Exploratory Search Behavior Research Articles

Continuous, long-term crawling behavior characterized by a robotic transport system.

Detailed descriptions of behavior provide critical insight into the structure and function of nervous systems. In Drosophila larvae and many other systems, short behavioral experiments have been successful in characterizing rapid responses to a range of stimuli at the population level. However, the lack of long-term continuous observation makes it difficult to dissect comprehensive behavioral dynamics of individual animals and how behavior (and therefore the nervous system) develops over time. To allow for long-term continuous observations in individual fly larvae, we have engineered a robotic instrument that automatically tracks and transports larvae throughout an arena. The flexibility and reliability of its design enables controlled stimulus delivery and continuous measurement over developmental time scales, yielding an unprecedented level of detailed locomotion data. We utilize the new system's capabilities to perform continuous observation of exploratory search behavior over a duration of 6 hr with and without a thermal gradient present, and in a single larva for over 30 hr. Long-term free-roaming behavior and analogous short-term experiments show similar dynamics that take place at the beginning of each experiment. Finally, characterization of larval thermotaxis in individuals reveals a bimodal distribution in navigation efficiency, identifying distinct phenotypes that are obfuscated when only analyzing population averages.

Role of Search Pressure and Slack on Direction of Search

Utilizing behavioral theory, extant research argues that firms respond to performance discrepancy by resorting to more risky actions. Building on this body of knowledge, we examine the impact of considerable search pressure on the direction of search behavior of firms. We hypothesize that under considerable search pressure from higher intensity of performance discrepancy, firms would shift to more explorative search behavior. We argue that duration of performance discrepancy would weaken the relationship between intensity of performance discrepancy and exploratory search behavior. Furthermore, we propose that organizational slack positively moderates the relationship between intensity of performance discrepancy and explorative search. We operationalize the degree of explorative search behavior using content analysis of publically available annual reports. Using panel data of a multi-industry sample of 2720 firm-years observations of Indian firms and dynamic panel model, we find partial support for our hypotheses

Is exploratory search different? A comparison of information search behavior for exploratory and lookup tasks

Exploratory search is an increasingly important activity yet challenging for users. Although there exists an ample amount of research into understanding exploration, most of the major information retrieval (IR) systems do not provide tailored and adaptive support for such tasks. One reason is the lack of empirical knowledge on how to distinguish exploratory and lookup search behaviors in IR systems. The goal of this article is to investigate how to separate the 2 types of tasks in an IR system using easily measurable behaviors. In this article, we first review characteristics of exploratory search behavior. We then report on a controlled study of 6 search tasks with 3 exploratory—comparison, knowledge acquisition, planning—and 3 lookup tasks—fact‐finding, navigational, question answering. The results are encouraging, showing that IR systems can distinguish the 2 search categories in the course of a search session. The most distinctive indicators that characterize exploratory search behaviors are query length, maximum scroll depth, and task completion time. However, 2 tasks are borderline and exhibit mixed characteristics. We assess the applicability of this finding by reporting on several classification experiments. Our results have valuable implications for designing tailored and adaptive IR systems.

Switching sources: A study of people's exploratory search behavior on social media and the web

ABSTRACTSearching the Web for information via search engines is a ubiquitous phenomenon and a well‐established field of study in Information Science. Social media sites also continue to evolve and by now have gained enough popularity and momentum to be used as not just vessels for communication with others, but also as important repositories of information. However, it is not clear if the information behavior of users of traditional search engines differ from those performing information searches strictly on social media sites. To address this, we examined data from two user studies on people's exploratory searching behavior: one group only used Web search engines, while the other exclusively used social media sites to search for information. Information search behaviors of both groups regarding exploratory tasks were observed and analyzed through search log and surveys. The results indicate that, while people using social media sites for exploratory search tasks find a smaller quantity and a less diverse set of documents than what they might discover when utilizing traditional Web search engines, they do perceive to end up with more relevant documents. They also report doing less work and feeling less challenged.

Agitated Losses and Relaxed Gains

One of the robust regularities of stock markets is the asymmetric relation between stock returns and their subsequent volatility, commonly referred to as the 'leverage effect'. In the current paper we present a psychological model linking between gains and losses, choice volatility, and market prices of publicly traded stocks, based on a recent attentional model of losses, that accounts for this effect as well as some other regularities of the stock market. The attentional effect of losses implies greater exploratory search behavior and therefore more choice volatility (i.e., incidents of switching between choice options) following monetary losses. Our study begins with an empirical examination using an abstract experiential task. We find increased choice volatility in tasks with losses compared to tasks with no losses, and that this heightened volatility is maintained even in subsequent tasks that do not include losses. Conversely, gains are found to have an opposite 'relaxing' effect on choice volatility. Both phenomena are observed even in the absence of loss aversion. We follow with an agent based model of the stock market and demonstrate that embedding a simple increase in choice volatility following losses compared to gains yields increased price volatility subsequent to losses, while also providing sufficient conditions for four other major stock market regularities in a unified framework.

The Influence of Display Characteristics on Visual Exploratory Search Behavior

Visual information search is a combination of two distinct types of behavior. Goal-directed search behavior occurs when consumers use stored search routines to collect information in a deliberate manner. In contrast, exploratory search behavior occurs when consumers are confronted with multiple pieces of information but have little stored knowledge about how to proceed with the information gathering. This article reports on an investigation into exploratory search behavior and attempts to establish a connection between the layout of objects in a display and the amount of attention devoted to each of these objects. The research has implications for catalog page layout and visual merchandising.