Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to discuss the emerging geographic features of current concepts of relevance, and to improve, modify, and extend the framework proposed by Mizzaro (1998). The objective is to define a new framework able to account, more completely and precisely, for the notions of relevance involved in mobile information seeking scenarios. Design/methodology/approach – The authors formalise two new dimensions of relevance. The first dimension emphasises the spatio-temporal nature of the information seeking process. The second dimension allows us to describe how different concepts of relevance rely on different abstractions of reality. Findings – The new framework allows: to conceptualise the point in space and time at which a given notion of relevance refers to; to conceptualise the level of abstraction taken into account by a given notion of relevance; and to include widely adopted facets (e.g. users mobility, preferences, and social context) in the classification of notions of relevance. Originality/value – The conceptual discussion presented in this paper contributes to the future development of relevance in the scope of mobile information seeking scenarios. The authors provide a more comprehensive framework for conceptualization, development, and classification of notions of relevance in the field of information retrieval and location-based services.
Highlights
Almost a decade ago, Coppola et al (2004) depicted what at the time was the raising mobile revolution, and its consequences in the field of Information Retrieval (IR)
We will refer to a structured representation of real-world objects using the term ‘feature’, as it is commonly used in geographic information systems2
The new framework allows us to describe the difference between the “egocentric” concept of geographic relevance proposed by Raper (2007), who discusses how users perceive the relevance of surrounding objects based on their need, and a strictly related, but more pragmatic concept of geographic relevance proposed by Reichenbacher and De Sabbata (2011), who discuss how scores can be computed based on users’ query and location at the time the query is sent
Summary
Almost a decade ago, Coppola et al (2004) depicted what at the time was the raising mobile revolution, and its consequences in the field of Information Retrieval (IR). Mobile devices became ubiquitous, flooding our lives with a continuous stream of information, when the advent of social networks was still out of sight. The aim of this paper is to improve, modify, and extend the framework proposed by Mizzaro (1998) and Coppola et al (2004), in order to account, more completely and precisely, for the characteristics of relevance concepts dealing with mobile information seeking scenarios. The proposed framework is intended as a tool to describe relevance concepts, and facilitate the classification and comparison of relevance concepts It aims at fostering the discussion and the development of information retrieval in the mobile and context-aware scenarios.
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