Abstract
This study investigated the change in the content of the queries
when performing reformulations in relation to age and task
difficulty. Results showed that both generalization and specialization
strategies were applied significantly more often
for difficult tasks compared to simple tasks. Young participants
were found to use specialization strategy significantly
more often than old participants. Generalization strategy was
also used significantly more often by young participants, especially
for difficult tasks. Young participants were found to
reformulate much longer than old participants. The semantic
relevance of queries with the target information was found to
be significantly higher for difficult tasks compared to simple
tasks. It showed a decreasing trend across reformulations for
old participants and remained constant for young participants,
indicating that as old participants reformulated, they produced
queries that were further away from the target information.
Implications of these findings for design of information search
systems are discussed.
when performing reformulations in relation to age and task
difficulty. Results showed that both generalization and specialization
strategies were applied significantly more often
for difficult tasks compared to simple tasks. Young participants
were found to use specialization strategy significantly
more often than old participants. Generalization strategy was
also used significantly more often by young participants, especially
for difficult tasks. Young participants were found to
reformulate much longer than old participants. The semantic
relevance of queries with the target information was found to
be significantly higher for difficult tasks compared to simple
tasks. It showed a decreasing trend across reformulations for
old participants and remained constant for young participants,
indicating that as old participants reformulated, they produced
queries that were further away from the target information.
Implications of these findings for design of information search
systems are discussed.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems |
| Publisher | Association for Computing Machinery |
| Pages | 5720-5730 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 7 May 2016 |
Keywords
- Information Search
- Aging
- Reformulation Strategies
- Task Difficulty