A study of mediated successive searching during information seeking

Abstract

The study of successive searching, or users’ searches in digital environments over time related to the same or evolving information problem, is developing as an area of research. A growing body of studies is beginning to investigate and characterize aspects of the successive searching process. This research draws together areas of information retrieval (IR) research and information-seeking research toward a focus on IR within the context of human information behaviour. Previous studies show that end-users of IR systems and the World Wide Web conduct a series of related or successive searches over time or request successive searches from search intermediaries. This paper provides results from a study that expands our understanding of successive searches conducted for information seekers by intermediaries. The study explored aspects of successive Dialog searches conducted by intermediaries for information seekers. Forty-seven intermediaries conducted as many online searches as requested by their information seekers who were working on a particular information problem. Findings show that information seekers requested a mean of two searches from intermediaries with a range of one to six searches. Successive searches were generally requested by information seekers to extend or expand, or refine the results of previous searches. Most successive searches involved some change in search terms and databases from the previous search. Interestingly, precision did not necessarily increase over successive searches and the percentage of partially relevant items decreased significantly after three searches. The findings have implications for interactive IR models, the design of IR systems and the practice of searching.