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An invitation to browse: Designing full-text systems for novice users
... When browsing, we may employ a variety of techniques ranging from the casual and undirected to the planned and systematic. As Marchionini (1987) explains, "These techniques are dependent on the object sought, individual searcher characteristics, the purpose of the search, and the setting and context for conducting the search. The objective of browsing may be well-defined (e.g., a particular antique chair to match a desk), or ill-defined (e.g., an interesting wall hanging for a favorite room)" (pp. ...
... Searching or Browsing? Marchionini (1987) discusses three primary reasons why people browse: ...
... Liebscher and Marchionini's ( 1988) research has demonstrated that browsing can be as effective in its results as structured, query-oriented Boolean searching for novice searchers of fulltext documents. Marchionini (1987) argues that because of the massive amounts of poorly organized information available in electronic form, browsing is even more important in electronic environments than in traditional environments like those presented by open-access libraries. ...
This paper discusses online public access catalog (OPAC) models and milestones. The journey of the networked online catalog has clearly departed from its early, first-generation manifestation as a stand-alone, local "card catalog online" and continues at an alarming pace in its evolution to some fuzzily conceived expanded, transformed entity we may humbly refer to for now as the library catalog information system. What this future information management and retrieval system will be like is not entirely clear, which makes it the topic of much speculation and wishful thinking. Its parameters and features may be decided by, nay, even driven by, new, emergent technologies, or, hopefully, its form and function will be guided by the knowledge attained from a vast body of research and experience with online catalogs and their users. published or submitted for publication
... This dichotomy is captured in word pairs such as surfing/browsing-searching, hedonistic-utilitarian, sensory-functional, experiential-goal-directed, play-work that are typically used to refer to Web navigation (Chen et al., 1998;Dutta-Bergman, 2003a;Li & Bukovac, 1999). Although browsing is characterized by its exploratory nature and absence of planning, goals, or objectives (Marchionini, 1987;Marchionini & Shneiderman, 1988), searching is goal-directed and the user looks for specific information to solve a problem or to fulfill specific information needs (Chen at al., 1998). Whereas the browser is not particularly attentive to specific issue-relevant information objects, the searcher is driven by his or her very specific interest in the search topic. ...
... On a similar note, Li and Bukovac (1999) point out that information seekers in searching situations selectively orient their attention to information based on its need relevance and surfers are experientially oriented and are drawn toward whatever is interesting in their information environment (Li & Bukovac, 1990). In other words, although surfing is diffusely oriented toward the information environment, is unplanned, and comprises an exploratory informationprocessing strategy that heavily depends upon serendipity, searching involves planned information seeking marked by goal-directed processing of relevant information (Carmel, Crawford, & Chen, 1992;Marchionini, 1987;Marchionini & Shneiderman, 1988). ...
Recent articles on the quality of health information on the Internet reveal 2 critical criteria: completeness and credibility. This article investigates the effect of Web use motivation on the relationship between completeness and consumer perceptions of credibility. Based on a 2 × 3 experiment conducted with 246 respondents, the article demonstrates that the extent of completeness of health information on the Internet impacts consumer assessment of source and website credibility. In contrast to the extant research on the orthogonality of content and source characteristics, this research demonstrates their interaction.
... These range from a simple desire to find something interesting Several researchers have defined browsing behavior in the context of hypertext environments (Carmel, Craw-(for no particular reason) to searching for useful information on a specific topic. Internet service providers have ford, Liebscher & Marchionini, 1988;Marchionini, 1987;Marchionini & Shneiderman, 1988). responded to such expectations by increasing the size of their indexed World Wide Web (WWW) homepages, and For our research, browsing can best be described by a combination of quotes from Marchionini's work: Brows-by improving their Internet searching engines (focusing initially on improving user interfaces and query forma-ing is ''an exploratory, information seeking strategy that depends upon serendipity'' and is ''especially appropriate tion). ...
... Alta Vista (through for ill-defined problems and for exploring new task domains'' (Marchionini & Shneiderman, 1988, p. 71). a strategic alliance with Yahoo!) claims to have indexed 30/ million URLs as of August 1996. HotBot (a recently Browsingis ''characterized by the absence of planning'' (Marchionini, 1987, p. 69) and is often used as ''an alter-introduced Internet searching product from Hot Wired) claims to have indexed the largest number of homepages, native to the complex Boolean (keyword-based) search strategy (Marchionini, 1987). In essence, browsing ex-54 million URLs as of August 1996. ...
We describe the use of ethnomethodologically-informed ethnography as a means of informing the requirements elicitation, design, development and evaluation of digital libraries. We present the case for the contribution of such studies to the development ...
... The recall vs. recognition principle is evident in systems that rely on menus or direct manipulation rather than commands. Systems that require entering keywords necessarily rely on recall knowledge, since the user must think of words and their synonyms from memory (Marchionini, 1987). Added to the burden of recall knowledge for children is their relatively smaller attainment of content knowledge, particularly in subject areas such as science that are not part of everyday knowledge. ...
... Browsing relies on recognition knowledge and requires less well-defined search objectives than does directed keyword searching. Children prefer browsing to keyword Boolean-based searching and can use the browsing technique effectively in both OPACs (Armstrong & Costa, 1983) and full-text searching of electronic encyclopedias (Liebscher & Marchionini, 1988;Marchionini, 1987). ...
As we seek both to improve public school education in high technology areas and to link libraries and classrooms on the "information superhighway," we need to understand more about children's information searching abilities. We present results of four experiments conducted on four ver- sions of the Science Library Catalog (SLC), a Dewey deci- mal-based hierarchical browsing system implemented in HyperCard without a keyboard. The experiments were conducted over a 3-year period at three sites, with four da- tabases, and with comparisons to two different keyword online catalogs. Subjects were ethnically and culturally di- verse children aged 9 through 12; with 32 to 34 children participating in each experiment. Children were provided explicit instruction and reference materials for the key- word systems but not for the SLC. The number of search topics matched was comparable across all systems and all experiments; search times were comparable, though they varied among the four SLC versions and between the two keyword online public access catalogs (OPACs). The SLC overall was robust to differences in age, sex, and computer experience. One of the keyword OPACs was subject to mi- nor effects of age and computer experience; the other was not. We found relationships between search topic and sys- tem structure, such that the most difficult topics on the SLC were those hard to locate in the hierarchy, and those most difficult on the keyword OPACs were hard to spell or re- quired children to generate their own search terms. The SLC approach overcomes problems with several search- ing features that are difficult for children in typical keyword OPAC systems: typing skills, spelling, vocabulary, and Boolean logic. Results have general implications for the design of information retrieval systems for children.
... La Interacció Persona-Ordinador (IPO) és la conjunció interdisciplinària de diverses ciències i tecnologies convertida avui en una disciplina per ella mateixa, atesa la seva trajectòria i el seu assentament en la recerca en les últimes dècades. D'entre les diferents definicions que se n'han anat donant, en proposem una que considerem que en condensa d'altres de donades amb anterioritat per autors com Booth (1989), Marchionini (1995) o Shneiderman (1992): la IPO s'ocupa d'estudiar la creació de productes informàtics que ajudin en la realització de tasques als seus usuaris tenint en compte la facilitat d'ús, el temps d'execució, que evitin possibles errors i que, en conseqüència, els satisfacin. ...
... - Thompson i Croft (1989) veuen el browsing com una bona estructura organitzacional, ja que els ítems relacionats estan els uns a prop d'altres. - Motro (1986) i Marchionini (1987) creuen que és d'utilitat especial quan els usuaris no estan familiaritzats amb el contingut de la col·lecció. -Belkin, Oddy i Brooks (1982a i 1982b) diuen que resulta útil als qui tenen dificultat per expressar la seva necessitat d'informació. ...
... An ideal information retrieval system should fully integrate browsing with searching and allow users to iteratively switch effortlessly between both types of search tactics (Lin 1997, 41;Marchionini 1995;Pejtersen 1988;Shneiderman et al. 2000, 62). Keyword searching is an adequate tool for well defined needs with recognizable answers (e.g., What is the capital of Norway?); alternatively, browsing (Chen et al. 1998;Heo 2000;Lin 1997;Marchionini 1987;McAleese 1989) takes place when the need is broad and/or complex and the potential answer is a collection of related and supporting information (e.g., How can physical exercise effect the quality of life of cancer patients?). An explorative browsing process may be well supported by direct manipulation visual interface metaphors which are preferred to text-only interfaces and easier to learn for novice users (Carroll et al. 1982;Hearst 1999, 282;Shneiderman 2003, 364). ...
Controlled vocabulary is known to help searchers and Semantic Web ontologies are one of its latest incarnations. Unfortunately, many searchers are unaware of this useful organization of information. An interactive 3D fly-through search and browsing prototype was developed and is proposed as potential solution to enhance navigation.Le vocabulaire contrôlé est reconnu pour aider les chercheurs et les ontologies du web sémantique en sont la dernière incarnation. Malheureusement, nombre de chercheurs ne connaissent pas cet utile outil d'organisation de l'information. Un prototype interactif de recherche et de navigation en 3D a été développé et est proposé comme solution pour rehausser la navigation.
... The OPAC interface style may affect search performance as well. Marchionini (1987) discussed why people prefer search by browsing: "First, people browse because they cannot or have not defined their search objective. Second, they browse because it takes less cognitive load to browse than it does to plan and conduct an analytical, optimized search. ...
This study aims to explore common pitfalls of design and functional issues of Open Public Access Catalogue (OPAC) systems for archives for the general public and suggest solutions to approach such problems. Other than general users, this study also suggests ways to enhance the OPAC system to make it more user-friendly to users with special needs, such as the elderly and children. This paper uses a case study approach to evaluate the usability of the OPAC system in the Hong Kong Film Archive (HKFA), which is a representative and important archive of its type. The paper provides practical insights on common pitfalls of design and functional issues of OPAC for archives under such context (such as searching user-friendliness) and suggests technical solutions (such as Web 2.0 and more user friendly input devices) to approach such problems. Although we carried out this usability study mainly based on observation without direct interaction with their target users, we already discover adequate and significant problems for the discussions and suggestions in this paper. The paper includes implications and suggestion for archives to improve the usability and functionality of their OPAC systems, which is a key to their public services. Recently, implementing public Web-based access to archives has become popular. However, there are just few usability studies on such OPAC systems, especially for archives facing the general public instead of just professionals.
... Taxonomy is a hierarchical arrangement of thematic structure inherent in a collection of documents which can improve Internet search precision [12,13]. Marchionini & Shneiderman define browsing as an exploratory, information seeking strategy that depends upon serendipity for ill-defined problems and for exploring new task domains in [14,15]. Because browsing is frequently used when users only have general topics or they are not sure how to narrow their search from a general topic, users typically rely on pre-existing taxonomies of information organization as they explore. ...
... To evaluate the performance of each clustering method, we adapt some ideas from the contingency table model (Marchionini et al., 1987). ...
The World Wide Web is transitioning from being a mere collection of documents that contain useful information toward providing a collection of services that perform useful tasks. The emerging Web service technology has been envisioned as the next technological wave and is expected to play an important role in this recent transformation of the Web. By providing interoperable interface standards for application-to-application communication, Web services can be combined with component based software development to promote application interaction and integration both within and across enterprises. To make Web services for service-oriented computing operational, it is important that Web service repositories not only be well-structured but also provide efficient tools for developers to find reusable Web service components that meet their needs. As the potential of Web services for service-oriented computing is being widely recognized, the demand for effective Web service discovery mechanisms is concomitantly growing. A number of techniques for Web service discovery have been proposed, but the discovery challenge has not been satisfactorily addressed. Unfortunately, most existing solutions are either too rudimentary to be useful or too domain dependent to be generalizable. In this paper, we propose a Web service organizing framework that combines clustering techniques with string matching and leverages the semantics of the XML-based service specification in WSDL documents. We believe that this is one of the first attempts at applying data mining techniques in the Web service discovery domain. Our proposed approach has several appealing features : (1) It minimizes the requirement of prior knowledge from both service consumers and publishers; (2) It avoids exploiting domain dependent ontologies; and (3) It is able to visualize the semantic relationships among Web services. We have developed a prototype system based on the proposed framework using an unsupervised artificial neural network and empirically evaluated the proposed approach and tool using real Web service descriptions drawn from operational Web service registries. We report on some preliminary results demonstrating the efficacy of the proposed approach.
... Browsing is generally considered to virtually involve no planning, preparation or focus. For instance, Marchionini [55] notes that browsing does not involve planning and is often utilized as an alternative to an analytical search strategy. Many studies have been reported that show the benefits of browsing, for instance [11], [40], [53]. ...
The field of information retrieval (IR) has experienced tremendous growth over the years. Researchers have however identified Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) aspects as important concerns in IR research. Incorporation of HCI techniques in IR can ensure that IR systems intended for human users are developed and evaluated in a way that is consistent with and reflects the needs of those users. The traditional methods of evaluating IR systems have for a long period been largely concerned with system-oriented measurements such as precision and recall, but not on the usability aspects of the IR system. There also are no well-established evaluation approaches for studying users and their interactions with IR systems. This chapter describes the role and place of HCI toward supporting and appropriating the evaluation of IR systems.
... Although browsing has been a prevalent information-seeking behavior, very little is known about what motivates people to choose this strategy (Rice, McCreadie, and Chang, 2001). Marchionini (1987) argues that people browse for three reasons: the search objective cannot be defined clearly, the cognitive burden is less than the structured formalized searching, or perhaps the retrieval system 'encourages' browsing. Hildreth (1987) notes that most users do not search for a known item, but rather browse because the process of exploration and discovery is essential to them. ...
... Browsing is an exploratory and information-seeking strategy that depends upon serendipity, which is appropriate for ill-defined problems or exploring new task domains [22]. It is characterized by the absence of planning [21]. In essence, browsing explores both the organization and structures of the information space and its content, based on the pre-existing mental models of information organization. ...
Information overload is a critical problem in World Wide Web. Category map developed based on Kohonen's self-organizing map (SOM) has been proven to be a promising browsing tool for the Web. The SOM algorithm automatically categorizes a large Internet information space into manageable sub-spaces. It compresses and transforms a complex information space into a two-dimensional graphical representation. Such graphical representation provides a user-friendly interface for users to explore the automatically generated mental model. However, as the amount of information increases, it is expected to increase the size of the category map accordingly in order to accommodate the important concepts in the information space. It results in increasing of visual load of the category map. Large pool of information is packed closely together on a limited size of displaying window, where local details are difficult to be clearly seen. In this paper, we propose the fisheye views and fractal views to support the visualization of category map. Fisheye views are developed based on the distortion approach while fractal views are developed based on the information reduction approach. The purpose of fisheye views are to enlarge the regions of interest and diminish the regions that are further away while maintaining the global structure. On the other hand, fractal views are an approximation mechanism to abstract complex objects and control the amount of information to be displayed. We have developed a prototype system and conducted a user evaluation to investigate the performance of fisheye views and fractal views. The results show that both fisheye views and fractal views significantly increase the effectiveness of visualizing category map. In addition, fractal views are significantly better than fisheye views but the combination of fractal views and fisheye views do not increase the performance compared to each individual technique.
... Hypertext users can enhance their perception and understanding of vast amounts of information by mamining the association links between information iterns. Hypertext has been shown to be a useful tool for browsing [6,171 and learning [9]. Hypertext systemscanalsobeused tomtrievespecificinformation [12,18] sinceuserscan follow an association trail from one item to artother until the desired information is found. ...
... Several studies have shown that a hierarchical representation with associated browser is an effective approach [1, 19]. Recent studies have shown that browsing through a table of contents is a preferred method over more analytical methods such as query formulation [2, 4, 14]. Benefits of online information include geographically distributed high speed access to data; faster, more complete updates to information [20]; the capability for string searching; and inclusion of animation [16], sound, and video.Figure 1b. ...
Three different interfaces were used to browse a large (1296 items) table of contents. A fully expanded stable interface, expand/contract interface, and multipane interface were studied in a between-groups experiment with 41 novice participants. Nine timed fact retrieval tasks were performed; each task is analyzed and discussed separately. We found that both the expand/contract and multipane interfaces produced significantly faster times than the stable interface for many tasks using this large hierarchy; other advantages of the expand/contract and multipane interfaces over the stable interface are discussed. The animation characteristics of the expand/contract interface appear to play a major role. Refinements to the multipane and expand/contract interfaces are suggested. A predictive model for measuring navigation effort of each interface is presented.
... Second, users browse when they do not have a specific thing they want to look for, whether it be an unfamiliar area in which they are interested and want to explore or something that has aroused curiosity. The research reported here primarily focuses on the browsing aspect of information seeking, because providing hierarchical subject categories (akin to Yahoo! directory) or knowledge maps (knowledge structures represented by a map metaphor ) has been shown to be an effective way to support browsing behaviors [5,8,20,25,26]. The explosion of information has made manual efforts to create subject categories or knowledge maps an overwhelming task. Furthermore, normal information users often are not capable of navigating through a large space of information. ...
Abstract Information technology has made possible the capture and accessing of a large number of data and knowledge bases, which,in turn has brought about the problem,of information,overload. Text mining,to turn textual information,into knowledge has become a very active research area, but much of the research remains restricted to the English language. Due to the differences in linguistic characteristics and methods of natural language processing, many existing text analysis approaches have yet to be shown,to be useful for the Chinese language. This research focuses on the automatic generation of a hierarchical knowledge map NewsMap, based on online Chinese news, particularly the finance and health sections. Whether in print or online, news still represents one important knowledge source that people produce and consume on a daily basis. The hierarchical knowledge,map,can be used as a tool for browsing,business intelligence and medical knowledge hidden in news articles. In order to assess the quality of the map, an empirical study was conducted which shows that the categories of the hierarchical knowledge,map,generated by NewsMap,are better than those generated by regular news readers, both in terms of recall and precision, on the sub-level categories but not on the top-level categories. NewsMap employs,an improved,interface combining,a 1D alphabetical hierarchical list and a 2D Self-Organizing Map (SOM) island display. Another empirical study compared,the two,visualization displays and,found,that users’ performances,can be improved,by taking advantage of the visual cues of the 2D SOM display. D 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Knowledge management; Knowledge map; Online news; Neural networks; Experimental research
Much of the research on the information-seeking behavior of young people has examined either the degree to which they use particular providers or the manner in which they exploit such sources or materials. Considerably less attention has focused on the identification of generic characteristics that relate to the use of a range of information sources. Nevertheless, a recent qualitative research project undertaken in England has revealed that a variety of patterns appear to emerge even when sources of different types are used. While a few are indicative of the nature of the information-seeking process itself, some pertain to users' information-seeking problems and others to patterns of behavior. Many of the recurring features of user behavior reflect attempts by youngsters to simplify the task of information seeking and reduce the effort expended.
This study explores how virtual desktops hosted within a cloud computing environment can be used as a data capture tool to undertake research exploring web-browsing and web-searching behaviour. It details the protocol used to observe the task-orientated web interactions of 105 university and school aged participants within the confines of a research experiment and considers the comparability between data collected remotely via virtual desktops and data collected in a controlled environment. Data collected remotely via virtual desktops is found to be comparable to data collected in the field across a number of key statistics, with remote data collection making recruitment and participation more convenient, whilst potentially reducing response bias. The protocol detailed has broad potential for adaption where there is a need to remotely capture participants’ web-use in a cost-effective and non-technical manner. Limitations with the protocol are identified and possibilities for future adaptations are discussed.
Information seeking is a problem-solving activity that depends on a variety of individual and systemic characteristics. As part of an ongoing investigation of how highly interactive electronic access to primary information affects information seeking, a series of studies explored the effects of domain expertise and search expertise. Professional search intermediaries and experts in computer science, business/economics, and law conducted assigned searches in hypertext or full-text CD-ROM databases. Domain experts were content-driven; they sometimes used technical query terms based on their knowledge, formed expectations related to possible answers, and browsed the full text freely. Search experts were problemdriven; they used more system features, formed expectations related to the form and location of answers, focused on documents, and browsed more than they would when using online databases. Enabling strategies allowed both domain and search experts to reflect on the progress of the search in continuous rather than batch ways, but raised issues of cost effectiveness for searcher time investments. Designers can improve systems by reducing response time, adding browsing support after potentially relevant sets or documents have been identified, and automatically offering suggestions for search strategies or shortcuts. and to be explicit in representing what these alternatives imply for users.
The goal of this research is to evaluate the usability of visually browsing the automatically extracted information. A domain-independent information extraction system was used to extract information from news type texts to populate the visually browasable knowledge base. The information extraction system automatically generated Concept-Relation-Concept triples by applying various Natural Language Processing techniques to the text portion of the news articles. To visualize the information stored in the knowledge base, we used PersoanlBrain to develop a visualization portion of the user interface. PersonalBrain is a hyperbolic information visualization system, which enables the users to link information into a network of logical associations. To understand the usability of the visually browsable knowledge base, IS test subjects were observed while they use the visual interface and also interviewed afterward. By applying a qualitative test data analysis method. a number of usability Problems and further research directions were identified.
Information technology has made possible the capture and accessing of a large number of data and knowledge bases, which in turn has brought about the problem of information overload. Text mining to turn textual information into knowledge has become a very active research area, but much of the research remains restricted to the English language. Due to the differences in linguistic characteristics and methods of natural language processing, many existing text analysis approaches have yet to be shown to be useful for the Chinese language. This research focuses on the automatic generation of a hierarchical knowledge map NewsMap, based on online Chinese news, particularly the finance and health sections. Whether in print or online, news still represents one important knowledge source that people produce and consume on a daily basis. The hierarchical knowledge map can be used as a tool for browsing business intelligence and medical knowledge hidden in news articles. In order to assess the quality of the map, an empirical study was conducted which shows that the categories of the hierarchical knowledge map generated by NewsMap are better than those generated by regular news readers, both in terms of recall and precision, on the sub-level categories but not on the top-level categories. NewsMap employs an improved interface combining a 1D alphabetical hierarchical list and a 2D Self-Organizing Map (SOM) island display. Another empirical study compared the two visualization displays and found that users' performances can be improved by taking advantage of the visual cues of the 2D SOM display.
Information is an important concept that is studied extensively across a range of disciplines, from the physical sciences to genetics to psychology to epistemology. Information continues to increase in importance, and the present age has been referred to as the "Information Age." One may understand information in a variety of ways. For some, information is found in facts that were previously unknown. For others, a fact must have some economic value to be considered information. Other people emphasize the movement through a communication channel from one location to another when describing information. In all of these instances, information is the set of characteristics of the output of a process. Yet Information has seldom been studied in a consistent way across different disciplines. Information from Processes provides a discipline-independent and precise presentation of both information and computing processes. Information concepts and phenomena are examined in an effort to understand them, given a hierarchy of information processes, where one process uses others. Research about processes and computing is applied to answer the question of what information can and cannot be produced, and to determine the nature of this information (theoretical information science). The book also presents some of the basic processes that are used in specific domains (applied information science), such as those that generate information in areas like reasoning, the evolution of informative systems, cryptography, knowledge, natural language, and the economic value of information. Written for researchers and graduate students in information science and related fields, Information from Processes details a unique information model independent from other concepts in computer or archival science, which is thus applicable to a wide range of domains. Combining theoretical and empirical methods as well as psychological, mathematical, philosophical, and economic techniques, Losee's book delivers a solid basis and starting point for future discussions and research about the creation and use of information. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2012. All rights are reserved.
Recent articles on the evaluation of the quality of health information on the World Wide Web reveal an emphasis on the completeness of information. This paper takes a situational approach to Web usage arguing that the impact of completeness on attitude and intention toward the issue is moderated by Web use motivation. Borrowing the analogy between low-high involvement and surfing-searching, it was hypothesized that the effect of completeness would be observed in the searching situation and not observed in the surfing situation. After the initial pretests and pilot studies, 246 respondents were recruited to participate in a 2×3 study design. Not supporting the hypotheses, it was observed that the effect of completeness was significant in both surfing and searching situations. Explanations are provided for the observation, and directions for future research are suggested.
Browsing is an interactive and exploratory process for finding information in a digital library that has advantages over search term queries in many situations. Some browsers display a concept space as a node-link graph diagram, but this can look chaotic for a graph of moderate complexity. The approach taken in this paper is to suppress some of the interrelationships (links) and order the concept space as a tree by some `natural' hierarchy. The user can then explore hidden interrelationships by dynamically interacting with the system. We demonstrate the usefulness of browsing a hierarchy via this method in a prototype called MeSHBROWSE, a system for browsing terms from the NLM Medical Subject Headings tree. It displays a node-link tree diagram of the concept space and reveals hidden interrelationships when a node is clicked on by triggering related nodes scattered about the tree to become highlighted. In this paper we describe MeSHBROWSE, discuss semantic and algorithmic issues involve...
Hypertext offers users a simple, flexible way to navigate through electronic information systems but at the potential risk of becoming lost in the network of interconnected pieces of information. A study was conducted on information retrieval using a commercial hypertext-based help system. It was found that the predominant search strategy was “browsing” (characterized by scanning tables of contents and paging through topics), rather than employing the indexes ("analytical search"). Although subjects did not get lost, individuals with better spatial visualization skills, as measured by a standardized test, were faster at retrieving information and returned to the top of the information hierarchy less often than those with poorer spatial visualization skills. These results support previous studies that have found a strong preference by users for browsing in hypertext systems and extend those findings to a new domain (help), a different type of user interface, and a different information architecture. In addition, the results demonstrate the importance of spatial visualization ability for efficient navigation and information retrieval in a hierarchical hypertext system.
Unlike traditional information retrieval systems in which users access information from large databases using boolean operations on keyword strings, users of a hypertext system are free to move between arbitrary nodes in the database by the simple click of a mouse button (See Conklin, 1987 for a major review of hypertext). This architecture encourages users to find information by browsing (Marchionini, 1987). However, in the absence of spatial cues, this method of search can easily lead users to become disoriented ("lost in hyperspace").
This study investigated the effects of search tools and learner cognitive styles on performance in searches for information within a hypermedia database. Seventy-five students in a university English as a Second Language (ESL) program were blocked for field dependence and assigned to one of four treatments: browser, index/find, map, and all tools. Subjects searched the hypermedia database, EarthQuest, for facts to answer practice and posttest questions on science topics. Results revealed a significant interaction between search tool and cognitive style. Field-independent learners performed significantly better than field-dependent learners under the index/find and map treatments. Subjects in the four treatment groups accessed information from the database differently. Furthermore, cognitive style was significantly related to achievement, tool use, and attitude. Implications for the design and instructional use of hypermedia databases are provided.
Much of the research on the information-seeking behavior of young people has examined either the degree to which they use particular providers or the manner in which they exploit such sources or materials. Considerably less attention has focused on the identification of generic characteristics that relate to the use of a range of information sources. Nevertheless, a recent qualitative research project undertaken in England has revealed that a variety of patterns appear to emerge even when sources of different types are used. While a few are indicative of the nature of the information-seeking process itself, some pertain to users' information-seeking problems and others to patterns of behavior. Many of the recurring features of user behavior reflect attempts by youngsters to simplify the task of information seeking and reduce the effort expended.
Relevance and economic feedback may be used to produce an ordering of documents that supports browsing in hypermedia and digital libraries. Document classification based on the Gray code provides paths through the entire collection, each path traversing each node in the set of documents exactly once. Systems organizing documents based on weighted and unweighted Gray codes are examined. Relevance feedback is used to conceptually organize the collection for an individual to browse, based on that individual's interests and information needs, as reflected by their relevance judgements and user supplied economic preferences. We apply Bayesian learning theory to estimating the characteristics of documents of interest to the user and supply an analytic model of browsing performance, based on minimizing the Expected Browsing Distance (EBD). Economic feedback may be used to change the ordering of documents to benefit the user. Using these techniques, a hypermedia or digital library may order any and all available documents, not just those examined, based on the information provided by the searcher or people with similar interests.
Hypertext offers users a simple, flexible way to navigate through electronic information systems but at the potential risk of becoming lost in the network of interconnected pieces of information. A study was conducted on information retrieval using a commercial hypertext based help system. It was found that the predominant search strategy was “browsing” (characterized by scanning tables of contents and paging through topics), rather than employing the indexes (“analytical search”). Although subjects did not become lost, individuals with better spatial visualization ability, as measured by a standardized test, were faster at retrieving information and returned to the top of the information hierarchy less often than those with poorer spatial visualization ability. These results support previous studies that have found a strong preference by users to browse in hypertext systems and extend those findings to a new domain (help), a different type of user interface, and a different information architecture. In addition, the results demonstrate the importance of spatial visualization ability for efficient navigation and information retrieval in a hierarchical hypertext system.
This paper argues that a new paradigm for information retrieval has evolved that incorporates human attention and mental effort and takes advan- tage of new types of information objects and relationships that have emerged in the WWW environment. One aspect of this new model is attention to highly interactive user interfaces that engage people directly and actively in informa- tion seeking. Two examples of these kinds of interfaces are described.
Purpose
The purpose of this article is to review the research on human‐computer interfaces for library‐based commercial online information retrieval (IR) systems.
Design/methodology/approach
The review first focuses on basic interface issues for information retrieval such as interface style, end‐user searching, query formulation, relevance feedback and browsing. The second part deals with cognitive engineering in IR including mental models and individual differences. Finally, the topics on user interface engineering are covered. These include user interface guidelines, usability evaluation methods and interface engineering techniques.
Findings
The review shows that user interface design has received a limited attention from IR researchers. There is a need for adopting human‐computer interaction (HCI) techniques into IR interface designs, but this issue has not yet been fully recognised by the commercial database vendors and distributors. The paper recommends that applying HCI techniques could help in developing more usable IR interfaces.
Practical implications
The review identifies the main activities of a user‐centred design methodology and suggests that IR interface designers should use this method in future. This could have major implications in IR interface design for end‐user searching.
Originality/value
The review is the first to offer an overview of empirical research on IR interface design and IR usability engineering. Both IR researchers and practitioners may benefit from the description of previous research and the user‐centred design advocated by the current research.
As the Web becomes more popular, the interest in effective navigation is increasing. Menu design is becoming a central issue of human computer interface design as the focus of computer applications moves from the computer as a machine to the human as a user. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of three different Web menu designs (a simple selection menu, a global and local navigation menu, and a pull-down menu) on users' information-seeking performance and attitudes. Three Cyber-shopping mall Web sites were developed for the experiment. These Web sites had the same content and a constant information structure, but each had a different menu design. The results showed different effect of menu design on both searching performance and browsing performance. More specifically, participants' searching performance was superior in the pull-down menu condition compared to the global and local navigation menu and the simple selection menu conditions. Browsing task performance was the fastest with the global and local navigation menu. However, there were no significant differences among three menu designs in terms of users' perception on appeal of the Web site and disorientation.
d/or searching the Internet. Our results indicate that a Kohonen self-organizing map ( SOM ) -based 1. Introduction algorithm can successfully categorize a large and eclectic Internet information space ( the Entertainment sub- The Information Age has produced a wealth of infor- category of Yahoo! ) into manageable sub-spaces that mation which is supposed to be readily available to any- users can successfully navigate to locate a homepage one who wishes to use it. Indeed with the increased popu- of interest to them. The SOM algorithm worked best with browsing tasks that were very broad, and in which sub- larity of online services, more people have access to more jects skipped around between categories. Subjects es- information than ever before, and that information ap- pecially liked the visual and graphical aspects of the pears to be growing at an exponential rate. This sheer map. Subjects who tried to do a directed search, and volume of information is often overwhelming to u
DalText, a prototype information retrieval system has been developed that permits the user to select access methods based on the task at hand. The system integrates multiple access techniques to such textual data as those generated through word processing packages, newsgroups, e-mail, etc., that are not maintained in traditional database management systems or information retrieval systems. The access methods available include viewing the data as a sequence of records for browsing, generating sets of records through string matching and Boolean combinations, and through generating a table schema and instantiating attribute values dynamically. As the access methods are all based on the same underlying data access model, the user can flip back and forth between the access methods in order to best accomplish the task at hand. An evaluation was conducted to test for correlations among a number of different variables. Of note among the results, it was found that the subjects used the access method best suited to the information task rather than relying on the access method with which they were familiar. The results indicate that further investigation should be conducted on the development of information retrieval systems that allow users to select access and display methodologies appropriate to the task at hand. © 1994 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
The focus of this article is to develop a map display for information retrieval. Through an examination of relationships among visual displays, information retrieval, and browsing, advantages of visual displays for information retrieval are characterized as (1) the ability to convey a large amount of information in a limited space, (2) the potential to reveal semantic relationships of terms and documents, and (3) the facilitation of browsing and perceptual inferences on retrieval interfaces. These advantages are further demonstrated through a map display generated by a neural network's self-organizing algorithm. The map display detects complex relationships among given documents, and reveals the relationships through a spatial arrangement of terms abstracted from the documents. The map display also provides interactive tools to allow the user to interact with the underlying information. Examples of the map displays show that such map displays can be used both as an overview tool and an access or exploration tool, and the map displays will likely increase the amount of information that the user is willing to browse.
Little research has compared youngsters' use of CD-ROM and the Internet for information-seeking purposes. Nevertheless, the area has recently been addressed within a largely qualitative project more generally devoted to young people's information universes. Home access to the Internet was seen to be more limited than that to CD-ROM, although the former was consulted to tackle needs of a greater number of types. The strategies employed to exploit each form of information resource were essentially similar. No attempts were reported to check the credibility of any information retrieved from electronic sources. The Internet was, however, used more frequently beyond the informants' own homes than was CD-ROM. There was also greater employment of the Internet by adults acting on the youngsters' behalf. As Internet use for school purposes rose in accordance with age, that of CD-ROM declined. When youngsters themselves compared the two resources as information-seeking tools, CD-ROM software was criticized for its lack of detailed material and the Internet for the problems in locating what was desired. Project findings have implications in a range of areas, including the marketing of CD-ROM packages, research and development and practices within schools.
The study on information science (IS) by Bates (2007) is an important contribution to the literature on browsing in IS. It is explicitly based on “behavioural science.” I use this article as the point of departure for demonstrating how more social and interpretative understandings may provide fruitful improvements for research in information seeking, browsing, and related phenomena. It is part of my ongoing publication of articles about philosophical issues in IS and it is intended to be accompanied by analyses of other examples of contributions to core issues in IS. Although it is mainly formulated as a discussion based on a specific paper, it should be seen as part of a general discussion of the philosophical foundation of IS and as support for the emerging social paradigm in this field. The article argues that human browsing should not be conceptualized primarily in biological terms and should not be understood as random exploratory processes, but rather it should be seen as a kind of orienting strategy governed by people's metatheories or “paradigms.” Information professionals should know how different metatheories are distributed in the information ecology and, thus, be able to help people developing fruitful browsing strategies. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
To examine the emergent properties of information seeking in hyperlinked environments, in this paper we developed a cyclic model. Using this model as a framework, the relationships among perceived goal difficulty, goal success, and self-efficacy were examined. Self-efficacy was conceptualized as a mediating mechanism and intrinsic motivation (IM) in the task was examined as a moderator. Data were collected as repeated measures over 20 cycles during an hour-long session of information seeking when students were given that task of designing a travel plan for a trip to China. The findings suggest that success in meeting information goals in one cycle resulted in an increase in self-efficacy, which in turn reduced the perceived difficulty of information goals in the upcoming cycle. At the same time, self-efficacy from previous cycles seemed to provide the impetus for formulating more challenging information goals in subsequent cycles. Besides this dual role of self-efficacy, the moderating role of IM was also evident. For participants relatively high in baseline IM for the task, the link between self-efficacy and goal success was weaker. However, for participants with relatively low levels of baseline IM for the task, goal success has a stronger effect on self-efficacy.
Not available Educational Psychology
Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of North Texas, 1997. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-120). Photocopy. s
Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of North Texas, Dec., 1997. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-120). Microfiche. "98-16157."
A category map developed based on Kohonen's self-organizing map has been proven to be a promising browsing tool for solving the information overload problem of the World Wide Web. The SOM algorithm automatically compresses and transforms a complex information space into a two-dimensional graphical representation. Such graphical representation provides a user-friendly interface for users to explore the automatically generated mental model. However, as the amount of information increases, the size of the category map is expected to increase accordingly in order to accommodate the important concepts in the information space, which increases the visual load of the category map. In this paper, we propose the fisheye views and fractal views to support the visualization of category map. Fisheye views are developed based on the distortion approach while fractal views are developed based on the information reduction approach. We have developed a prototype system and conducted a user evaluation to investigate the performance of fisheye views and fractal views. The results show that both fisheye views and fractal views significantly increase the effectiveness of visualizing the category map. In addition, fractal views are significantly better than fisheye views.
Several dimensions of browsing are examined to find out: what
browsing is and what cognitive processes are associated with it; whether
there is a browsing strategy and, if so, whether there are any
differences between how subject-area experts and novices browse; and how
this knowledge can be applied to improve the design of hypertext
systems. Two groups of students, subject-area experts and novices, were
studied while browsing a Macintosh HyperCard application. Three browsing
strategies were identified: (1) search-oriented browse: scanning and
reviewing information relevant to a fixed task; (2) review-browse:
scanning and reviewing interesting information in the presence of
transient browse goals that represent changing tasks; and (3)
scan-browse: scanning for interesting information without review. Most
subjects used review-browse interspersed with search-oriented browse.
Within this strategy, comparisons showed that experts browsed in more
depth, and viewed information differently than did novices. Based on
these findings, suggestions are made to hypertext developers
The purpose of this study is to examine whether the types of
information display interface in hypermedia design (window-scroll versus
frame-based) are perceived, manipulated, or processed identically by
their users. The subjects of the study were 18 undergraduates with
similar experience in the computer and content domain. A two-condition,
independent subject design was employed using the presentation format as
the independent variable. The dependent variables were the lesson
completion time, accuracy rates, and times at which movement switched.
One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to analyze the data. The
results show that the different display formats do not affect the
subjects' performance on any of the dependent variables analyzed. The
study concludes by some suggestions for future study
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