People Search For Information Research Articles

Searching for people on Web search engines

The Web is a communication and information technology that is often used for the distribution and retrieval of personal information. Many people and organizations mount Web sites containing large amounts of information on individuals, particularly about celebrities. However, limited studies have examined how people search for information on other people, using personal names, via Web search engines. Explores the nature of personal name searching on Web search engines. The specific research questions addressed in the study are: “Do personal names form a major part of queries to Web search engines?”; “What are the characteristics of personal name Web searching?”; and “How effective is personal name Web searching?”. Random samples of queries from two Web search engines were analyzed. The findings show that: personal name searching is a common but not a major part of Web searching with few people seeking information on celebrities via Web search engines; few personal name queries include double quotations or additional identifying terms; and name searches on Alta Vista included more advanced search features relative to those on AlltheWeb.com. Discusses the implications of the findings for Web searching and search engines, and further research.

Health promotion for the mind, body, and spirit: a college course for older adults with dementia.

This article describes a pilot study of an experimental college course for individuals with newly diagnosed dementia, with a focus on teaching methods for promoting and maintaining optimal health. Community involvement included recruitment by the local Alzheimer's Association chapter and an off-campus site at a local assisted living center with easy access for the students. Course topics covered over the 10-week period, included modules on: physical and cognitive fitness, nutrition, recreation, communication, understanding the disease process, depression, coping, relationships, and driving issues. Stress, depression, self-efficacy, and self-esteem were evaluated both prior to and after the 10-week course. Providing education early in the course of the disease, empowers the older adult student and provides an element of personal control and dignity. The course also attempts to prevent future problems by teaching new habits and lifestyles early in the disease process. Attempts to change habits and behavior later in the course of the disease often fail due to the difficulty of learning new behaviors.

Improving the “darkness to light” ratio in user‐related information retrieval research

Research into information retrieval (IR) cannot yet answer the basic question of how we can design IR systems to help people search for information with optimal levels of effectiveness. In relation to human‐system interaction, we have failed to develop any valid and at the same time robust user models capable of driving practical system development. If we strip away assumptions and over‐optimism relating to the generalisability of what are essentially sporadic and fragmented research efforts, the great “darkness to light” ratio characterising our knowledge of human aspects of IR becomes apparent. From a more critical and pessimistic (but by no means less realistic) perspective, we are getting nowhere fast. A range of strategies is proposed to improve the situation by supporting relatively “horizontal” as well as “vertical” knowledge integration. These consist of: greater use of pluralistic research approaches; enhanced access to research data; more multidisciplinary and multi‐perspective integrative reviews and conceptual mappings; and establishing a greater critical mass of published research findings sufficient to support the generation of a less sparse and fragmented evidence‐based knowledge map. The potential of electronic publishing and data access for helping achieve these goals is discussed.

Dialogue and the search for information

Knowledge of conversation theory and speech acts assists us to understand how people search for information. Dialogue embodies meanings and intentionalities, and represents epistemic inquiry. There are implications for the information‐processing model of cognitive psychology. Question formulation (erotetics) and turn‐taking play important roles in eliciting information, while discourse analysis furnishes us with information about people's categorising, recall, and semantic skills.

The design of a dynamic book for information search

Information-seeking skills are central to many learning tasks, from finding simple facts and comparing events in an encyclopedia, to pursuing complex research questions. Electronic document/database systems are touted as alternatives to piles of paper for accessing information, yet our current understanding of how people search for information provides few clues about how to improve the design of such systems. Dynamic books are a powerful electronic transformation of information that could potentially offer multiple paths through complex information and help us actively in searching. Within this context, this paper explores how people look for information and how the design of dynamic books interacts with the search process. It also describes a simple dynamic book, based on a world history textbook, implemented in the Smalltalk programming system, and used by students to answer questions.