Information Retrieval Specialist Research Articles

Report on the 43rd european conference on information retrieval (ECIR 2021)

The 43rd European Conference on Information Retrieval (ECIR 2021), organized under the auspices of the Information Retrieval Specialist Group of the British Computer Society (BCS IRSG), took place between March 28 and April 1, 2021. As sadly customary in these dark times, the conference was held entirely online, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the original plans, it should have instead taken place in Lucca, a small Italian town in Tuscany, Italy, which enjoys a beautiful, extremely well-preserved historic centre.

2019 Tony Kent Strix Memorial Award Winner

In 2019, the UK electronic information Group (UKeiG), in partnership with the International Society for Knowledge Organisation UK (ISKO UK), the Royal Society of Chemistry Chemical Information and Computer Applications Group (RSC CICAG) and the British Computer Society Information Retrieval Specialist Group (BCS IRSG), was delighted to announce that the winner of the prestigious Tony Kent Strix Memorial Award for 2019, in recognition of his major and sustained contributions to the field of information retrieval, was Professor Ingemar J. Cox, Department of Computer Science at University College London.
 Professor Cox is Head of UCL’s Media Futures Research Group and a Professor at the Department of Computer Science at the University of Copenhagen. His current research interests include information retrieval and data analytics of online social media, twitter and query logs.

Preschool predictors of later reading comprehension ability: a systematic review

Preschool predictors of later reading comprehension ability: a systematic review

Information retrieval for the Cochrane systematic reviews: the case of breast cancer surgery.

Systematic reviews are fundamental sources of knowledge on the state-of-the-art interventions for various clinical problems. One of the essential components in carrying out a systematic review is that of developing a comprehensive literature search. Three Cochrane systematic reviews published in 2012 were retrieved using the MeSH descriptor breast neoplasms/surgery, and analyzed with respect to the information sources used and the search strategies adopted. In March 2014, an update of one of the reviews retrieved was also considered in the study. The number of databases queried for each review ranged between three and seven. All the reviews reported the search strategies adopted, however some only partially. All the reviews explicitly claimed that the searches applied no language restriction although sources such as the free database Lilacs (in Spanish and Portuguese) was not consulted. To improve the quality it is necessary to apply standards in carrying out systematic reviews (as laid down in the MECIR project). To meet these standards concerning literature searching, professional information retrieval specialist staff should be involved. The peer review committee in charge of evaluating the publication of a systematic review should also include specialists in information retrieval for assessing the quality of the literature search.

The BCS Information Retrieval Specialist Group

The British BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT1 (also known as the British Computer Society) is a UK-based international organisation whose goal it is to bridge the gap between education, practise and research in Information Technology, providing a scope similar to the German Gesellschaft fur Informatik in this respect. BCS is one of the leading professional and learned societies in the field of computers and information systems. With members in over 100 countries it consists of local UK branches and international sections as well as more than 50 Specialist Groups. One of them is the Information Retrieval Specialist Group (BCS-IRSG) as a representative for the growing field of Information Retrieval (IR). The BCS-IRSG can be regarded as the British equivalent to the German GI-Fachgruppe Information Retrieval, however with a more international focus. In this article we are going to briefly introduce the BCSIRSG and its main activities.

Effects of decentralized forest management (DFM) on deforestation and poverty in low‐ and middle‐income countries: a systematic review

The authors conducted a systematic review of studies on the impact of decentralized forest management (DFM) on deforestation and poverty in developing countries. The review is motivated by debates over whether the pursuits of conservation and poverty reduction in developing countries tend to conflict or whether they might be complementary. A search for rigorous evaluation studies identified eleven quantitative and nine associated qualitative evaluation studies on DFM. The methodological rigor of these studies varied widely, meaning that the evidence base for the impact of DFM policies is limited in both quantity and quality. Given the evidence available, the authors found little reason for optimism about the potential for current DFM approaches to achieve both conservation and poverty reduction benefits jointly. They call for the production of much better impact studies, employing randomized field experiments when possible, to assess whether the apparent incompatibility of conservation and poverty reduction might be overcome through programming innovations.

Effects of Payment for Environmental Services (PES) on Deforestation and Poverty in Low and Middle Income Countries: A Systematic Review

7 Executive summary 8 Background 8 Objectives 9 Selection criteria 9 Search strategy 9 Data collection and analysis 10 Results 10 Effects on Deforestation Outcomes 10 Effects on Human Welfare Outcomes 11 The Role of Institutional and Social Conditions 11 Authors’ conclusions 12 1 Background 13 1.1 Description of the problem 13 1.2 Description of the intervention 14 1.2.1 Description of PES 14 1.3 How the intervention might work 16 1.3.1 Main hypotheses 16 1.3.2 Unintended consequences and moderating factors for PES 18 1.3.3 Moderator hypotheses 19 1.4 Why it was important to do this review 20 2 Objectives 22 3 Selection Criteria 24 3.1 Participants 24 3.2 Interventions 24 3.3 Outcomes 25 3.4 Study Types 25 4 Search Strategy 27 4.1 Electronic searches 27

ECIR 2013

The European Conference on Information Retrieval (ECIR) is the main European forum for the presentation of new research results in the field of information retrieval and cognate areas. Initiated as a BCS Information Retrieval Specialist Group (IRSG) Colloquium for Information Retrieval in 1979, the event developed in a renowned international scientific meeting. To reflect its European scale, since 1998 the conference was held alternately in the UK and continental Europe. From 2012, this rule has been removed. The most recent ECIR editions were held in Glasgow, UK (2008), Toulouse, France (2009), Milton Keynes, UK (2010), Dublin, Ireland (2011), and Barcelona, Spain (2012). The 35th European Conference on Information Retrieval took place March 24-27, 2013 in Moscow (Russia). The conference was jointly organized by Yandex and Higher School of Economics (HSE). The conference became the easternmost ECIR ever. ECIR 2013 in Moscow marks an important step in the development of the conference series: geographic expansion, a high number of participants, and the largest number of accepted papers (which resulted in an impressive 900-page proceedings volume). In addition, the Moscow edition of the conference introduced some new features: a two-tier program committee, a redesigned mentoring program, a boaster session for poster presentations, and attracted many new participants. ECIR 2013 received a total of 287 submissions in three categories: 191 full papers, 78 posters, and 18 demonstrations. The geographical distribution of the submissions is as follows: 70% were from Europe (including 9% from Russia), 17% from Asia, 12% from North and South America, and 3% from the rest of the world. All submissions were reviewed by at least three members of an international two-tier Program Committee. Of the papers submitted to the main research track, 30 were selected for oral presentation and 25 for poster/short presentation (16% and 13% respectively, hence a 29% acceptance rate). In addition, 38 posters (49%) and 10 demonstrations (56%) were accepted. Out of accepted contributions 66% have a student as the primary author. Additionally, ECIR 2013 hosted four tutorials and two workshops covering various IR-related topics.

ECIR 2012

The British Computer Society’s Information Retrieval Specialist Group’s European Conference on Information Retrieval (ECIR) is the main European forum for the presentation of new research results in the field of information retrieval. The conference has been running in various forms since 1979. The most recent editions of the conference were held in Rome, Italy (2007); Glasgow, UK (2008); Toulouse, France (2009), Milton Keynes, UK (2010) and Dublin, Ireland (2011). The 34th European Conference on Information Retrieval (ECIR 2012) was held at the Pompeu Fabra University from April 1, 2012 to April 5, 2012 in Barcelona, Spain, chaired by Ricardo Baeza-

Future Searching

Tony Russell-Rose CEng MBCS CITP, Udo Kruschwitz MBCS and Andrew MacFarlane CEng MBCS CITP, of the BCS Information Retrieval Specialist Group (IRSG), look at the changing face of search.

Introduction to special issue on the second international conference on the theory of information retrieval

This special issue of the Journal of Information Retrieval contains selected and substantially extended works presented and published at the second International Conference on the Theory of Information Retrieval (ICTIR), held at Microsoft Research in Cambridge, UK, on 10–11 September 2009. The ICTIR conference series is a biennial international conference that provides an opportunity for the presentation of the latest work describing advances in the theoretical and formal aspects of Information Retrieval (IR). The conference is run under the auspices of the British Computer Society’s Information Retrieval Specialist Group and the proceedings are now being published in the Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) series by Springer. The first ICTIR was held in Budapest in October 2007, organized by Sandor

ECIR 2010

The 32nd European Conference on Information Retrieval (ECIR 2010) was held at The Open University during March 28-31, 2010 in Milton Keynes, United Kingdom. The conference was organized by the Knowledge Media Institute (KMi), The Open University, in co-operation with Dublin City University and the University of Essex. The core conference attracted well over 160 attendees, and about 210 individuals attended one or more events of the overall programme that included tutorials and workshops before the conference and the Industry Day after the conference. The ECIR conference series is the annual conference of the Information Retrieval Specialist Group of BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, (BCS IRSG) and had been running in various forms since 1979. ECIR has long been the foremost Information Retrieval (IR) conference in Europe. It started out as a small-scale colloquium, but increased in size until it became a conference in 2003. Irrespective of this change, the conference has kept the ethos of encouraging the participation of research students or new researchers to the area either by paper or poster presentation or by supporting attendance at the conference. ECIR is a general and multi-disciplinary information retrieval conference that accepts submissions on all aspects of IR including those from computer scientists, information scientists, psychologists, engineers etc. Since 1998 the conference has alternated between the UK and mainland

Introduction to the special issue on the 27th European Conference on Information Retrieval Research

This special issue contains the extended versions of six among the best papers presented at the 27th European Conference on Information Retrieval Research (ECIR 2005). This conference was initially established by the Information Retrieval Specialist Group of the British Computer Society (BCS-IRSG) under the name “Annual Colloquium on Information Retrieval Research.” The colloquium was held in the United Kingdom each year until 1998, when the event was organised in Grenoble, France. Since then the conference venue has alternated between the United Kingdom and Continental Europe, reflecting the growing European orientation of ECIR. For the same reason, in 2001 the event was renamed “European Conference on Information Retrieval Research.” In recent years, ECIR has continued to grow and has become the major European forum for the discussion of research in the field of Information Retrieval. Since 2002, the proceedings of this conference are being published by Springer Verlag in their Lecture Notes in Computer Science series. ECIR 2005, celebrated in Santiago de Compostela (Spain) on 21–23 March 2005, was jointly organized by the University of Santiago de Compostela (Spain) and the University of Granada (Spain), under the auspices of the Information Retrieval Specialist Group of the British Computer Society. The conference was co-chaired by David E. Losada (University of Santiago de Compostela) and Juan M. Fernandez-Luna (University of Granada) and the conference venue was the Technical School of Engineering of the University of Santiago de Compostela. In terms of submissions, ECIR 2005 was a record-breaking success, since

Report on the 27th European conference on information retrieval research (ECIR 2005)

The 27th European Conference on Information Retrieval Research (ECIR 2005), celebrated in Santiago de Compostela (Spain) on 21-23 March 2005, was jointly organized by the University of Santiago de Compostela (Spain) and the University of Granada (Spain), under the auspices of the Information Retrieval Specialist Group of the British Computer Society (BCS-IRSG). The conference was co-chaired by David E. Losada (University of Santiago de Compostela) and Juan M. Fernández-Luna (University of Granada) and was celebrated in the Technical School of Engineering of the University of Santiago de Compostela.

Book Review: Information retrieval: new systems and current research. Proceedings of the 16th Research Colloquium of the British Computer Society Information Retrieval Specialist Group

Book Review: Information retrieval: new systems and current research. Proceedings of the 16th Research Colloquium of the British Computer Society Information Retrieval Specialist Group

Information retrieval: New systems and current research. Proceedings of the 15th research colloquium of the British Computer Society Information Retrieval Specialist Group

Journal of the American Society for Information ScienceVolume 46, Issue 9 p. 713-714 Book Review Information retrieval: New systems and current research. Proceedings of the 15th research colloquium of the British Computer Society Information Retrieval Specialist Group Terrence A. Brooks, Corresponding Author Terrence A. Brooks tabrooks@u.washington.edu Graduate School of Library and Information Science, FM-30 University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195Graduate School of Library and Information Science, FM-30 University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195Search for more papers by this author Terrence A. Brooks, Corresponding Author Terrence A. Brooks tabrooks@u.washington.edu Graduate School of Library and Information Science, FM-30 University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195Graduate School of Library and Information Science, FM-30 University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195Search for more papers by this author First published: October 1995 https://doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1097-4571(199510)46:9<713::AID-ASI14>3.0.CO;2-NCitations: 1AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Citing Literature Volume46, Issue9October 1995Pages 713-714 RelatedInformation

Information retrieval: new systems and current research Edited by RubenLeon. Proceedings of the 15th Research Colloquium of the British Computer Society Information Retrieval Specialist Group, Glasgow, 1993.

Information retrieval: new systems and current research Edited by RubenLeon. Proceedings of the 15th Research Colloquium of the British Computer Society Information Retrieval Specialist Group, Glasgow, 1993.

Report of a workshop on information science and technology for developing countries: London, 26–28 June 1984

The British Computer Society is a professional body representing the computing profession in the UK. Within the Society are a number of specialist groups, two of which are the Specialist Group for Developing Countries (Chairman, Dr Y. Paker) and the Information Retrieval Specialist Group (Chairman, Mr A.S. Pollitt). Informal contacts between members of these two groups have recognised: