Understanding mobile web and mobile search use in today's dynamic mobile landscape

Abstract

The term mobile Web is changing. Mobile is traditionally associated with on-the-move, portable and dynamic. However, with the advent of smartphones, an increasing number of users are accessing the mobile Internet via their phone while in more stationary and familiar settings, like at home or at work. This shift in the meaning of mobile is having a significant effect on mobile Web behavior. Designing great mobile Web experiences requires a deeper understanding of the information needs, behaviors and underlying motivations of mobile users. As such, the goal of this work is to study this shift and its impact on mobile Internet access, with a view to determining what this means for the future of the mobile Web and in particular mobile search. In this paper we present the results of an online diary and interview study of 18 active mobile Web users over a 4-week period focusing on how, why, where and in what situations people use the mobile Internet and mobile search. Our findings raise a new set of open research questions and point to a number of implications for enriching the experiences of mobile Web users.

Exploring social context in mobile information behavior

“…In our study, many of the information activities that took place in a car were precipitated by the proximity of the individuals or the just-in-time information needs that arose enroute to a destination, e.g., finding directions, or business hours, etc. The data we gathered about where our participants conducted their information activities confirmed that a significant amount of mobile IB occurs in non-mobile settings, such as at home or in the workplace (Church & Oliver, 2011;Nylander et al, 2009). We also observed that there were some locations, namely outside or public spaces, where social and non-social information activities occurred on par.…”

“…In a recent study of "just-in-time" information behaviors, 27% and 41% of those sampled indicated they used their mobile phones to settle an argument or coordinate a social gathering, respectively, within the past month (Rainie & Fox, 2012). Further, mobile search is often conducted in the presence of others (Church & Oliver, 2011;Amin, Setlur, Xi, Hayashi & Hong, 2009;Teevan, Karlson, Amini, Brush & Krumm, 2011), and searches may be socially motivated (Rahmati & Zhong, 2012) or prompted by conversations (Church & Smyth, 2009;Sohn et al, 2008).…”

Learning With Mobile Devices: The Changing Place and Space of Distance Learners’ Study

“…We argue that this group should be defined as 'distant learners' not just 'distance' learners. These learners transcend stationary environments [17] and demonstrate more mobility in their study routine. Data from the 2016 survey indicates that that distant learners comprise about a quarter of the undergraduate distance learning students surveyed.…”

How Users Search the Mobile Web: A Model for Understanding the Impact of Motivation and Context on Search Behaviors

“…Church and Oliver (2011) suggested that limitations in screen size and the type of interactions and input that mobile devices can support play an important role in shaping the way that mobile users use mobile search engines. Kamvar and Baluja (2006) found out that Google's PDA logs related to searches originating on PDAlike devices with sophisticated input capabilities.…”