patterns, and many studies investigated effects of selected factors on search behavior, including information organization and presentation, type of search task, Web experience, cognitive abilities, and affective states. What distinguishes the research on adult searchers is the use of multiple data-gathering methods. The research on Web search behavior reflects researchers' commitment to examine users in their information environment and exhibits rigor in design and data analysis. However, many studies lack external validity. Implications of this body of research are discussed.

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Abstract

Recent studies show that humans engage in multitasking behaviors as they seek and search information retrieval (IR) systems for information on more than one topic at the same time. For example, a Web search session by a single user may consist of searching on single topics or multitasking. Findings are presented from four separate studies of the prevalence of multitasking information seeking and searching by Web, IR system, and library users. Incidence of multitasking identified in the four different studies included: (1) users of the Excite Web search engine who completed a survey form, (2) Excite Web search engine users filtered from an Excite transaction log from 20 December 1999, (3) mediated on-line databases searches, and (4) academic library users. Findings include: (1) multitasking information seeking and searching is a common human behavior, (2) users may conduct information seeking and searching on related or unrelated topics, (3) Web or IR multitasking search sessions are longer than single topic sessions, (4) mean number of topics per Web search ranged of 1 to more than 10 topics with a mean of 2.11 topic changes per search session, and (4) many Web search topic changes were from hobbies to shopping and vice versa. A more complex model of human seeking and searching levels that incorporates multitasking information behaviors is presented, and a theoretical framework for human information coordinating behavior (HICB) is proposed. Multitasking information seeking and searching is developing as major research area that draws together IR and information seeking studies toward a focus on IR within the context of human information behavior. Implications for models of information seeking and searching, IR/Web systems design, and further research are discussed.

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Abstract

Previous studies have examined various aspects of user behavior on the Web, including general information-seeking patterns, search engine use, and revisitation habits. Little research has been conducted to study how users navigate and interact with their Web browser across different information-seeking tasks. We have conducted a field study of 21 participants, in which we logged detailed Web usage and asked participants to provide task categorizations of their Web usage based on the following categories: Fact Finding, Information Gathering, Browsing, and Transactions. We used implicit measures logged during each task session to provide usage measures such as dwell time, number of pages viewed, and the use of specific browser navigation mechanisms. We also report on differences in how participants interacted with their Web browser across the range of information-seeking tasks. Within each type of task, we found several distinguishing characteristics. In particular, Information Gathering tasks were the most complex; participants spent more time completing this task, viewed more pages, and used the Web browser functions most heavily during this task. The results of this analysis have been used to provide implications for future support of information seeking on the Web as well as direction for future research in this area.

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Abstract

Despite a number of studies looking at Web experience and Web searching tactics and behaviours, the specific relationships between experience and cognitive search strategies have not been widely researched. This study investigates how the cognitive search strategies of 80 participants might vary with Web experience as they engaged in two researcher-defined tasks and two participant-defined information seeking tasks. Each of the two researcher-defined tasks and participant-defined tasks included a directed search task and a general-purpose browsing task. While there were almost no significant performance differences between experience levels on any of the four tasks, there were significant differences in the use of cognitive search strategies. Participants with higher levels of Web experience were more likely to use "Parallel player", "Parallel hub-and-spoke", "Known address search domain" and "Known address" strategies, whereas participants with lower levels of Web experience were more likely to use "Virtual tourist", "Link-dependent", "To-the-point", "Sequential player", "Search engine narrowing", and "Broad first" strategies. The patterns of use and differences between researcher-defined and participant-defined tasks and between directed search tasks and general-purpose browsing tasks are also discussed, although the distribution of search strategies by Web experience were not statistically significant for each individual task.

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Abstract

Previous studies have shown that users' cognitive styles play an important role during web searching. However, only a limited number of studies have showed the relationship between cognitive styles and web search behavior. Most importantly, it is not clear which components of web search behavior are influenced by cognitive styles. This article examines the relationships between users' cognitive styles and their web searching and develops a model that portrays the relationship. The study uses qualitative and quantitative analyses based on data gathered from 50 participants. A questionnaire was utilized to collect participants' demographic information, and Riding's (1991) Cognitive Styles Analysis (CSA) test to assess their cognitive styles. Results show that users' cognitive styles influenced their information-searching strategies, query reformulation behavior, web navigational styles, and information-processing approaches. The user model developed in this study depicts the fundamental relationships between users' web search behavior and their cognitive styles. Modeling web search behavior with a greater understanding of users' cognitive styles can help information science researchers and information systems designers to bridge the semantic gap between the user and the systems. Implications of the research for theory and practice, and future work, are discussed.

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Abstract

Users' individual differences and tasks are important factors that influence the use of information systems. Two independent investigations were conducted to study the impact of differences in users' cognition and search tasks on Web search activities and outcomes. Strong task effects were found on search activities and outcomes, whereas interactions between cognitive and task variables were found on search activities only. These results imply that the flexibility of the Web and Web search engines allows different users to complete different search tasks successfully. However, the search techniques used and the efficiency of the searches appear to depend on how well the individual searcher fits with the specific task