Abstract
The complex process of online information search has been of great interest to academics and practitioners, regarding its motivation, triggers, phases, and various aspects of user search behavior. Web search spanning multiple sessions has been studied, including users switching between devices. The study presented in this paper aims to critically analyze two decades (2000 - 2020) of research on cross-session and cross-device search. A systematic literature review of 29 journal papers and peer reviewed academic conference proceedings was conducted. The main results were extracted, synthesized, and presented. Topical (focus and terminology), methodological (data collection, sample size, sample type, and countries studied) and bibliometric (publication outlet and citations) aspects of online information search were evaluated and described. The paper identifies keywords for effective literature searches and adds new insights about effective research methods and sampling, the most cited publications and most influential authors in this field and the possibility of conducting interdisciplinary research. Both scholars and practitioners can use this study to gain a deeper understanding of the cross-session and cross-device search research agenda. Future research suggestions inform researchers about issues that warrant further attention.
Highlights
The growth of the internet over the past decades resulted in a plethora of information about products and brands on websites and social networks
The research questions we address are: RQ1: How has the terminology related to cross-session search evolved over time? RQ2: What are the focus areas of the research on crosssession and cross-device search? RQ3: What are the characteristics of the samples used and which methodologies prevail in the current research? RQ4: What are the most influential publications, based on the number of citations? RQ5: What are the broader implications of the research on cross-session and cross-device search? RQ6: What are the potential directions for future research in this area?
The review started by classifying previous research according to its focus, i.e. either cross-session search or cross-device search
Summary
The growth of the internet over the past decades resulted in a plethora of information about products and brands on websites and social networks. Researchers have been studying the information search behaviour of users for some time. The study of Bates [8], for example, investigates an evolving interactive online search within the context of a single search session. Online information search became a focal point of researchers with the increased availability of the internet and the development of search engines. One of the directions of research focuses on online information search intensity and user behaviour. This resulted in defining and using two well established terms that reflect how the information process works. These terms are ‘cross-session search’ and ‘cross-device search’
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