Abstract
As Web search services become a major source of information for a growing number of people, we need to know more about how users search heterogeneous collections using Web search engines. This paper reports the results from a major study exploring users' information searching behaviour on the EXCITE Web search engine. Three hundred and fifty-seven (357) EXCITE users responded to an interactive survey, including their search topics, intended query terms, search frequency for information on their topic, and demographic data. Results show that: users tend to employ simple search strategies, and conduct successive searches over time to find information related to a particular topic. Implications for the design of Web search services are discussed.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 12-27 |
| Number of pages | 16 |
| Journal | Information Research |
| Volume | 4 |
| Issue number | 2 |
| Publication status | Published - Oct 1998 |
| Externally published | Yes |