Towards a cognitive theory of information retrieval

Sutcliffe﻿, Alistair; Ennis, Mark

doi:10.1016/s0953-5438(98)00013-7

Cited by 135 publications

(104 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…Thus the results of studies of searching may differ because of the use of different search engines on the web and differing digital library functionality. This is to be expected, since Sutcliffe and Ennis (1998) stress that search expertise is likely to be affected by not only domain knowledge, search skills and available resources, but also the characteristics of the system. Within these factors, therefore, there is significant scope for variation when advanced strategies such as 4 Boolean operators are taken into account.…”

Section: Studies Of Expertisementioning

confidence: 99%

Cognitive economy and satisficing in information seeking: A longitudinal study of undergraduate information behavior

Warwick

Rimmer

Blandford

et al. 2009

J. Am. Soc. Inf. Sci.

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Use policyThe full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-pro t purposes provided that:• a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in DRO • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders.Please consult the full DRO policy for further details. AbstractThis paper reports on a longitudinal study of information seeking by undergraduate Information Management students. It describes how they found and used information, and explores their motivation and decision making. We employed a use-in-context approach where students were observed conducting, and interviewed about, information seeking tasks carried out during their academic work.We found that participants were reluctant to engage with a complex range of information sources, preferring to use the internet. The main driver for progress in information seeking was the immediate demands of their work (e.g. assignments). Students used their growing expertise to justify a conservative information strategy, retaining established strategies as far as possible and completing tasks with minimum information seeking effort. The time cost of using library material limited the uptake of such resources. New methods for discovering and selecting information were only adopted when immediately relevant to the task at hand, and tasks are generally chosen or interpreted in ways that minimised the need to develop new strategies. Students were driven by the demands of the task to use different types of information resources, but remained reluctant to move beyond keyword searches, even when they proved ineffective. They also lacked confidence in evaluating the relative usefulness of resources.Whereas existing literature on satisficing has focused on stopping conditions, this work has highlighted a richer 2 repertoire of satisficing behaviours.

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Section: Studies Of Expertisementioning

confidence: 99%

Cognitive economy and satisficing in information seeking: A longitudinal study of undergraduate information behavior

Warwick

Rimmer

Blandford

et al. 2009

J. Am. Soc. Inf. Sci.

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Section: Insert Figure 1 About Herementioning

confidence: 99%

“…During this search for information Rita has selected a search strategy (using a search engine), specified search terms and judged results. Computer skills like using a mouse and keyboard are also Information Problem Solving 6 important in this part of the process Marchionini, 1995;Sutcliffe & Ennis, 1998).After opening the site http://www.tibet.net Rita discovers that this site is owned by the government in exile and the information is up to date. This site is useful for the essay and she copies some information in her own file.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Information-problem solving: A review of problems students encounter and instructional solutions

Walraven

Brand‐Gruwel

Boshuizen

2008

Computers in Human Behavior

169

118

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Searching and processing information is a complex cognitive process that requires students to identify information needs, locate corresponding information sources, extract and organize relevant information from each source, and synthesize information from a variety of sources.This process is called information-problem solving (IPS). IPS can be characterized as a complex cognitive skill, which may need direct instruction to reach high levels of performance. However, IPS has been given little attention in schools, and instruction in this skill is rarely embedded in curricula. And yet, by giving students assignments in which students have to solve an information-based problem, teachers assume that their pupils have developed this skill naturally.A literature study was done to determine what kinds of problems students experience when solving information problems using the WWW for searching information, and what kind of instructional support can help to solve these problems. Results show that children, teenagers and adults have trouble with specifying search terms, judging search results and judging source and information. Regulating the search process is also problematic. Instruction designed specifically for IPS using the WWW for searching information is rare but indeed addresses the problematic skills. However, there are differences between various methods and it is unclear which method is most effective for specific age groups. Information Problem Solving 3 Information Problem Solving: A Review of Problems Students Encounter and Instructional SolutionsOur current society is an information society. Recent technological developments such as mobile communication, GPS, and the Internet provide us with large bodies of information every day. It is up to us to decide what to do with all this information. One could decide to ignore it altogether, but this will almost certainly result in alienation from society. A more fruitful approach might be to regularly gain access to new information. This approach requires people to identify their information needs, locate corresponding information sources, extract and organize relevant information from each source, and synthesize information from a variety of sources into cogent, productive uses (Bawden, 2001;Eisenberg & Berkowitz, 1990, 1992Marchionini, 1999;Moore, 1995Moore, , 1997Shapiro & Hughes, 1996;Spitzer, 2000). Together these activities constitute a process that we refer to as InformationProblem Solving (IPS).IPS is not only important in everyday life, but also in education. In the last decade educational systems have undergone changes. Instead of a system aiming at the reproduction of knowledge, new learning is aiming at learning outcomes that are durable, flexible, functional, meaningful, and applicable. Active pedagogical methods, in which students learn by doing instead of listening and in which the teacher has a guiding role, fit this new learning (Simons, Van der Linden, & Duffy, 2000). Students are given assignments, such as writing an essay on Tibet, that ...

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“…It can be described as knowledge of facts, concepts and their relationships in a specific domain (Sutcliffe and Ennis, 1998). Research has shown that the more familiar user to the topic, the more efficient their searching (Kelly and Cool, 2002).…”

Section: Domain Knowledgementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Research has shown that the more familiar user to the topic, the more efficient their searching (Kelly and Cool, 2002). High domain knowledge enables users to search effectively and provides a richer set of concepts and terms for query formulation (Sutcliffe and Ennis, 1998), thus initiating a successful search (Navarro-Prieto Scaife et al, 1999). Conceptual and semantic knowledge related to the query is required to articulate a good query (Large et al, 2001;Sridhar, 2004).…”

Section: Domain Knowledgementioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of User Knowledge on Web Search Satisfaction

Liu¹

2011

American Journal of Economics and Business Administration

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Problem statement: Searching on the web is a tedious process as it requires knowledge and skills on what and how to search. What to search is basically, the core of the searching activity as it represents the need of the searcher. How to search is related to the knowledge on how the facilities available on the web can be utilized in order to achieve the needs. Search satisfaction is the level of measurement that describes the achievement of the searcher towards his/her information needs. Approach: In this study, two categories of knowledge: Topic understanding and web search system understanding have been identified to contribute to the search satisfaction. These knowledge was measured based on objective and subjective knowledge. The statistical analysis is employed study the impact of these knowledge on search satisfaction. Results: The Linear Regression analysis confirms that both topic and search system understanding are equally important since they are significantly associated with search satisfaction. Conclusions/Recommendations: This finding proves that user knowledge is an important aspect in searching activities. This finding can benefit the search system provider when updating their search system facilities especially query processing, matching and manipulation engine.

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Towards a cognitive theory of information retrieval

Cited by 135 publications

References 17 publications

Cognitive economy and satisficing in information seeking: A longitudinal study of undergraduate information behavior

Cognitive economy and satisficing in information seeking: A longitudinal study of undergraduate information behavior

Information-problem solving: A review of problems students encounter and instructional solutions

The Impact of User Knowledge on Web Search Satisfaction

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