All Assigned Search Tasks

1358 records found

Task type name Definition Citation
Xie, I., & Joo, S. (2012). Factors affecting the selection of search tactics: Tasks, knowledge, process, and systems. Information Processing and Management, 48(2), 254-270.
Bellardo, T. (1984). Some Attributes of Online Search Intermediaries that Relate to Search Outcome. Ph.D. dissertation. Philadelphia, PA: Drexel University.
Alhenshiri, A., Watters, C., Shepherd, M., & Duffy, J. (2012). Building support for Web information gathering tasks. Proceedings of the 45th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), 1687-1696.
Liu, J., Kim, C.S., & Creel, C. (2015). Exploring search task difficulty reasons in different task types and user knowledge groups. Information Processing & Management, 51, 273-285.
Eight topics were selected from the topic set used by the main (automatic) Web TREC track. For each of these topics, a search scenario was provided in order to provide the participants a context of their search activity Wu, M., Muresan, G., McLean, A., Tang, M.-C. M., Wilkinson, R., & Li, Y. (2004). Human versus machine in the topic distillation task. Paper presented at the Proceedings of SIGIR 2004, Sheffield, UK.
"Subjects have the task to create lesson material from a database filled with text and picture fragments about gorillas. They search in three different conditions, reflecting the different size and structure of the intersection between information retrieval and work task concept spaces. Subjects receive an assignment that contains a template in which didactical goals and topics to create the lesson material are set out for them." (p.352) Kabel, S., de Hoog, R., Wielinga, B.J., & Anjewierden, A. (2004). The added value of task and ontology-based markup for information retrieval. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 55(4), 348-362.
Search tasks were “selected from a set of questions developed from “real” requests to ERIC searchers”’ included both specification of topic and specification of search outcome/goal Fenichel, C. H. (1981). Online searching: Measures that discriminate among users with different types of experiences. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 32(1), 23-32.
Participants asked to write a question of their own on a general topic that was assigned (AIDS and the Federal government) Asked to write down two search strings that could be used to search their question [Combines assignment of questions with user-generated questions] Jacobson, T., & Fusani, D. (1992). Computer, system, and subject knowledge in novice searching of a full-text, multifile database. Library & Information Science Research, 14(1), 97-106.
Five questions at three levels of complexity, based on number of search terms and type/number of Boolean operators. Level 1: single term. Level 2: two terms combined with a single Boolean operator (one question each using AND, OR, NOT). Level 3: required creation of a table with 2 columns from different tables, linked by a table with common values. Linde, L., & Bergstrom, M. (1988). Impact of Prior Knowledge of Informational Content and Organization on Learning Searching Principles in a Database. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 13, 90-101.
Finding an answer to each question in a set of three questions. Questions from an evidence-based medicine project at McMaster (Converted to yes-no format). 4 sets of 3 questions were used. 2/3 therapeutic, 1/3 diagnostic. Hersh, W. R., Pentecost, J., & Hickam, D. H. (1995). A task-oriented approach to retrieval system evaluation. Paper presented at the ASIS '95 Proceedings, Chicago.
Ageev, M., Guo, Q., Lagun, D., & Agichtein, E. (2011). Find it if you can: A game for modeling different types of Web search success using interaction data. Proceedings of the 34th International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 345-354.
Ageev, M., Guo, Q., Lagun, D., & Agichtein, E. (2011). Find it if you can: A game for modeling different types of Web search success using interaction data. Proceedings of the 34th International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 345-354.
Jansen, B. (2000). The effect of query complexity on Web searching results. Information Research, 6(1), Paper 87. http://www.informationr.net/ir/6-1/paper87.html.
Jansen, B. (2000). The effect of query complexity on Web searching results. Information Research, 6(1), Paper 87. http://www.informationr.net/ir/6-1/paper87.html.
Maynard, D.C., & Hakel, M.D. (1997). Effects of objective and subjective task complexity on performance. Human Performance, 10(4), 303-330.
Maynard, D.C., & Hakel, M.D. (1997). Effects of objective and subjective task complexity on performance. Human Performance, 10(4), 303-330.
Maynard, D.C., & Hakel, M.D. (1997). Effects of objective and subjective task complexity on performance. Human Performance, 10(4), 303-330.
Maynard, D.C., & Hakel, M.D. (1997). Effects of objective and subjective task complexity on performance. Human Performance, 10(4), 303-330.
Shah, C. (2013). Effects of awareness on coordination in collaborative information seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 64(6): 1122-1143.
not defined Azzopardi, L., Kelly, D. & Brennan, K. (2013). How query cost affects search behavior In Proceedings of the 36th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 23-32.
not defined Williamsa, S. C. & Fostera, A. K. (2011). Promise Fulfilled? An EBSCO Discovery Service Usability Study. Journal of Web Librarianship, 5(3): 179-198.
Bates, M. J. (1977). Factors affecting subject catalog search success. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 28(3), 161-169.
Analytical search tasks "Analytical search tasks were defined as tasks that need more goal-oriented and systematic analytical strategies." Yuan, X. (2011). A comparative experiment of the effect of visualization on user performance of information systems. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 48, 1-2.
information retrieval task definition not provided Hertzum, M., & Frokjaer, E. (1996). Browsing and querying in online documentation: A study of user interfaces and the interaction process. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 3(2), 136-161.
multi- session search task "A multi-session search task, such as writing a report, consists of multiple information seeking tasks, each of which might be composed of its own sub-tasks." (p. 123) Bron, M., Gorp, J., Nack, F., Baltussen, L. B., & Rijke, M. (2013). Aggregated search interface preferences in multi-session search tasks. In Proceedings of the 36th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 123-132.
parallel task (PT) not defined Liu, J. & Belkin, N. J. (2011). Search task difficulty: the expected vs. the reflected. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 1183-1184.
"Background search" "In this task the participants were asked to find general background information on a topic, essentially as much information as possible on a topic. In our study the participants were asked to find information on the demographics of the Internet." (p.331) Tombros, A., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J.M. (2005). How users assess Web pages for information seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 56(4), 327-344.
"Decision task" "In this task the participants had to gather information and make a decision based on the information found while searching. The participants, in this case, were asked to decide on the best hi-fi speakers available in their own price range." (p.331) Tombros, A., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J.M. (2005). How users assess Web pages for information seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 56(4), 327-344.
"factual search task" "The factual search task was to find information on general requirements for applying for graduate study at the University. There existed a specific piece of target information, and the participant was required to continue searching until he or she located the target information. The participant was asked to make a bookmark of the Web page containing the target information once they found it." (p.561) Palmquist, R. A., & Kim, K.-S. (2000). Cognitive style and on-line database search experience as predictors of Web search performance. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(6), 558-566.
"How to cite" search "This type of search was used to find instructions on how to cite sources." (p. 132) Bowler, L. (2009). Genres of search: A concept for understanding successive search behavior. Canadian Journal of Information Science, 33(3), 119-140.
"Locate Information" - high, medium or low complexity "the second task dealt with locating information on that site. ... The difficulty of the "locate information" tasks was determined by the structural complexity of the particular WWW-sites." (p. 578) The operational definitions of task complexity: "Simple/Low: Site contains distinct categories and subcategories with well-structured information Medium: Site contains indistinct categories and subcategories with well-structured information" (p.578, Table 1) Complex/High: Site contains indistinct categories and subcategories with ill-structured information Lazonder, A.W., Biemans, H. J.A., & Wopereis, I.G.J.H. (2000). Differences between novice and experienced users in searching information on the World Wide Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(6), 576-581.
"Locate site" - high, medium or low complexity "The first task dealt with locating a Web site ... The complexity of the “locate site” tasks was determined by the level of inferencing (low, medium, high) required to deduce the site’s URL from the task description." (p. 578) The operational definitions of task complexity: "Simple/Low: URL is given in the task description Medium: URL can be easily inferred from the task description Complex/High: URL cannot be inferred from the task description" (p.578, Table 1) Lazonder, A.W., Biemans, H. J.A., & Wopereis, I.G.J.H. (2000). Differences between novice and experienced users in searching information on the World Wide Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(6), 576-581.
"Many items task" "In this task the participants were asked to compile a list of items. This task specifically asked the participants to compile a list of interesting things to do over a weekend in the city of Kyoto." (p.331) Tombros, A., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J.M. (2005). How users assess Web pages for information seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 56(4), 327-344.
"mental comprehensive" search N/A Marchionini, G. (1989). Making the transition from print to electronic encyclopedias: Adaption of mental models. International Journal of Man-Machine Studies, 30, 591-618.
"Padding the bibliography" search "they launched a new search, essentially to find material to pad the bibliography." (p. 133) Bowler, L. (2009). Genres of search: A concept for understanding successive search behavior. Canadian Journal of Information Science, 33(3), 119-140.
"self-selected tasks" "[Participants] are asked to recall occasions when they have tried to find information using a search engine, but have encountered difficulties. They are asked to repeat these searches." Madden, A. D., Eaglestone, B., Ford, N. J., & Whittle, M. (2007). Search engines: a first step to finding information: preliminary findings from a study of observed searches. Information Research, 12(2).
"topical search task" "The other search task was more topical in nature—to find information helpful to the participant’s future career plans. As the participant was allowed to search for information related to the career of his or her interest, the relevance of the retrieved information was judged subjectively by the participant. Bookmarks were made of the pages that the participant felt were useful, thus overtly signaling that those pages were judged relevant." (p. 561) Palmquist, R. A., & Kim, K.-S. (2000). Cognitive style and on-line database search experience as predictors of Web search performance. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(6), 558-566.
A cause and effect type question definition not provided Sutcliffe, A. G., Ennis, M., & Watkinson, S. J. (2000). Empirical studies of end-user information searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(13), 1211-1231.
A comparative question with aspects "This was a comparative question with aspects (i.e., the answer sets should contain the comparison from four viewpoints of safety, infection, statistics, and economics). (Code OG2)" Sutcliffe, A. G., Ennis, M., & Watkinson, S. J. (2000). Empirical studies of end-user information searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(13), 1211-1231.
a fixed fact-finding task not defined Balatsoukas, P. & Ruthven, I. (2012). An eye-tracking approach to the analysis of relevance judgments on the Web: The case of Google search engine. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(11), 1728-1746.
a free search "choose an arbitrary task of current interest" (p. 481) Klas, C., Fuhr, N., & Schaefer, A. (2004). Evaluating Strategic Support for Information Access in the DAFFODIL System. In Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries (pp. 476-487). Presented at the ECDL 2004, Berlin: Springer.
a known-item search "a task requiring the searcher to find a piece of information known to exist. The search scope is so narrowly focused and specific that every searcher should have the same criteria in evaluating the relevance of the retrieved information. For this known-item task, there was a piece of target information that all searchers were expected to retrieve." (p.238) Kim, K.-S. (2001). Information seeking on the web: Effects of user and task variables. Library & Information Science Research, 23(3), 233-256.
A multiple-step fact-finding search not defined Gonzalez-Ibanez, R. & Shah, C. (2012). Investigating positive and negative affects in collaborative information seeking: A pilot study report. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
a recall-oriented information-gathering task (exploratory web search tasks) not defined Yue, Z., Han, S., & He, D. (2013). An Investigation of the Query Behavior in Task-based Collaborative Exploratory Web Search. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-10.
a simple lookup task "The simple lookup tasks had a fixed answer, but the chosen task description was presented in such a way that the most likely query would not find the answer without subsequent queries or refinements." (p. 76) Hughes-Morgan, K. & Wilson, M. L. (2012). Information vs interaction: examining different interaction models over consistent metadata. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 72-81.
a subject search "a task requiring the searcher to retrieve information that is related to the given subject or topic regarded as useful to the searcher." (p.239) "The scope of this search is so broad that each searcher could have different criteria for evaluating the relevance of the retrieved information. It is well known that individuals can hardly reach a consensus when evaluating the relevance of information. Thus, for the subject task used in this study, the usefulness of the retrieved information, judged by each searcher, was adopted as the criteria." (p.239) Kim, K.-S. (2001). Information seeking on the web: Effects of user and task variables. Library & Information Science Research, 23(3), 233-256.
a utility-based decision-making task (exploratory web search tasks) not defined Yue, Z., Han, S., & He, D. (2013). An Investigation of the Query Behavior in Task-based Collaborative Exploratory Web Search. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-10.
a “known-item” search "The operational definition of known-item search is a task requiring the searcher to find a piece of information that is known to exist and to give a specific answer to the question given. The target information is located in only one place." (p.112) Kim, K.-S., & Allen, B. (2002). Cognitive and task influences on web searching behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(2), 109-119.
a “subject” search "A subject search task, on the other hand, is defined as a task requiring the searcher to find different pieces of information that are related to the subject given and regarded as useful to the searcher. These tasks were designed to be relevant to the context in which the participants— university students—were embedded." (p.112) Kim, K.-S., & Allen, B. (2002). Cognitive and task influences on web searching behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(2), 109-119.
Abstract "In an abstract task, the information need is abstract for which a concrete, direct solution may not exist. The abstract search task is more open-ended than the exploratory task." (p.41). Kinley, K., Tjondronegoro, D., Partridge, H., & Edwards, S. (2012). Relationship between the nature of the search task types and query reformulation behaviour. In Proceedings of the Seventeenth Australasian Document Computing Symposium (39-46) New York, NY: ACM.
Abstract image "searching for an image that conveys some abstract meaning e.g. tranquility" (p.82) McDonald, S., & Tait, J. (2003). Search strategies in content-based image retrieval. In ACM SIGIR Proceedings, (pp. 80-87).
Abstract image search task not defined Wang, X. & Erdelez, S. (2013). Medical image users' search tactics across different search tasks. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-4.
Abstract task "In an abstract task, the information need is abstract and a concrete, direct solution may not exist. The abstract search task is more open-ended than the exploratory task." (p.1112) Kinley, K., Tjondronegoro, D., Partridge, H., & Edwards, S. (2014). Modeling users' web search behavior and their cognitive styles. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 65(6), 1107-1123.
Academic Research definition not provided White, R. W., & Kelly, D. (2006). A study on the effects of personalization and task information on implicit feedback performance. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 297-306). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Academic research task Thesis research actually being conducted by PhD students. The characteristics of a research tasks include: explorative, uncertain topic, multifaceted, logical, variable, and successive (updated). Du, J.T., & Evans, N. (2011). Academic users' information searching on research topics: Characteristics of research tasks and search strategies. Journal of Academic Librarianship, 37(4), 299-306.
active, directed search task "Subjects were assigned an identical search task with the requirement of being able to choose an alternative after the search." (185) Ylikoski, T. (2005). A sequence analysis of consumers' online searches. Internet Research: Electronic Networking Applications and Policy, 15(2), 181-194.
actual search request definition not provided Woelfl, N. (1984). Individual differences in online search behavior: The effect of learning styles and cognitive abilities on process and outcome. Unpblished doctoral dissertation, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH.
Ad-hoc topics Not defined Malik, S., Klas, C.-P., Fuhr, N., Larsen, B., & Tombros, A. (2006). Designing a user interface for interactive retrieval of structured documents -- Lessons learned from the INEX interactive track. Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries. Springer. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4172, 291-302.
Advance Obituary (OBI) not defined Liu, J., Liu, C., & Belkin, N. (2013). Examining the effects of task topic familiarity on searchers' behaviors in different task types. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 50, Article No. 38.
Advance Obituary (OBI) OBI is a Factual Product, because facts about the person are needed. It is at the Document Level because entire documents need to be examined. It is Unnamed because the search targets are not specifically identified in the task. The Goal Quality is Amorphous because “all the information” is undefined. It has High Complexity because many facts need to be found. Cole, M.J., Gwizdka, J., Liu, C., & Belkin, N.J. (2011). Dynamic assessment of inforamtion acquisition effort during interactive search. ASIST Proceedings, n.p.
Advanced Obituary "OBI is a Factual Product, because facts about the person are needed; it is at the Document Level because entire documents need to be examined; Goal Quality is Amorphous because “all the information” is undefined; it has High Objective Complexity because many facts need to be found." (p.72) Liu, J., Cole, M., Liu, C., Bierig, R., Gwizdka, J., Belkin, N., Zhang, J., Zhang, X. (2010). Search behaviors in different task types. In Proceedings of the 10th annual joint conference on digital libraries (69-78.) New York, NY: ACM.
Advanced search tasks Tasks using the advanced search form Kim, J. (2005). Finding documents in a digital institutional repository: DSpace and Eprints. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 42, n.p.
Aimless browsing Look thorough web pages according to your own interest. Find out about the contents of the web pages and, if you found something interesting, read the pages partly or completely as you like. Pagendarm, M., & Schaumburg, H. (2001). Why Are Users Banner-Blind? The Impact of Navigation Style on the Perception of Web Banners. Journal of Digital Information, 2(1). Retrieved from http://journals.tdl.org/jodi/article/viewArticle/36/38
Aimless browsing No definition was given Calisir, F., & Karaali, D. (2008). The impacts of banner location, banner content and navigation style on banner recognition. Computers in Human Behavior, 24(2), 535-543.
All articles task "The task is to find all articles of “Norbert Fuhr” in the area of “digital libraries” of the last four years" (p. 482) Klas, C., Fuhr, N., & Schaefer, A. (2004). Evaluating Strategic Support for Information Access in the DAFFODIL System. In Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries (pp. 476-487). Presented at the ECDL 2004, Berlin: Springer.
an exploratory task "The exploratory search tasks were chosen to be tasks with multiple sub-problems, such that searchers would have to perform a series of searches or refinements to combine answers from several websites. The tasks, therefore, resembled a collection-style task, without there being specific dependencies between the sub-elements." (p. 76) Hughes-Morgan, K. & Wilson, M. L. (2012). Information vs interaction: examining different interaction models over consistent metadata. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 72-81.
Analogous transformations "When working on such a problem, the chemist will search for a transformation that takes a known substance C into another known substance D, where C is related to A, and D is related to B." (p.306) Egan, D.E., Lesk, M.E., Ketchum, R.D., Lochbaum, C.C., Remde, J.R., Littman, M., & Landauer, T.K. (1991). Hypertext for the electronic library? CORE sample results. Proceedings of the Third Annual ACM Conference on Hypertext, 299-312.
Analytical questions "The answers to analytical questions are considerably more complex than answers to factual and definitional questions such as those used in the TREC QA track... An adequate answer... may encompass reactions by a variety of individuals and organizations... An answer of some depth is required; depth depends on the characteristics of the person who asks the question and the context in which the question is asked." (p.1035) Kelly, D., Wacholder, N., Rittman, R., Sun, Y., Kantor, P., Small, S., & Strzalkowski, T. (2007). Using interview data to identify evaluation criteria for interactive, analytical question-answering systems. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 58(7), 1032-1043.
Analytical search tasks "The analytical search tasks were defined as tasks which need more goal-oriented and systematic analytical strategies (Marchionini, 1995)." (p. 4) Yuan, X. & Liu, J. (2013). Relationship between cognitive styles and users' task performance in two information systems. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50, article No. 40.
Analyze "Breaking material into constituent parts, determining how the parts relate to one another and to an overall structure or purpose through differentiating, organizing, and attributing." (p.255) Wu, W., Kelly, D., Edwards, A., & Arguello, J. (2012). Grannies, tanning beds, tattoos and NASCAR: Evaluation of search tasks with varying levels of cognitive complexity. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium (254-257). New York, NY: ACM.
Analyze "Breaking material into constituent parts, determining how the parts relate to one another and to an overall structure or purpose through differentiating, organizing, and attributing" (p.439) Arguello, J., Wu, W., Kelly, D., & Edwards, A. (2012). Task complexity, vertical display and user interaction in aggregated search. In Proceedings of the 35th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 435-444.
Analyzing Breaking material into constituent parts, determining how the parts relate to one another and to an overall structure or purpose through differentiating, organizing, and attributing (Table 2); Scenario must have participant deduce, scrutinize, or survey information (Table 3) Jansen, B.J., Booth, D., & Smith, B. (2009). Using the taxonomy of cognitive learning to model online searching. Information Processing & Management, 45(6), 643-663.
Apply "Carrying out or using a procedure through executing, or implementing." (p.255) Wu, W., Kelly, D., Edwards, A., & Arguello, J. (2012). Grannies, tanning beds, tattoos and NASCAR: Evaluation of search tasks with varying levels of cognitive complexity. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium (254-257). New York, NY: ACM.
Applying Carrying out or using a procedure through executing, or implementing (Table 2); Scenario must have participant exploit information and put the resulting knowledge into action (Table 3) Jansen, B.J., Booth, D., & Smith, B. (2009). Using the taxonomy of cognitive learning to model online searching. Information Processing & Management, 45(6), 643-663.
Area question "Questions asking about relationship between many topics and many other topics, whose answer resides in many 'dots' over an 'area" in the diagram (p.8) Qu, Y., Furnas, G., & Walstrum, B. (2006). Using category information for relationship exploration in textual data. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 43, n.p.
Asking Questions "The purpose of exploration, as described in a previous section, is for students to gather appropriate background information to help them develop rich questions to focus their research. This step is difficult for students, as they are rarely required to ask their own questions in traditional classroom activities. We found during our first units that instead of asking open-ended questions, students too often begin by asking very restricted, close ended questions. These questions often has a single correct answer, and this answer was often numerical (such as "How many people died in Hurricane Andrew?"). The rest of their time on-line was was spent looking for a page that has the answer on it. Our goal is for students to ask questions that do not have a single correct answer, but require students to synthesize infiltration from multiple sources." (14) Lyons, D. J., et al. (1997). An investigation of the use of the World Wide Web for online inquiry in a science classroom (Report No.). (ERIC Document No. ED 406158).
aspectual (or instance) retrieval task "searchers are to identify documents which specify the different aspects or instances of a search topic." (p. 22) Liu, Y, & Belkin, N. J. (2008). Query reformulation, search performance, and term suggestion devices in question-answering tasks. In Proceedings of the second international symposium on Information interaction in context, 21-26.
aspectual recall-oriented search not defined Huang, C., Joo, S. & Xie, I. (2012). Effects of learning styles on the application of search tactics: A preliminary result. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
aspectual search tasks "Aspectual tasks required the subject to identify as many different aspects as possible for a given topic and save appropriate resources that cover all distinct aspects of that topic." Yuan, X. (2011). A comparative experiment of the effect of visualization on user performance of information systems. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 48, 1-2.
aspectual search tasks "The aspectual tasks were to identify as many different aspects as possible for a given topic and save appropriate resources that cover all distinct aspects of that topic (Over, 1997)." (p. 4) Yuan, X. & Liu, J. (2013). Relationship between cognitive styles and users' task performance in two information systems. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50, article No. 40.
Aspectual task From TREC5 Interactive Track Park, S. (1999). User preferences when searching individual and integrated full-text databases. Proceedings of the 4th ACM Conference on Digital Libraries, 195-203.
Aspectual task "This task is to identify as many different aspects as possible for a given topic and save documents that, taken together, cover all distinct aspects of that topic." (p.458). Six topics: solar power, military downsizing, paper cost, world-wide welfare, environmental protection, electric automobiles. Park, S. (2000). Usability, user preferences, effectiveness, and user behaviors when searching individual and integrated full-text databases: implications for digital libraries. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(5), 456-468.
Aspectual topics, modified from TREC-8 "The new topics asked subjects to find documents covering as many aspects as possible (comprehensiveness) and also as many documents as possible relating to each aspect (exhaustiveness)... we further added text describing an information seeking scenario by combining the description and instance fields. (p.131) Harper, D.J., & Kelly, D. (2006). Contextual relevance feedback. Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Information Interaction in Context, 129-137.
Assessing Information "One facet of the World Wide Web is that the content is comprehensive. The wide variety of information is unparalleled in most school environments. This can be a great asset, since there is information that is unavailable to students locally, but it can also be something of a liability. Unfortunately, students often have a tendency to believe practically anything that is written. In the course of normal school activities, the authority of information providers is rarely questioned, since students are generally presented only with accepted textbooks, and with library materials that are in keeping with the library's collections policy. However, in dealing with Web-based resources the question of authority is paramount. Since almost anyone with access to a computer and in Internet account can post information on the Web, it becomes difficult for students to easily assess the quality of the information that is provided." (20) Lyons, D. J., et al. (1997). An investigation of the use of the World Wide Web for online inquiry in a science classroom (Report No.). (ERIC Document No. ED 406158).
Assessments "At each assessment, the student made two passes through a single problem set. The students were asked first to respond to the entire set of problems, with their own personal knowledge, within 35 minutes...The students were directed to retrieve information that would address [the incorrectly answered] questions selected by the research team." (55) de Bliek, R., Martz, J. M., Reich, G. M., Friedman, C. P., & Wildemuth, B. M. (1992). Domain knowledge and information retrieval in bacteriology: An information science perspective. Academic Medicine, 67(10) (October Suppl.), S54-S56.
asynchronous collaborative search task not defined Capra, R., Chen, A. T., McArthur, E., & Davis, N. (2013). Searcher Actions and Strategies in Asynchronous Collaborative Search. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-10.
Author task "The test person searches for the main research area of an author" (p. 482) Klas, C., Fuhr, N., & Schaefer, A. (2004). Evaluating Strategic Support for Information Access in the DAFFODIL System. In Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries (pp. 476-487). Presented at the ECDL 2004, Berlin: Springer.
author, subject, or title searching require the ability to search by author, subject or title Sit, R. A. (1998). Online library catalog search performance by older adult users. Library & Information Science Research, 20(2), 115-131.
Author-biography search "At the request of the teacher, participants had to determine the credibility of authors in order be able to reference an information source in their research paper. To do so they ran separate searches just to find biographical information on the authors." (p. 132) Bowler, L. (2009). Genres of search: A concept for understanding successive search behavior. Canadian Journal of Information Science, 33(3), 119-140.
Automatic information processing tasks "are a priori completely determinable so that, in principle, they could be automated-whether actually automated or not. Example: Computation of a person’s net salary yields a real number in some known range and requires this person’s gross salary and tax code, and the taxation table." (194) Bystrom, K. & Jarvelin, K. (1995). Task complexity affects information seeking and use. Information Processing and Management, 31, 191-213.
Background Information Collection "BIC is a Mixed Product, because identifying “important” newspapers is intellectual, and finding documents on the topic is factual. It is at the Document Level because whole stories are judged; it has the Specific Goal of finding documents on a well- defined topic; it has High Objective Complexity because of the number of sources and activities that need to be consulted/done." (p.72) Liu, J., Cole, M., Liu, C., Bierig, R., Gwizdka, J., Belkin, N., Zhang, J., Zhang, X. (2010). Search behaviors in different task types. In Proceedings of the 10th annual joint conference on digital libraries (69-78.) New York, NY: ACM.
Background Information Collection (BIC) not defined Liu, J., Liu, C., & Belkin, N. (2013). Examining the effects of task topic familiarity on searchers' behaviors in different task types. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 50, Article No. 38.
Background Information Collection (BIC) BIC task is a mixed product because identifying “important” newspapers is intellectual, but finding topical documents is factual. It is Document Level because whole stories are judged. It has the Specific Goal of finding documents on a well-defined topic, but Unnamed because the search targets are not specifically identified (compare with CPE[copy editing]). It has High Complexity because of the number of sources to be consulted and the activities that need to be done. p. 4 Cole, M.J., Gwizdka, J., Liu, C., & Belkin, N.J. (2011). Dynamic assessment of inforamtion acquisition effort during interactive search. ASIST Proceedings, n.p.
Background search "finding information about dust allergies in the workplace" (p718) White, R. W., Jose, J. M., & Ruthven, I. (2003). A task-oriented study on the influencing effects of query-biased summarisation in web searching. Information Processing & Management, 39(5), 707-734
background search definition not provided White, R. W. (2004). Implicit feedback for interactive information retrieval (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Department of Computing Science Faculty of Computing Science, Mathematics and Statistics University of Glasgow, Scotland.
background search definition not provided White, RW., Jose, JM., & Ruthven, I. 2005. Using top-ranking sentences for facilitate effective information access. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 56(10): 1113-1125.
background search "the background search asked subjects to find as much information as possible on a given topic." (5) White, R., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J. (2002). Finding relevant documents using top-ranking sentences: an evaluation of two alternative schemes. In Proceedings of the 25th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference (SIGIR 2002).
Background search "In this task the participants were asked to find general background information on a topic, essentially as much information as possible on a topic. In our study the participants were asked to find information on the demographics of the Internet." (p.331) Tombros, A., Ruthven, I. and Jose, J.M. (2005). How users assess web pages for information-seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 56(4), 327-344.
Background search N/A White, R; Ruthven, I; Jose, JM. (2001). Web document summarisation: a task-oriented evaluation. 12th Interdisciplinary Workshop on Database and Expert Systems Applications, Proceedings: 951-955. edited by Tjoa, AM; Wagner, RR. presented at 12th International Conference on Database and Expert Systems Applications (DEXA) in Munich, Germany, Sep 03-07, 2001.
Background search Example: finding information on dust allergies (p.178) White, RW., Jose, JM., & Ruthven, I. (2006). An implicit feedback approach for interactive information retrieval. Information Processing & Management 42(1), 166-190.
Background search "searchers were asked to find as much general background information on the demographics of the Internet as possible" (p.385) Tombros, A., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J.M. (2003). Searchers' criteria for assessing Web pages. Proceedings of the 26th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 385-386.
Background search Not defined White, R., Jose, J.M., & Ruthven, I. (2001). Query-biased web page summarisation: A task-oriented evaluation. Proceedings of the 24th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 412-413.
Background search task "This task asked participants to find general background information on a topic. In our experiment, participants were asked to find the pages which provide the information about the recent change of student populations." (p.306) Joho, H., & Jose, J.M. (2006). A comparative study of the effectiveness of search result presentation on the Web. Advances in Information Retrieval. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3936, 302-313.
Background search task "This task asked participants to find general background information on a topic." [p. 230] Joho, H., & Jose, J. M. (2008). Effectiveness of additional representations for the search result presentation on the web. Information Processing and Management, 44, 226-241.
Background search task "This task asked participants to find general background information on a topic. In our experiment, participants were asked to find the pages which provide information about the recent change of student populations." (p.84) Joho, H., Birbeck, R.D., & Jose, J.M. (2007). An ostensive browsing and searching on the web. Proceedings of the 2nd International Workshop on Context-Based Information Retrieval, 81-92.
background seeking definition not provided White, R. W. (2004). Implicit feedback for interactive information retrieval (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Department of Computing Science Faculty of Computing Science, Mathematics and Statistics University of Glasgow, Scotland.
Background tasks Not defined Pharo, N., & Nordlie, R. (2005). Context matters: An analysis of assessments of XML documents. In Crestani, F., & Ruthven, I. (eds.), Context: Nature, Impact and Role (5th International Conference on Conceptions of Library and Information Sciences, CoLIS 2005, Glasgow, UK, June 4-8, 2005. Proceedings). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3507, 238-248. Springer.
Background tasks "Background type tasks instructed searchers to look for information about a certain topic (e.g. concerns about the CIA and FBI's monitoring the public)" (p.1070) Szlavik, Z., Tombros, A., & Lalmas, M. (2006). Investigating the use of summarisation for interactive XML retrieval. Proceedings of the 2006 ACM symposium on Applied computing, 1068-1072.
Background tasks "find as much general information on a topic as possible" (p.411) Tombros, A., Larsen, B., & Malik, S. (2004). The interactive track at INEX 2004. In Fuhr, N., Lalmas, M., Malik, S., & Szlavik, Z. (eds.), Advances in XML Information Retrieval (Third International Workshop of the Initiative for the Evaluation of XML Retrieval, INEX 2004, Dagstuhl Castle, Germany, December 6-8, 2004, Revised Selected Papers). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3493, 410-423. Springer.
Background type tasks "Background type tasks instructed searchers to look for information about a certain topic (e.g., concerns about the CIA and FBI's monitoring of the public)" (p.79) Szlavik, Z., Tombros, A., & Lalmas, M. (2006). The use of summaries in XML retrieval. In Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries (Proceedings of the 10th European Conference on Digital Libraries, Alicante, Spain, September 17-22, 2006), 75-86.
Baseline question One asked about a single fact; one asked about a relationship involving topics that did not have corresponding categories (all other "questions were about relationships between topics that have corresponding categories in the data set") (p.7) Qu, Y., Furnas, G., & Walstrum, B. (2006). Using category information for relationship exploration in textual data. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 43, n.p.
Basic "contained one subtopic, based on either visual or textual information alone" (p.1682) Albertson, D., & Meadows, C., III. (2011). Situated topic complexity in interactive video retrieval. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 62(9), 1676-1695.
basic information search tasks not defined Jayroe, T. J. & Wolfram, D. (2012). Internet searching, tablet technology and older adults. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-3.
Basic search task Consisted of one subtask, based on either visual or textual information alone. (243) Albertson, D. (2010). Analyzing user interaction with the ViewFinder video retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(2), 238-252.
Basic task Medium difficulty; A factual task or an intellectual task with well-defined information needs: (1) using academic databases to search relevant papers by basic search strategies, as in searching titles and subjects; or (2) using a specific web site or search engines to search images, videos, or audio information by using basic search strategies. This type of task has comparatively complex information scan and evaluation steps, with five to eight total search paths. (p.363) Ding, R., & Ma, F. (2013). Assessment of university student web searching competency by a task-based online test: A case study at Wuhan University, China. The Electronic Library, 31(3), 359-375.
basic, unstructured search "All search questions were drawn from teacher-compiled lists of current science curricula in grades 4 through 6. Search topics varied slightly between the research sites due to differences in class topics and records in the databases." (670) "All search questions were drawn from teacher-compiled lists of current science curricula in grades 4 through 6. Search topics varied slightly between the research sites due to differences in class topics and records in the databases. Topics for LAPL were adapted from those used in Experiments l-3. Topics were balanced by science (Dewey classes 500-599) vs. technology (Dewey classes 600-699); in Experiments 1 and 2, topics also were balanced by depth of hierarchy. In Experiments 1-3, all topics were defined by the experimenters. In Experiment 4, one topic in each set was selected by the child, within a science or technology topic area." (670) "Children were "given six search topics (three science and three technology topics), one at a time, in the same sequence" (671) Borgman, C.L., Hirsh, S.G., Walter, V.A., & Gallagher, A.L. (1995). Children's search behavior on browsing and keyword online catalogs: The Science Library Catalog Project. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 46(9), 663-684.
Bibliographic n/a Bates, M. J. (1981). Search techniques. In M.E. Williams (Ed.), Annual review of information science and technology (pp. 139-169). New York: Knowledge Industry for American Society for Information Science.
bibliographic questions "that asked about keywords and synonyms" Allen, B. (1990). Knowledge Organization in an Information Retrieval Task. Information Processing & Management, 26(4), 535-542.
Boolean searching broadening or narrowing a search using and, or, not Sit, R. A. (1998). Online library catalog search performance by older adult users. Library & Information Science Research, 20(2), 115-131.
Brand-specific queries "Queries representing a desire for information about a specific product item" (p.1953) Jansen, B.J., & Resnick, M. (2006). An examination of searcher's perceptions of nonsponsored and sponsored links during ecommerce web searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 57(14), 1949-1961.
broad definition not provided Saracevic, T., & Kantor, P. (1988). A study of information seeking and retrieving. II. Users, questions, and effectiveness. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 39(3), 177-196.
Broad simulated work task Borlund, P. (2003). The IIR evaluation model: A framework for evaluation of interactive information retrieval systems. Information Research, 8(3). Retrieved from http://informationr.net/ir/8-3/paper152.html Sahib, N.G., Tombros, A., & Stockman, T. (2014). Investigating the behavior of visually impaired users for multi-session search tasks. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 65(1), 69-83.
broader tasks requiring the participant to find possibly several documents that would provide enough information for the task (1682 Aula, A., & Nordhausen, K. (2006). Modeling successful performance in Web searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 57, 1678-1693.
browse "Browse involves use of a built-in selection feature (a list, collapsible menu, or hyperlink) within possibly useful content. Each browse event must yield a result displayed in the primary content area of the tool." (p. 5) Dorn, B. Stankiewicz, A. & Roggi, C. (2013). Lost while Searching: Difficulties in Information Seeking among End-User Programmers. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-10.
Browse task Not defined Chung, W., Zhang, Y., Huang, Z., Wang, G., Ong, T.-H., & Chen, H. (2004). Internet searching and browsing in a multilingual world: An experiment on the Chinese Business Intelligence Portal (CBizPort). Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 55(9), 818-831.
Browse task The browse task "asked subjects to find themes related to recent events of the company." (p.885) Marshall, B., McDonald, D., Chen, H., & Chung, W. (2004). EBizPort: Collecting and analyzing business intelligence information. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 55(10), 873-891.
Browse Task students were directed to complete a task using the hierarchical subject browse feature called “Explore a Room.” Holmes, J., Robins, D., Zhang, Y., & Salaba, A. (2008). An exploratory study of school-age children's use of a heterogeneous resource site. Journal of Web Librarianship, 2(2-3), 263-285.
Browsing "Subjects were ... asked to browse for ‘‘something of interest to you.’’ The browsing task was described to them as ‘‘window shopping’’ and they were asked to start without a specific goal in mind." (p.587) Chen, H., Houston, A.L., Sewell, R.R., & Schatz, B.R. (1998). Internet browsing and searching: Use evaluations of category map and concept space techniques. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 49(7), 582-603.
browsing "Subjects were asked to assume the role of a Help Desk administrator who receives requests for information from computer users via electronic mail and to find the answers to these questions using the Help Viewer. When subjects opened electronic mail, they found six messages containing requests for information. They were instructed to locate the answer to each question in the Help Viewer and to respond with the handbook, section and page on which the answer could be found." (p. 213-214) Campagnoni, F.R, & Ehrlich, K. (1989). Information retrieval using hypertext-based help system. In Belkin, N.J. & Rijsbergen, C.l (Eds.) Proceedings of the 12th Annual International ACMSIGIR Conference (pp.212-220). New York: ACM.
Browsing "Browsing is defined as a serendipitous task where you may be visiting Web pages with no specific goal in mind. You may allow yourself to take part for a predetermined period of time (e.g., “I have 20 min before my meeting”). This type of task is your classic “Web browsing,” with no specific goal in mind other than entertainment or to “see what’s new.” Sometimes this is done as part of a daily routine. Examples include reading the news, your favorite comic, or a friend’s blog." (1005) Kellar, M., Watters, C., & Shepherd, M. (2007). A field study characterizing web-based information-seeking tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(7), 999-1018. doi:10.1002/asi.20590
Browsing "“browsing” is usually applied to the actions of moving about a library and dipping into books, picking out bits and pieces of information of all kinds." Cove, J.F., & Walsh, B.C. (1988). Online text retrieval via browsing. Information Processing & Management, 24, 31-37.
Browsing Not defined at a task level Carmel, E., Crawford, S., & Chen, H. (1992). Browsing in hypertext: A cognitive study. IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, 22, 865-884
Browsing "almost aimless or general browsing, over the Web and through other sources (such as magazines) for ``something interesting''. pp. 23 Rowley, J. (2000). Product Search in E-Shopping: A Review and Research Propositions. Journal of Consumer Marketing Vol. 17(1), pp. 20-35
Browsing ...one is finding things of interest by going through bits of information. Bodner, R.C., Chignell, M.H., Charoenkitkarn, N., Golovchinsky, G., & Kopak, R.W. (2001). The impact of text browsing on text retrieval performance. Information Processing & Management, 37(3), 507-520.
Browsing ...required the user to look through more than one section of the document to answer the question. Rada, R., & Murphy, C. (1992). Searching versus browsing in hypertext. Hypermedia, 4, 1-30.
browsing not defined Wu, Z., Ramsden, A., Zhao, D. (1995). The user perspective of the ELINOR electronic library. Aslib Proceedings, 47(1), 13-22.
browsing for background information definition not provided Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
Browsing retrieval tasks Not specified Carpineto, C., & Romano, G. (1996). A lattice conceptual clustering system and its application to browsing retrieval. Machine Learning, 24(2), 95-122.
Browsing task "meant to simulate browsing recent journals to “keep current” in certain topics" (p.305) Egan, D.E., Lesk, M.E., Ketchum, R.D., Lochbaum, C.C., Remde, J.R., Littman, M., & Landauer, T.K. (1991). Hypertext for the electronic library? CORE sample results. Proceedings of the Third Annual ACM Conference on Hypertext, 299-312.
Browsing task Not defined Kim, J. (2005). Finding documents in a digital institutional repository: DSpace and Eprints. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 42, n.p.
Browsing tasks Not defined Olston, C., & Chi, E.H. (2003). ScentTrails: Integrating browsing and searching on the web. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(3), 177-197.
browsing tasks not defined Yuan, X., Zhang, X., & Trofimovsky, A. (2010). Testing visualization on the use of information systems. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 365-370.
browsing through a journal definition not provided Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
Category search task Not defined Urban, J., & Jose, J.M. (2005). Exploring results organisation for image searching. Proceedings of the IFIP TC13 International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (INTERACT '05). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3585, 958-961.
Cause and effect as well as a comparison This task contained cause and effect as well as a comparison; however, the need was expressed ambiguously (i.e., some areas) which left it open for the subject to interpret how much information was required. ( Sutcliffe, A. G., Ennis, M., & Watkinson, S. J. (2000). Empirical studies of end-user information searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(13), 1211-1231.
Challenging tasks Not defined Pharo, N. (2008). The effect of granularity and order in XML element retrieval. Information Processing & Management, 44(5), 1732-1740.
Citation Index n/a Bates, M. J. (1981). Search techniques. In M.E. Williams (Ed.), Annual review of information science and technology (pp. 139-169). New York: Knowledge Industry for American Society for Information Science.
Citation task "meant to simulate a situation in which a researcher has a very specific question whose answer is contained in a known reference." (p.305) Egan, D.E., Lesk, M.E., Ketchum, R.D., Lochbaum, C.C., Remde, J.R., Littman, M., & Landauer, T.K. (1991). Hypertext for the electronic library? CORE sample results. Proceedings of the Third Annual ACM Conference on Hypertext, 299-312.
class assignment "The subjects had to complete five assignments during the semester. Two of them were used as the tasks for the study; the first (Task A) in mid-semester, and the second (Task B) at the end of the semester. Task A was concerned with whether the ruins of Athens left an impression of inadequacy, and Task B examined attitudes toward competition and strife in Classical Greece. These tasks required the learners’ thoughtful and sustained examination of a given topic over an extended period of time using the Perseus application." (p.76) Yang, S. (1997). Information seeking as problem-solving using a qualitative approach to unfover the novice learners' information-seeking process in a perseus hypertext system. Library and Information Science Research, 19(1), 71-92.
class research project not defined He, J., Bron, M., & de Vries, A. P. (2013). Characterizing stages of a multi-session complex search task through direct and indirect query modifications. In Proceedings of the 36th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 897-900.
class researh project (naturalistic) not defined Bron, M., Gorp, J., Nack, F., Baltussen, L. B., & Rijke, M. (2013). Aggregated search interface preferences in multi-session search tasks. In Proceedings of the 36th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 123-132.
clinical practice definition not provided Hersh, W.R., Crabtree, M.K., Hickam, D.H., Sacherek, L., Friedman, C.P., & Tidmarsh, P. (2002). Factors associated with success in searching MEDLINE and applying evidence to answer clinical questions. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, 9, 283-293.
Clinical problem Each problem was accompanied by three to five specific questions. Generally, the questions asked for (a) the identification of the particular entity of interest (organism, disease, drug, or toxic agent); (b) particular information about the entity of interest; or (c) a candidate set of entities that related to the problem. Wildemuth, B., de Bliek, R., Friedman, C., & File, D. (1995). Medical students' personal knowledge, searching proficiency, and database user in problem solving. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 46, 590-607.
Clinical questions "To formulate standard searches, we chose six clinical problems, tow each dealing with issues in disease therapy, causation, and diagnosis."(p.812) Haynes, B., McKibbon, A., Walker, C., Mousseau, J., Baker, L., Fitzgerald, D., Guyall, G., & Norman, G. (1985). Computer searching of the medical literature: An evaluation of the MEDLINE searching systems. Annals of Internal Medicine, 103, 812-816.
Close-ended definition not provided Tu, Y., Shih, M., & Tsai, C. (2008). Eighth graders' web searching strategies and outcomes: The role of task types, web experiences and epistemological beliefs. Computers & Education, 51(3), 1142-1153.
Close-ended questions Not defined Marchionini, G., Dwiggins, S., Katz, A., & Lin, X. (1993) Information seeking in full-text end-user-oriented search systems: The roles of domain and search expertise. Library and Information Science Research, 15(1), 35-69.
Closed specified factual answer(s) Liu, J., Liu, C., Yuan, X., & Belkin, N.J. (2011). Understanding searchers' perception of task difficulty: Relationships with task type. ASIST Proceedings, n.p.
Closed Specified factual answer(s) Liu, J., Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., and Belkin, N. J. (2010). Can search systems detect users' task difficulty?: some behavioral signals. Proceeding of the 33rd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Geneva, Switzerland.
closed information search "the task focuses on finding a specific piece of information (closed)" (p. 861) Pu, H. (2010). User evaluation of textual results clustering for web search. Online Information Review, 34(6), 855 - 874.
Closed task "one task required students to find a fact... The task required students to combine three facets (concepts): place, activity, and time. This was termed a closed task." (p.57) Marchionini, G. (1989). Information-Seeking Strategies of Novices Using a Full-Text Electronic Encyclopedia. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 40(1), 54-66.
Closed task definition not provided Fidel, R., Davies, R.K., Douglass, M.H., Holder, J.K., Hopkins, C.J., Kushner, E.J., Miyagishima, B.K., & Toney, C.D. (1999). A visit to the information mall: Web searching behavior of high school students. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50, 24-37.
Closed task definition not provided Fidel, R., Davies, R.K., Douglass, M.H., Holder, J.K., Hopkins, C.J., Kushner, E.J., Miyagishima, B.K., & Toney, C.D. (1999). A visit to the information mall: Web searching behavior of high school students. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50, 24-37.
Closed, MultiStage, Implicit See general definition. Madden, A. D., Eaglestone, B., Ford, N. J., & Whittle, M. (2007). Search engines: a first step to finding information: preliminary findings from a study of observed searches. Information Research, 12(2).
closed/predictable definition not provided White, M.D., & Iivonen, M. (2001). Questions as a factor in Web search strategy. Information Processing & Management, 37, 721-740.
Closed/predictable source "Closed questions require exact answers, often brief facts; searchers have little discretion in judging correctness or in determining alternatives... With predictable source questions, searchers know or can guess with a high probability of success where relevant information can be found... In this study, a question is considered to have a predictable source if a specific proper name that can be readily associated with a Web site is included in the question." (p.211) White, M.D., & Iivonen, M. (2002). Assessing level of difficulty in Web search questions. Library Quarterly, 72(2), 205-233.
closed/unpredictable definition not provided White, M.D., & Iivonen, M. (2001). Questions as a factor in Web search strategy. Information Processing & Management, 37, 721-740.
Closed/unpredictable source "Closed questions require exact answers, often brief facts; searchers have little discretion in judging correctness or in determining alternatives... unpredictable source questions may require some searching to find appropriate sources, if they exist... In this study, a question is considered to have a predictable source if a specific proper name that can be readily associated with a Web site is included in the question." (p.211) White, M.D., & Iivonen, M. (2002). Assessing level of difficulty in Web search questions. Library Quarterly, 72(2), 205-233.
Collaborative academic tasks "the tasks involved in preparing for group projects and for co-authored research papers" (p.621). He, D., Wu, D., Yue, Z., Fu, A., & Vo, K.T.. (2012). Undergraduate students' interaction with online information resources in their academic tasks. Aslib Proceedings: New Information Perspectives, 64(6), 615-640.
collaborative exploratory search not defined Gonzalez-Ibanez, R., Haseki, M. & Shah, C. (2012). Time and space in collaborative information seeking: The clash of effectiveness and uniqueness. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49(1): 1-10.
collaborative exploratory search "people work together to conduct searches and collect documents related to a shared information need." (p. 1) Capra, R., Chen, A. T., Hawthorne, K., Arguello, J., Shaw, L. & Marchionini, G. (2012). Design and evaluation of a system to support collaborative search. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49(1), 1-10.
collaborative exploratory search not defined Yue, Z., Han, S. & He, D. (2012). An investigation of search processes in collaborative exploratory web search. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49(1), 1-4.
Collaborative Information Retrieval "...team members collaborate during various processes of information retrieval. We understand CIR to be any activity that collectively resolves an information problem taken by members of a workteam, regardless of the nature of the actual retrieval of information." page 236 Fidel, R., Bruce, H., Pejtersen, A. M, Dumais, S., Grudin, J., Poltrock, S. (2000). Collaborative Information Retrieval (CIR). New Review of Information Behaviour Research: Studies of Information Seeking in Context, 1(1), 235-247.
Collaborative search Allowing a team of searchers to find relevant information Pickens, J., Golovchinsky, G., Shah, C., Qvarfordt, P., & Back, M. (2008). Algorithmic mediation for collaborative exploratory search. Proceedings of the 31st Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 315-322.
Combination "contained one subtopic involving both textual and visual information" (p.1682) Albertson, D., & Meadows, C., III. (2011). Situated topic complexity in interactive video retrieval. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 62(9), 1676-1695.
Combination search task Consisted of one subtask, which involved both textual and visual information (243) Albertson, D. (2010). Analyzing user interaction with the ViewFinder video retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(2), 238-252.
Combined Controlled and Natural Language Controlled Language and Natural Language combined (p. 5) Cleverdon, C. W. (1977). A comparative evaluation of searching by controlled language and natural language in an experimental NASA database. European Space Agency, Space Documentation Service. Draft Report.
Combined known item and data element search Not defined Skov, M. (2009). The Reinvented Museum: Exploring Information Seeking Behaviour in a Digital Museum Context. PhD thesis, Royal School of Library and Information Science, Denmark. pure.iva.dk/ws/files/30768221/MetteSkovThesis.pdf
Combo-complex "contained more than one subtopic involving both textual and visual information" (p.1682) Albertson, D., & Meadows, C., III. (2011). Situated topic complexity in interactive video retrieval. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 62(9), 1676-1695.
Combo-complex search task Consisted of more than one subtask, involved both textual and visual information (243) Albertson, D. (2010). Analyzing user interaction with the ViewFinder video retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(2), 238-252.
Communications "communicating with others" (p.1190) MacKay, B., & Watters, C. (2012). An examination of multisession web tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63(6), 1183-1197.
Community browsing Examining bookmarks created by the community by time (recent bookmarks,), by frequency (most popular sites bookmarked), by people, and by tags. (p.28) Millen, D., Yang, M., Whittaker, S., & Feinberg, J. (2007). Social bookmarking and exploratory search. ECSCW '07: Proceedings of the 10th European Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, 21-40.
Comparative search "The user has to look for information regarding an interaction between two phenomena." (p.1009) Ceaparu, I., & Shneiderman, B. (2004). Finding governmental statistical data on the Web: A study of categorically organized links for the FedStats topics page. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 55(11), 1008-1015.
Comparing "comparing is a behavior of using some information ...and examining another entity in relationship to it according to some criterion." Page 67 Hert, C. A. (1997). Understanding Information Retrieval Interactions: Theoretical and Practical Implications: Ablex.
Comparison tasks Not defined Pharo, N., & Nordlie, R. (2005). Context matters: An analysis of assessments of XML documents. In Crestani, F., & Ruthven, I. (eds.), Context: Nature, Impact and Role (5th International Conference on Conceptions of Library and Information Sciences, CoLIS 2005, Glasgow, UK, June 4-8, 2005. Proceedings). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3507, 238-248. Springer.
Comparison tasks "There are a number of topics whose subject is along the lines of: 'Find differences between X and Y'." (p.412) Tombros, A., Larsen, B., & Malik, S. (2004). The interactive track at INEX 2004. In Fuhr, N., Lalmas, M., Malik, S., & Szlavik, Z. (eds.), Advances in XML Information Retrieval (Third International Workshop of the Initiative for the Evaluation of XML Retrieval, INEX 2004, Dagstuhl Castle, Germany, December 6-8, 2004, Revised Selected Papers). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3493, 410-423. Springer.
Complex "contained multiple subtopics, all of which based on textual or visual information alone" (p.1682) Albertson, D., & Meadows, C., III. (2011). Situated topic complexity in interactive video retrieval. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 62(9), 1676-1695.
complex "The complex problems generally dealt with uncommon conditions, required many answers, and were more ill-defined" (p.13). Sharit, J., Hernandez, M.A., Czaja, S.J., & Pirolli, P. (2008). Investigating the roles of knowledge and cognitive abilities in older adult information seeking on the Web. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 15(1).
complex "complex tasks required two or more indexes and one or more Boolean operators" (p. 53) Borgman, C.L. (1986). The user's mental model of an information retrieval system: an experiment on a prototype online catalog. International Journal of Man-Machine Studies, 24(l), 47-64.
Complex "Complex tasks are ill structured and their performance cannot be determined in advance. They typically consist of several subtasks and phases." pp. 541 Vakkari, P., & Hakala, N. (2000). Changes in relevance criteria and problems stages in task performance. Journal of Documentation, 56(5), 540-562.
Complex and General "The specificity was defined on the basis of the hierarchical level of the search request and the complexity on the basis ofthe llumbers of concepts in the search request." (102) Iivonen, M. (1995) Factors lowering the consistency in online searching. In Raitt, D.I., & Jeapes, B. (Eds.), Online information 95: Proceedings of 19th international online information meeting (pp. 101-107). Oxford: Learned Information Ltd.
Complex and General " According to Saracevic et al. (1987, p. 14), the specificity of search request means “the hierarchical level in the meaning of terms and ultimately the whole request,”and the complexity of search requests means “the number of search concepts, their modifiers and/or constraints in a request.” Iivonen, M. (1995). Consistency in the selection of search concepts and search terms. Information Processing & Management, 31, 173-190.
Complex and Specific "The specificity was defined on the basis of the hierarchical level of the search request and the complexity on the basis ofthe llumbers of concepts in the search request." (102) Iivonen, M. (1995) Factors lowering the consistency in online searching. In Raitt, D.I., & Jeapes, B. (Eds.), Online information 95: Proceedings of 19th international online information meeting (pp. 101-107). Oxford: Learned Information Ltd.
Complex and Specific Complex = more than 3 concepts " According to Saracevic et al. (1987, p. 14), the specificity of search request means “the hierarchical level in the meaning of terms and ultimately the whole request,”and the complexity of search requests means “the number of search concepts, their modifiers and/or constraints in a request.” Iivonen, M. (1995). Consistency in the selection of search concepts and search terms. Information Processing & Management, 31, 173-190.
complex browsing tasks "Complex-browsing tasks were those in which the task phrasing did not contain match words to the bookshelf topic headings." (p.732) Hirsh, S.G. (1997). How do children find information on different types of tasks? Children's use of the Science Library Catalog. Library Trends, 45(4), 725-745.
Complex Browsing, Complex Keyword “Complex-Browsing tasks were those in which the task phrasing did not contain match words to the bookshelf topic headings.” (p.88) “The size of the Keyword search results sets served as the basis for the keyword task complexity measure in this study. Searches that yielded lengthy results sets (i.e., greater than 10 headings) were considered complex-keyword topics and search which yielded 10 or fewer headings were considered simple-keyword topics.” (p.90) Hirsh, S.G. (1996). The effect of domain knowledge on elementary school children, information retrieval behavior on an automated library catalog. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Department ofLibrary and Information Science, University of California, Los Angeles.
Complex Browsing, Simple Keyword “Complex-Browsing tasks were those in which the task phrasing did not contain match words to the bookshelf topic headings.” (p.88) “The size of the Keyword search results sets served as the basis for the keyword task complexity measure in this study. Searches that yielded lengthy results sets (i.e., greater than 10 headings) were considered complex-keyword topics and search which yielded 10 or fewer headings were considered simple-keyword topics.” (p.90) Hirsh, S.G. (1996). The effect of domain knowledge on elementary school children, information retrieval behavior on an automated library catalog. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Department ofLibrary and Information Science, University of California, Los Angeles.
Complex close ended "The fuzzier the description, the more complex the task" (p.1035). Complex tasks had one exact and two fuzzy clues. "Close-ended tasks ask users to find one specific item based on some specific information, such as author, title, or publisher, and there is only one absolutely correct answer" (p.1035). Niu, X., & Hemminger, B. (2015). Analyzing the interaction patterns in a faceted search interface. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(5), 1030-1047.
Complex Criteria "The second search task (complex criteria) also asked participants to find a single, factual answer... but contained specific criteria, such as date, price, travel, that had to be met to satisfy the answer. In this search topic there may be several answers fitting the criteria but each possible answer has to be assessed against the range of criteria given in the task." (37-38) Poddar, A., & Ruthven, I. (2010). The emotional impact of search tasks. In Proceeding of the third symposium on information interaction in context. (35-44). New York, NY: ACM.
complex difficult complexity defined by number of facets (3); difficulty defined by the unlikelihood of their being any relevant documents to be retrieved (p. 746) Ford, N., Miller, D., Moss, N. (2005). Web search strategies and human individual differences: cognitive and demographic factors, Internet attitudes, and approaches. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 56(7), 741-756.
complex easy complexity defined by number of facets; difficulty defined by the likelihood of their being any relevant documents to be retrieved (p. 745-746) Ford, N., Miller, D., Moss, N. (2005). Web search strategies and human individual differences: cognitive and demographic factors, Internet attitudes, and approaches. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 56(7), 741-756.
Complex exploratory search task "The third search task (Task 3) simulated a complex situation where the participants were asked to go to a place which was known to at least one of the teammates, and several travel conditions, such as accommodation, weather, and budget, needed to be satisfied concurrently." (p.2289) Arif, A.S.M., Du, J.T., & Lee, I. (2015). Understanding tourists' collaborative information retrieval behavior to inform design. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(11), 2285-2303.
complex factual retrieval "requiring the use of more than one [encyclopedia] article to answer the question, creative insight that would suggest possible keywords to search, or narrowing of an initially high retrieval rate" [p. 258] Edyburn, D.L. (1988). Examining the successful retrieval of information by students using online databases. School Library Media Quarterly, 16, 256-259.
Complex individual academic tasks "preparing for class assignments, preparing for a research paper, and preparing for an exam" (p.621) He, D., Wu, D., Yue, Z., Fu, A., & Vo, K.T.. (2012). Undergraduate students' interaction with online information resources in their academic tasks. Aslib Proceedings: New Information Perspectives, 64(6), 615-640.
complex keyword tasks "Searches that yielded lengthy results sets(i.e., greater than ten headings) were considered complex-keyword topics." (p.733) Hirsh, S.G. (1997). How do children find information on different types of tasks? Children's use of the Science Library Catalog. Library Trends, 45(4), 725-745.
Complex Lookup (multiple facet) "In general, a lookup task involves finding a specific fact or an answer to a precisely defined question .... In our study, lookup tasks were further divided into two groups based on complexity. The complexity of lookup tasks was determined by three contributing factors: 1) the number of facets to be combined to get the target page, 2) the extent to which a higher level thinking (rather than simple recognition) such as comparing pages in the result set is required, 3) the navigation path to a target BLS web page." (p.445) Capra, R., Marchionini, G., Oh, J. S., Stutzman, F., & Zhang, Y. (2007). Effects of structure and interaction style on distinct search tasks. Paper presented at the JCDL 2007: Proceedings of the 7th ACM/IEEE Joint Conference on Digital Libraries, Vancouver, B.C.
Complex multisession task "A task likely to span multiple sessions in real-life circumstances" (p.2241) Sahib, N.G., Tombros, A., & Stockman, T. (2015). Evaluating a search interface for visually impaired searchers. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(11), 2235-2248.
Complex open ended "The fuzzier the description, the more complex the task" (p.1035). Complex tasks had one exact and two fuzzy clues. "For the open-ended tasks, users find three items on a particular topic. There might be more than three correct items" (p.1035). Niu, X., & Hemminger, B. (2015). Analyzing the interaction patterns in a faceted search interface. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(5), 1030-1047.
Complex retrieval "Complex retrieval tasks also involved finding leaf nodes, but involved either some ambiguity and lack of familiarity or a degree of depth in the hierarchy." (p.30) Pirolli, P., Card, S., Van Der Wege, M. (2001). The effects of information scent on visual search in the hyperbolic tree browser. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(1), 20-53.
Complex retrieval "Complex retrieval tasks also involved finding leaf nodes, but involved either some ambiguity and lack of familiarity or a degree of depth in the hierarchy." (p.30) Pirolli, P., Card, S.K., & van der Wege, M.M. (2003). The effects of information scent on visual search in the Hyperbolic Tree Browser. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(1), 20-53.
Complex retrieval task "An additional, quite complex task" (p.166) Stein, A. (1997). Usability and assessments of multimodal interaction in the SPEAK! system: An experimental case study. New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia, 3(1), 159-180.
Complex Search Task "We define complex search tasks as those that require multiple steps to achieve the answer—searchers must break the task into smaller pieces to succeed" (p.175). Foss, E., Druin, A., Yip, J., Ford, W., Golub, E., & Hutchinson, H. (2013). Adolescent search roles. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 64(1), 173-189.
Complex search task "This is the name we give to a search task that is designed to be complex in nature, requiring the searcher to break the task into smaller pieces that the search engine could process. However, each of these smaller pieces could themselves be a simple search, not requiring advanced query formation techniques" (p.560). Foss, E., Druin, A., Brewer, R., Lo, P., Sanchez, L., Golub, E., & Hutchinson, H. (2012). Children's search roles at home: Implications for designers, researchers, educators, and parents.Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63(3), 558-573.
Complex search task "A complex search is defined as a multistep, interactive and time-consuming process. It is not answerable with one query, instead requiring the searcher to aggregate and synthesize information from more than one (usually many) retrieved Web page or document. A complex search task is defined as one that leads to a complex search activity." (p.348) Singer, G., Norbisrath, U., & Lewandowski, D. (2013). Ordinary search engine users carrying out complex search tasks. Journal of Information Science, 39(3), 346-358.
Complex search task "Lack of structure in search task definition. Include task characteristics such as uncertainty and vagueness. Lack of prior knowledge on search domain. Require several search iterations. Information from multiple sources has to be aggregated. Involve a decision-making stage after relevant information has been compared and analyzed." (p.381) Sahib, N. G., Tombros, A., & Stockman, T. (2012). A comparative analysis of the information‐seeking behavior of visually impaired and sighted searchers. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology,63(2), 377-391.
Complex search task Consisted of multiple subtasks, all of which based on textual or visual information alone (243) Albertson, D. (2010). Analyzing user interaction with the ViewFinder video retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(2), 238-252.
Complex search task Not defined Han, H. (2018). Children's help-seeking behaviors and effects of domain knowledge in using Google and Kids.gov: Query formulation and results evaluation stages. Library & Information Science Research, 40(3), 208-218.
Complex Task "A complex task is an open-ended question. The desired information is less clear, and the answer to a complex task is often located on multiple pages. High-level cognitive activities, such as information comparing, interpreting, and synthesizing, are required to tackle a complex task." (p.110). Zhang, Y. (2012). The impact of task complexity on people's mental models of MedlinePlus. Information Processing & Management, 48(1), 107.
complex task "They were provided with an hour to work with a bibliographic database service, and were then required to search for resources on a complex four-concept task" Debowski, S. (2001). Wrong way: Go back! An exploration of novice search behaviours while conducting an information search. The Electronic Library, 19, 371-382.
complex tasks "Complex tasks are those in which the task phrasing does not contain match words to the bookshelf headings." (p.49) Hirsh, S.G. (1996). Complexity of Search Tasks and Children's Information Retrieval. ASIS '96 Proceedings, 47-51.
Complex tasks "Complexity was assessed on the basis of the knowledge the shadowees had when beginning each task on the tools/services to be used on the task, the protocol to be used (‘know how’) and on the assumed outcome of the task... If one or none were known, the task was complex." (p.97) Kumpulainen, S., & Jarvelin, K. (2010). Information interaction in molecular medicine: Integrated use of multiple channels. Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context (IIiX '10), 95-104.
Complex tasks "Complex tasks... are formulated in a way that the users have enough context to comprehend the task situation but the tasks are still characterized by uncertainty and ambiguity. There is no single correct answer retrievable and the required information is spread over various documents (web sites). Fulfilling the task typically requires issuing multiple queries, aggregating information from various sources and synthesizing the information into a single solution document." (p.112) Singer, G., Norbisrath, U., & Lewandowski, D. (2012). Ordinary search engine users assessing difficulty, effort, and outcome for simple and complex search tasks. Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context (IIiX) Symposium, 110-119.
Complex, exploratory topic-research tasks "The following criteria [were used] for designing CIS tasks that require collaborative sensemaking: •• Objective—the findings will be used to create a shared understanding, make a decision, or produce a knowledge product/representation; •• Information need—the target information will be uncertain and vague, ill-structured, multifaceted, or have a low level of specificity; •• Information-seeking process—results gathering will require multiple search sessions and multiple information sources, or will involve learning, investigation, and discovery; and •• Topic—participants will lack prior knowledge of subject matter." (p.40) Tao, Y., & Tombros, A.(2014). Investigating collaborative sensemaking behavior in collaborative information seeking. IEEE Computer, 47(3), 38-45.
Complexity level 1 "Complexity level 1 are tasks where the tasks are almost completely a priori determinable. It is generally clear what information is required, how to find the information and how to assess relevance. However, some parts of the search process or information needed may be vague." Bell, D. & Ruthven, I. (2004). Searcher's assessments of task complexity for Web searching. In Advances in Information Retrieval, 26th European Conference on IR Research, ECIR 2004 (pp. 57-71).
Complexity level 2 "Complexity level 2 are tasks in which the desired information may be clear, however the searcher must make case-by-case decisions regarding the inputs and search process." Bell, D. & Ruthven, I. (2004). Searcher's assessments of task complexity for Web searching. In Advances in Information Retrieval, 26th European Conference on IR Research, ECIR 2004 (pp. 57-71).
Complexity level 3 "Complexity level 3 are the most complex tasks. In this type of task the whole search may be unclear from the start, i.e. it is unclear what information is being sought, how to obtain relevant information and how the searcher will know they have found relevant information." Bell, D. & Ruthven, I. (2004). Searcher's assessments of task complexity for Web searching. In Advances in Information Retrieval, 26th European Conference on IR Research, ECIR 2004 (pp. 57-71).
comprehension "extract certain facts from the presentations" (p.394) Merlino, A., & Maybury, M. (1999). An empirical study of the optimal presentation of multimedia summaries of broadcast news. In Mani, I., & Maybury, M.T. (Eds.), Advances in Automatic Text Summarization (pp. 391-401). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
concepts that are difficult to search definition not provided Woelfl, N. (1984). Individual differences in online search behavior: The effect of learning styles and cognitive abilities on process and outcome. Unpblished doctoral dissertation, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH.
Conceptual / abstract n/a Westman, S., Lustila, A., and Oittinen, P. (2008). Search strategies in multimodal image retrieval. Proceedings of the second international symposium on Information interaction in context (London, United Kingdom), 13-20.
conceptualist search "modifies a retrieved set by changing the meaning of the concept it represents" (212) Fidel, R. (1984). Online searching styles: A case-study based model of online searching behavior. Journal of the American Society of Information Science, 35, 211-221.
Conditioned viewing "The individual directs viewing to information about selected topics or to certain types of information. The overall purpose is to evaluate the significance of the information encountered in order to assess the general nature of the impact on the organization. The individual has isolated a number of areas of potential concern from undirected viewing, and is now sensitized to assess the significance of developments in those areas." (p.6) Choo, C. W., Detlor, B., & Turnbull, D. (2000). Information seeking on the Web - an integrated model of browsing and searching. First Monday, 5(2). http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/729/638.
configure browser add bookmark, set helpers, change cache size, and window management-- scroll or resize window Byrne, M.D., John, B.E., Wehrle, N.S., & Crow, D.C. (1999). The tangled Web we wove: A taskonomy of WWW use. CHI Proceedings, 544-551.
Conjunctive (AND) definition not provided Mead, S.E., Sit, R.A., Rogers, W.A., Jamieson, B.A., & Rousseau, G.K. (2000). Influences of general computer experience and age on library database search performance. Behaviour & Information Technology, 19(2), 107-124.
Conscious topical information need "You would like to find information about a topic you are familiar with" (p.497) Borlund, P., & Dreier, S. (2014). An investigation of the search behaviour associated with Ingwersen's three types of information needs. Information Processing & Management, 50(4), 493-507.
Conscious topical information need "You would like to find information about a topic you are familiar with" (p.187) Borlund, P., Dreier, S., & Bystrom, K. (2012). What does time spent on searching indicate? Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context (IIiX), 184-193.
Construct an understanding "The question as well as the answer is very elaborate and the source of information to be searched is not clear from the context." (p.1009) Ceaparu, I., & Shneiderman, B. (2004). Finding governmental statistical data on the Web: A study of categorically organized links for the FedStats topics page. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 55(11), 1008-1015.
consumer task/business task The task resembled both a consumer task involving relatively infrequent, high-value decisions (e.g., major purchases or vacation planning) as well as a business task where a number of websites/online databases need to be consulted in order to select the best alternative from a group of similar choices. Taylor, N. J., Dennis, A. R. & Cummings, J. W. (2013). Situation normality and the shape of search: The effects of time delays and information presentation on search behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 64(5): 909-928.
Content creation task "Subjects were asked to find information on an assigned topic and then write up a paragraph in a Word document. Subjects were given... up to 20 minutes for each content creation task." (p.10) Rieh, S.Y. (2014). Credibility assessment of online information in context. Journal of Information Science Theory and Practice, 2(3), 6-17.
Content only topics Not defined Malik, S., Klas, C.-P., Fuhr, N., Larsen, B., & Tombros, A. (2006). Designing a user interface for interactive retrieval of structured documents -- Lessons learned from the INEX interactive track. Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries. Springer. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4172, 291-302.
controlled language "At each centre the staff would be responsible for obtaining ten search questions from scientific or technical staff...It was required that for each question there should be two searches made by different people. The pattern of searches would reflect the four modes in which they were to be carried out, namely with Controlled Language index terms, Natural Language searching on words in the title and abstract, Controlled Language and Natural Language combined and, finally, Natural Language also making use of the Associated Concepts File." (p. 5) Cleverdon, C. W. (1977). A comparative evaluation of searching by controlled language and natural language in an experimental NASA database. European Space Agency, Space Documentation Service. Draft Report.
Controlled Vocabulary ...one searches on the descriptors and identifiers that are assigned to each record by the data· base compilers. Bates, M. J. (1981). Search techniques. In M.E. Williams (Ed.), Annual review of information science and technology (pp. 139-169). New York: Knowledge Industry for American Society for Information Science.
Copy Editing "CPE is a Factual Product, because facts have to be identified; it is at the Segment Level, because items within a document need to be found; it has the Specific Goal of confirming facts; it has Low Objective Complexity because only three facts need to be confirmed." (p.72) Liu, J., Cole, M., Liu, C., Bierig, R., Gwizdka, J., Belkin, N., Zhang, J., Zhang, X. (2010). Search behaviors in different task types. In Proceedings of the 10th annual joint conference on digital libraries (69-78.) New York, NY: ACM.
Copy Editing (CPE) not defined Liu, J., Liu, C., & Belkin, N. (2013). Examining the effects of task topic familiarity on searchers' behaviors in different task types. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 50, Article No. 38.
Copy Editing (CPE) CPE is a Factual Product, because facts have to be identified. It is at the Segment Level, because items within a document need to be found. It has the Specific Goal of confirming facts, but is Low Complexity because only three facts need to be confirmed. It is Named because the search targets are specified. Cole, M.J., Gwizdka, J., Liu, C., & Belkin, N.J. (2011). Dynamic assessment of inforamtion acquisition effort during interactive search. ASIST Proceedings, n.p.
Create "Putting elements together to form a coherent or functional whole; reorganizing elements into a new pattern or structure through generating, planning, or producing." (p.255) Wu, W., Kelly, D., Edwards, A., & Arguello, J. (2012). Grannies, tanning beds, tattoos and NASCAR: Evaluation of search tasks with varying levels of cognitive complexity. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium (254-257). New York, NY: ACM.
Creating Putting elements together to form a coherent or functional whole; reorganizing elements into a new pattern or structure through generating, planning, or producing (Table 2); Scenario must have participant formulate, generate, restructure, or combine information in a novel way (Table 3) Jansen, B.J., Booth, D., & Smith, B. (2009). Using the taxonomy of cognitive learning to model online searching. Information Processing & Management, 45(6), 643-663.
cross-referencing search uses a cross-reference suggested by the online catalog to find related records to the initial search Sit, R. A. (1998). Online library catalog search performance by older adult users. Library & Information Science Research, 20(2), 115-131.
Data element Not defined Skov, M., & Ingwersen, P. (2008). Exploring information seeking behaviour in a digital museum context. Proceedings of the Second International Symposium on Information Interaction in Context (IIiX), 110-115.
Data element search Not defined Skov, M. (2009). The Reinvented Museum: Exploring Information Seeking Behaviour in a Digital Museum Context. PhD thesis, Royal School of Library and Information Science, Denmark. pure.iva.dk/ws/files/30768221/MetteSkovThesis.pdf
Data exploration and analysis tasks "require users to understand and make sense of the information collection." (p. 61) Fagan, J.C. (2010). Usability studies of faceted browsing: A literature review. Information Technology and Libraries, 29(2), 58-66.
Data Gathering Pharo, N., & Nordlie, R. (2012). Examining the effect of task stage and topic knowledge on searcher interaction with a "digital bookstore".In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium (4-11). New York, NY: ACM.
Database change switching databases to search for and retrieve appropriate records Sit, R. A. (1998). Online library catalog search performance by older adult users. Library & Information Science Research, 20(2), 115-131.
Database search None Wood, R. E., George-Falvy, J., & Debowski, S. (2001). Motivation and information search on complex tasks. In M. Erez, U. Kleinbeck & H. Thierry (Eds.), Work Motivation in the Context of a Globalizing Economy (pp. 27-48). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Deciding "Seeking information with the goal of identifying and comparing alternatives in order to determine a course of action" (p.3) Fruend, L. & Berzowska, J. (2010) The Goldilocks Effect: Task-Centred Assessments of E-Government Information. In Proceedings of the 73rd ASIS&T Annual Meeting on Navigating Streams in an Information Ecosystem. New York, NY: ACM.
Decision making "The objective is to select the best option among alternatives" (p.462) Balatsoukas, P., & Demian, P. (2010). Effects of granularity of search results on the relevance judgment behavior of engineers: Building systems for retrieval and understanding of context. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(3), 453-467.
Decision Making The objective is to select a course of action from among multiple alternatives Toms, E.G., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., Toze, S., Dawe, E., & MacNutt, A. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. In Focused Access to XML Documents, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4862, (pp. 359-372).
Decision making n/a Larsen, B., Malik, S., & Tombros, A. (2008). A comparison of interactive and ad-hoc relevance assessments. Lecture Notes in Computer science, 4862, 348-358.
Decision making The objective is to select a course of action from among multiple alternatives Malik, S., Tombros, A., & Larsen, B. (2007). The Interactive Track at INEX 2006. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4518, 387-399.
Decision making task "This task asked participants to make a decision about a topic. In our experiment, participants were asked to find the best Hi-Fi speakers available in a target price. Participants were encouraged to compare the speakers’ details in the decision making." (p.306) Joho, H., & Jose, J.M. (2006). A comparative study of the effectiveness of search result presentation on the Web. Advances in Information Retrieval. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3936, 302-313.
Decision making tasks "The tasks used were decision-making tasks that required one to make a decision between two options based on a set of criteria" (p.17) Toms, E., Villa, R., & McCay-Peet, L. (2013). How is a search system used in work task completion? Journal of Information Science, 39(1), 15-25.
Decision Making, Hierarchical Decision Making: "The objective is to select a course of action from among multiple alternatives"; Hierarchical: "The search uses a single concept for which multiple attributes or characteristics are sought; this is a depth search, that is, a single topic explored more widely" (p.362) Toms, E., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., & Toze, S. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. Workshop Pre-Proceedings in Initiative for the Evaluation of XML Retrieval (pp. 359-372).
Decision Making, Parallel Decision Making: "The objective is to select a course of action from among multiple alternatives"; Parallel: "The search uses multiple concepts that exist on the same level in a conceptual hierarchy; this is a breadth search" (p.362) Toms, E., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., & Toze, S. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. Workshop Pre-Proceedings in Initiative for the Evaluation of XML Retrieval (pp. 359-372).
Decision search N/A White, R; Ruthven, I; Jose, JM. (2001). Web document summarisation: a task-oriented evaluation. 12th Interdisciplinary Workshop on Database and Expert Systems Applications, Proceedings: 951-955. edited by Tjoa, AM; Wagner, RR. presented at 12th International Conference on Database and Expert Systems Applications (DEXA) in Munich, Germany, Sep 03-07, 2001.
Decision search Not defined White, R., Jose, J.M., & Ruthven, I. (2001). Query-biased web page summarisation: A task-oriented evaluation. Proceedings of the 24th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 412-413.
Decision search "finding information about the 'best' impressionist art museum in Rome, Italy" (p.718) White, R. W., Jose, J. M., & Ruthven, I. (2003). A task-oriented study on the influencing effects of query-biased summarisation in web searching. Information Processing & Management, 39(5), 707-734
decision search definition not provided White, R. W. (2004). Implicit feedback for interactive information retrieval (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Department of Computing Science Faculty of Computing Science, Mathematics and Statistics University of Glasgow, Scotland.
decision search definition not provided White, RW., Jose, JM., & Ruthven, I. 2005. Using top-ranking sentences for facilitate effective information access. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 56(10): 1113-1125.
Decision search Example: choosing the best financial instrument (p.178) White, RW., Jose, JM., & Ruthven, I. (2006). An implicit feedback approach for interactive information retrieval. Information Processing & Management 42(1), 166-190.
decision search "The decision search...forced subjects to make a qualitative decision on the information they retrieved." (5) White, R., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J. (2002). Finding relevant documents using top-ranking sentences: an evaluation of two alternative schemes. In Proceedings of the 25th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference (SIGIR 2002).
Decision task "In this task the participants had to gather information and make a decision based on the information found while searching. The participants, in this case, were asked to decide on the best hi-fi speakers available in their own price range." (p.331) Tombros, A., Ruthven, I. and Jose, J.M. (2005). How users assess web pages for information-seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 56(4), 327-344.
Decision task "subjects were asked to decide on the best hi-fi speakers available in their own price range" (p.385) Tombros, A., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J.M. (2003). Searchers' criteria for assessing Web pages. Proceedings of the 26th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 385-386.
decision tasks not defined Coiera, E. W. & Vickland, V. (2008). Is Relevance Relevant? User Relevance Ratings May Not Predict the Impact of Internet Search on Decision Outcomes. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, 15(4), 542-545.
Decision-making task "This task asked participants to make a decision about a topic. In our experiment, participants were asked to find the best Hi-Fi speakers available in a target price. Participants were encouraged to compare the speakers’ details in the decision making process. Task 1 and 2 were based on the descriptions originally proposed by [White, Jose, and Ruthven (2005)]." (p.84) Joho, H., Birbeck, R.D., & Jose, J.M. (2007). An ostensive browsing and searching on the web. Proceedings of the 2nd International Workshop on Context-Based Information Retrieval, 81-92.
Decision-making task "This task asked participants to make a decision about a topic." [p. 230] Joho, H., & Jose, J. M. (2008). Effectiveness of additional representations for the search result presentation on the web. Information Processing and Management, 44, 226-241.
definition search not defined Mu, X., Lu, K., & Ryu, H. (2014). Explicitly integrating MeSH thesaurus help into health information retrieval systems: An empirical user study. Information Processing & Management, 50(1): 24-40
Dependant Hierarchical task, where the search uses a single concept for which multiple attributes or characteristics are sought. Liu, J. and Belkin, N. (2010). Personalizing information retrieval for multi-session tasks: the roles of task stage and task type. Proceeding of the 33rd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Geneva, Switzerland.
Dependent task A task in which "the accomplishment of some subtask depends on that of others" (p.64) Liu, J., & Belkin, N.J. (2015). Personalizing information retrieval for multi-session tasks: Examining the roles of task stage, task type, and topic knowledge on the interpretation of dwell time as an indicator of document usefulness. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(1), 58-81.
dependent task (DT) not defined Liu, J. & Belkin, N. J. (2011). Search task difficulty: the expected vs. the reflected. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 1183-1184.
Describing task Write a description of an image Fidel, R. (1997). The image retrieval task: Implications for the design and evaluation of image databases. New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia, 3, 181-199.
Descriptor search Not specified Dimitroff, A., Wolfram, D., & Volz, A. (1996). Affective response and retrieval performance: Analysis of contributing factors. Library & Information Science Research, 18(2), 121-132.
Design task Not defined Urban, J., & Jose, J.M. (2005). Exploring results organisation for image searching. Proceedings of the IFIP TC13 International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (INTERACT '05). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3585, 958-961.
Details search "Participants searched for factual information in chapters and articles. The results of this type of search were used as content for the research paper." (p. 132) Bowler, L. (2009). Genres of search: A concept for understanding successive search behavior. Canadian Journal of Information Science, 33(3), 119-140.
DH, Decision/Solution, High objective task complexity Product: intellectual versus decision/solution Objective complexity: low, moderate, or high Li, Y., & Belkin, N.J. (2010). An exploration of the relationships between work task and interactive information search behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(9), 1771-1789.
Diagnosis/Symptoms n/a Lopes, C., & Ribeiro, C. (2010). Context Effect on Query Formulation and Subjective Relevance in Health Searches. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 205-214). New York, NY: ACM.
difficult Those questions answered correctly by <25% of study participants who attempted them Ageev, M., Guo, Q., Lagun, D., & Agichtein, E. (2011). Find it if you can: A game for modeling different types of Web search success using interaction data. Proceedings of the 34th International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 345-354.
difficult "designed to be difficult to solve with a search engine since the answer was not easily found on a single page" (p.36) Feild, H. A., Allan, J., & Jones, R. (2010). Predicting searcher frustration. Proceedings of the 33rd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 34-41.
Difficult Internet queries "“hard” queries, that is, queries whereby it is difficult to a priori formulate query terms in response to an information need" (127) Dennis, S., Bruza, P., & McArthur, R. (2002). Web searching: a progress-oriented experimental study of three interactive search paradigms. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(2), 120-133.
Difficult queries "queries that had synonyms to link wording. Although their search times were long, subjects were able to answer them." (p.1258) Fraser, L., & Locatis, C. (2001). Effects of link annotations on search performance in layered and unlayered hierarchically organized information spaces. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 52(14), 1255-1261.
Difficult search task "... formulated in non-official terms requiring term-refinement process, use of Thesaurus and/or employment of subject area knowledge as well a fair understanding of indexing principles and system capabilities." Maidenberg, E. (1991). Expertise in online information retrieval (Doctoral dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles, 1991). Dissertation Abstracts International, 52, 3225A.
Difficult search task "We selected 20 topics by ranking the topics using normalized discounted cumulated gain (nDCG) [3] at depth 50 for queries that were collected from subjects in a prior study [4] that used all 50 topics... The nDCG values were averaged for each topic and topics were sorted into four bins: easy, medium, moderate, and difficult" (p.812). Bailey, E.W., Kelly, D., & Gyllstrom, K. (2009). Undergraduates' evaluations of assigned search topics. Proceedings 32nd Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 812-813.
Difficult simulated search task ...difficult search task is general, complex and unclear... Sihvonen, A., & Vakkari, P. (2004). Subject knowledge improves interactive query expansion assisted by a thesaurus. Journal of Documentation, 60(6), 673-690.
Difficult task High difficulty; A factual task or an intellectual task with ill-defined information needs: (1) searching sophisticated foreign academic databases to create academic products or make solutions via advanced search strategies, such as using operators; or (2) using virtualization tools (like Google Maps) to solve complex daily- life problems, requiring multifaceted information browse and evaluation steps, with more than eight total search path. (p.363) Ding, R., & Ma, F. (2013). Assessment of university student web searching competency by a task-based online test: A case study at Wuhan University, China. The Electronic Library, 31(3), 359-375.
Difficult task "The topics were selected based on their difficulty levels, which were determined by retrieval performance using the topic titles as queries in our search system." (p.1315) Liu, J., Liu, C., Cole, M., Belkin, N.J., & Zhang, X. (2012). Exploring and predicting search task difficulty. Proceedings of the 21st ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management, 1313-1322.
Difficult tasks Not defined Aula, A., Khan, R., & Guan, Z. (2010). How does search behavior change as search becomes more difficult? In Proceedings of the 28th international conference on human factors in computing systems (35-44) New York, NY: ACM.
Difficulty level 1 "Searching for scientific publications which discuss a topic defined by a scientific term and have been published during a certain period of time." (p.6) Leichner, N., Peter, J., Maher, A.-K., & Krampen, G. (2014). Assessing information literacy using information search tasks. Journal of Information Literacy, 8(1), 3-20.
Difficulty level 2 "Searching for scientific publications discussing an issue which is defined using two scientific terms. Publications must meet several requirements (e.g. publication date, type of methodology used in the study)." (p.6-7) Leichner, N., Peter, J., Maher, A.-K., & Krampen, G. (2014). Assessing information literacy using information search tasks. Journal of Information Literacy, 8(1), 3-20.
Difficulty level 3 "Searching for scientific publications concerning an issue which is defined using non-scientific terms." (p.7) Leichner, N., Peter, J., Maher, A.-K., & Krampen, G. (2014). Assessing information literacy using information search tasks. Journal of Information Literacy, 8(1), 3-20.
directed "Directed tasks gave a description of a kind of functionality, as when a designer has an idea of what kind of functionality is needed, but doesn't know how to develop the idea." [p. 56] Henninger, S. (1994) Using iterative refinement to find reusable software. IEEE Software, 11 (5), 48-59.
directed - open search "I want to get an answer to an open - ended question, or one with unconstrained depth." (p. 1699) Kim, J. & Can, A. (2012). Characterizing Queries in Different Search Tasks. In Proceedings of 45th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), 1697 - 1706.
Directed search, participant definition not provided Thatcher, A. (2006). Information-seeking behaviours and cognitive search strategies in different search tasks on the WWW. International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 36(12), 1055-1068.
Directed search, researcher's choice definition not provided Thatcher, A. (2006). Information-seeking behaviours and cognitive search strategies in different search tasks on the WWW. International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 36(12), 1055-1068.
Directed searching "locate a specific item of information" pp. 23 Rowley, J. (2000). Product Search in E-Shopping: A Review and Research Propositions. Journal of Consumer Marketing Vol. 17(1), pp. 20-35
directed-closed search "I want to get an answer to a question that has a single, unambiguous answer." (p. 1699) Kim, J. & Can, A. (2012). Characterizing Queries in Different Search Tasks. In Proceedings of 45th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), 1697 - 1706.
Disease management n/a Lopes, C., & Ribeiro, C. (2010). Context Effect on Query Formulation and Subjective Relevance in Health Searches. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 205-214). New York, NY: ACM.
Disjunctive (OR) definition not provided Mead, S.E., Sit, R.A., Rogers, W.A., Jamieson, B.A., & Rousseau, G.K. (2000). Influences of general computer experience and age on library database search performance. Behaviour & Information Technology, 19(2), 107-124.
Distinguishing between multiple formats and resources definition not provided Holmes, J., Robins, D., Zhang, Y., & Salaba, A. (2008). An exploratory study of school-age children's use of a heterogeneous resource site. Journal of Web Librarianship, 2(2-3), 263-285.
DL, Decision/Solution, Low objective task complexity Product: intellectual versus decision/solution Objective complexity: low, moderate, or high Li, Y., & Belkin, N.J. (2010). An exploration of the relationships between work task and interactive information search behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(9), 1771-1789.
DM, Decision/Solution, Moderate objective task complexity Product: intellectual versus decision/solution Objective complexity: low, moderate, or high Li, Y., & Belkin, N.J. (2010). An exploration of the relationships between work task and interactive information search behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(9), 1771-1789.
document location (online) definition not provided Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
document location (print) definition not provided Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
document search "we designed tasks with fairly precise targets for which we knew documents existed that satisfy the information request (possibly more than one) and in which the main difficulty would be in finding such a document rather than assessing several very similar documents or collecting information from different documents." (p. 1382) Kruschwitz, U., & Al-Bakour, H. (2005). Users want more sophisticated search assistants: Results of a task-based evaluation. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 56(13), 1377-1393.
Doing "Seeking information with the goal of accomplishing some procedural task by identifying the steps to take and the issues involved" (p.3) Fruend, L. & Berzowska, J. (2010) The Goldilocks Effect: Task-Centred Assessments of E-Government Information. In Proceedings of the 73rd ASIS&T Annual Meeting on Navigating Streams in an Information Ecosystem. New York, NY: ACM.
Domain knowledge high; instruction definition not provided Kiestra, M., Stokmans, M., & Kamphuis, J. (1994). End-users searching the online catalogue: The influence of domain and system knowledge on search patterns. The Electronic Library, 12, 335-343.
Domain knowledge high; no instruction definition not provided Kiestra, M., Stokmans, M., & Kamphuis, J. (1994). End-users searching the online catalogue: The influence of domain and system knowledge on search patterns. The Electronic Library, 12, 335-343.
Domain knowledge low; instruction definition not provided Kiestra, M., Stokmans, M., & Kamphuis, J. (1994). End-users searching the online catalogue: The influence of domain and system knowledge on search patterns. The Electronic Library, 12, 335-343.
Domain knowledge low; no instruction definition not provided Kiestra, M., Stokmans, M., & Kamphuis, J. (1994). End-users searching the online catalogue: The influence of domain and system knowledge on search patterns. The Electronic Library, 12, 335-343.
Dot question Question "asking about the relationship between two individual topics, whose answer resides in a “dot” (the crossover of two individual topics) in the diagram" (p.8) Qu, Y., Furnas, G., & Walstrum, B. (2006). Using category information for relationship exploration in textual data. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 43, n.p.
E-commerce "Participants were asked to locate a consumer electronics item for purchase." (p.202) Woodruff, A., Faulring, A., Rosenholtz, R., Morrison, J., and Pirolli, P. (2001). Using thumbnails to search the Web. In Proceedings of the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2001 (Seattle).
E-commerce "participants were asked to locate a consumer electronics item for purchase." (p. 177) "Characteristics - Requires genre classification (correct pages highly graphical; incorrect pages highly graphical, e.g., product reviews)" (p.177, Table 1) Woodruff, A., Rosenholtz, R., Morrison, J. B., Faulring, A., & Pirolli, P. (2002). A comparison of the use of text summaries, plain thumbnails, and enhanced thumbnails for web search tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(2), 172-185.
Easy "Six search tasks of varying difficulty were identified for use in the study. The easier tasks had wording identical or similar to the wording in links pointing to answer locations, while the more difficult tasks required more interpretation." (178) Khan, K., & Locatis, C. (1998). Searching through cyberspace: The effects of link cues and correspondence on information retrieval from hypertext on the World Wide Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 49(14), 1248-1253.
easy Those questions answered correctly by >75% of study participants who attempted them Ageev, M., Guo, Q., Lagun, D., & Agichtein, E. (2011). Find it if you can: A game for modeling different types of Web search success using interaction data. Proceedings of the 34th International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 345-354.
Easy definition not provided Liu, J., Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., and Belkin, N. J. (2010). Can search systems detect users' task difficulty?: some behavioral signals. Proceeding of the 33rd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Geneva, Switzerland.
Easy Condition "The Easy Condition was a triple conjunction task where each distractor shared one feature with the target." (p.55) Chun, M. M., & Wolfe, J. M. (1996). Just say no: How are visual searches terminated when there is no target present? Cognitive Psychology, 30, 39-78.
Easy filler tasks Not defined Aula, A., Khan, R., & Guan, Z. (2010). How does search behavior change as search becomes more difficult? In Proceedings of the 28th international conference on human factors in computing systems (35-44) New York, NY: ACM.
Easy queries "those queries having a word in them corresponding to a word found only in a single link. These queries had the shortest search times." (p.1258) Fraser, L., & Locatis, C. (2001). Effects of link annotations on search performance in layered and unlayered hierarchically organized information spaces. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 52(14), 1255-1261.
Easy search task ... formulated in a limited number of search terms and did not require any term refinement procedures or subject area knowledge." Maidenberg, E. (1991). Expertise in online information retrieval (Doctoral dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles, 1991). Dissertation Abstracts International, 52, 3225A.
Easy search task "We selected 20 topics by ranking the topics using normalized discounted cumulated gain (nDCG) [3] at depth 50 for queries that were collected from subjects in a prior study [4] that used all 50 topics... The nDCG values were averaged for each topic and topics were sorted into four bins: easy, medium, moderate, and difficult" (p.812). Bailey, E.W., Kelly, D., & Gyllstrom, K. (2009). Undergraduates' evaluations of assigned search topics. Proceedings 32nd Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 812-813.
Easy simulated search task ...easy search task is simple, specific and clear. Sihvonen, A., & Vakkari, P. (2004). Subject knowledge improves interactive query expansion assisted by a thesaurus. Journal of Documentation, 60(6), 673-690.
Easy task "The topics were selected based on their difficulty levels, which were determined by retrieval performance using the topic titles as queries in our search system." (p.1315) Liu, J., Liu, C., Cole, M., Belkin, N.J., & Zhang, X. (2012). Exploring and predicting search task difficulty. Proceedings of the 21st ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management, 1313-1322.
Easy tasks "The [task difficulty] levels were controlled by assigning topics with the appropriate number of relevant documents within the corpus (more than 100, less than 20, one or zero), therefore improving or decreasing the chance of one finding relevant documents accordingly." (p.396) Arapakis, I., Jose, J.M., & Gray, P.D. (2008). Affective feedback: An investigation into the role of emotions in the information seeking process. Proceedings of the 31st ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development of Information Retrieval, 395-402.
Easy topics Topics with which subjects are more familiar (participant ratings of familiarity greater than 2.5) Mana-Lopez, M.J., de Buenaga, M., & Gomez-Hidalgo, J.M. (2004). Multidocument summarization: An added value to clustering in interactive retrieval. ACM Transactions on Information Systems, 22(2), 215-241.
Easy topics Those topics "with the most relevant documents (M = 865)", as "measured by the mean number of relevant documents in the Tipster collection as identified by information retrieval experts associated with TREC" (p.215) Pirolli, P., Schank, P., Hearst, M., & Diehl, C. (1996). Scatter/gather browsing communicates the topic structure of a very large text collection. Proceedings of the ACM SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 213-220.
Eat task (Study 3) Not defined Goker, A., & Myrhaug, H. (2008). Evaluation of a mobile information system in context. Information Processing & Management, 44(1), 39-65.
Enterprise Search • any organisation with text content in electronic form; • search of the organisation’s external website; • search of the organisation’s internal websites (it’s intranet); • search of other electronic text held by the organisation in the form of email, database records, documents on fileshares and the like. Hawking, D. (2004). Challenges in enterprise search, presented at Proceedings of the Australasian Database Conference, Dunedin, New Zealand.
Entertainment definition not provided White, R. W., & Kelly, D. (2006). A study on the effects of personalization and task information on implicit feedback performance. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 297-306). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Essay task "simulates having to write an introductory paragraph to a research paper that summarizes the recent work done on a topic" (p.306) Egan, D.E., Lesk, M.E., Ketchum, R.D., Lochbaum, C.C., Remde, J.R., Littman, M., & Landauer, T.K. (1991). Hypertext for the electronic library? CORE sample results. Proceedings of the Third Annual ACM Conference on Hypertext, 299-312.
Evaluate "Making judgments based on criteria and standards through checking and critiquing." (p.255) Wu, W., Kelly, D., Edwards, A., & Arguello, J. (2012). Grannies, tanning beds, tattoos and NASCAR: Evaluation of search tasks with varying levels of cognitive complexity. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium (254-257). New York, NY: ACM.
Evaluating Making judgments based on criteria and standards through checking and critiquing (Table 2); Scenario must have participant appraise or relate information to the real world (Table 3) Jansen, B.J., Booth, D., & Smith, B. (2009). Using the taxonomy of cognitive learning to model online searching. Information Processing & Management, 45(6), 643-663.
exam-preparation task definition not provided Verheij, J., Soutjesdijk, E., & Beishuizen, J. (1996). Search and study strategies in hypertext. Computers in Human Behaviour, 12(1), 1-15.
examination "examination of results and modification of search expression" (9) Timbie, M., & Coombs, D. (1969). An interactive retrieval system: Case studies on the use of DIALOG to search the ERIC document file. Stanford University, ERIC Clearinghouse of Educational Media and Technology, Stanford, CA. ED 034 431.
Example (unknown categorization) definition not provided Lopes, C., & Ribeiro, C. (2010). Context Effect on Query Formulation and Subjective Relevance in Health Searches. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 205-214). New York, NY: ACM.
Existing category, multiple parents "The subject was asked to find an existing category" and "the target category and requested response involved... multiple parents/paths" (p.706) Risden, K., Czerwinski, M.P., Munzner, T., & Cook, D.B. (2000). An initial examination of ease of use for 2D and 3D information visualizations of web content. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 53(5), 695-714.
Existing category, one parent "The subject was asked to find an existing category" and "the target category and requested response involved a single parent/path" (p.706) Risden, K., Czerwinski, M.P., Munzner, T., & Cook, D.B. (2000). An initial examination of ease of use for 2D and 3D information visualizations of web content. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 53(5), 695-714.
experiential task "the experiential activity was mainly entertaining" (p. A5) Nadkarni, S., and Gupta, R. (2004). Perceived Website Complexity, Telepresence and User Attitudes: The Moderating Role of Online User Tasks. Paper presented at the Academy of Management Annual Conference, New Orleans, August 2004, pp. A1-A6.
Experimental search tasks definition not provided Goldberg, J.H., Stimson, M.J., Lewenstein, M., Scott, N., & Wichansky, A.M. (2002). Eye tracking in Web search tasks: Design implications. Proceedings of the 2002 Symposium on Eye Tracking Research & Applications, 51-58.
Experimental Tasks definition not provided Te'eni, D., & Feldman, R. (2001). Performance and satisfaction in adaptive Websites: an experiment on searches within a task-adapted Website. Journal of the Association for Information Systems, 2(3).
experimental testing definition not provided Korthauer, R.D., & Koubek, R.J. (1994). An empirical evaluation of knowledge, cognitive style, and structure upon the performance of a hypertext task. International Journal of Human Computer Interaction, 6, 373-390.
Expert/Constant these are experimental conditions rather than task types (User is expert on topic, and feedback is provided constantly) Hembrooke, H.A., Granka, L.A., Gay, G.K., & Liddy, E.D. (2005). The effects of expertise and feedback on search term selection and subsequent learning. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 56, 861-871.
Expert/Intermittent these are experimental conditions rather than task types (User is expert on topic, and feedback is provided intermittently) Hembrooke, H.A., Granka, L.A., Gay, G.K., & Liddy, E.D. (2005). The effects of expertise and feedback on search term selection and subsequent learning. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 56, 861-871.
Explicit search Using a traditional search box to enter a set of search terms. (p.28) Millen, D., Yang, M., Whittaker, S., & Feinberg, J. (2007). Social bookmarking and exploratory search. ECSCW '07: Proceedings of the 10th European Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, 21-40.
Exploration of availability Not defined here; adopting definition from Shneiderman (1997) Pansanato, L.T.E., & Fortes, R.P.M. (2007). System description: An orienteering strategy to browse semantically-enhanced educational wiki pages. In Franconi,E., Kifer, M., & May, W. (eds.), The Semantic Web: Research and Applications (4th European Semantic Web Conference, ESWC 2007, Innsbruck, Austria, June 3-7, 2007. Proceedings). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4519, 809-818. Springer.
exploration of availability definition not provided Navarro-Prieto, R., Scaife, M., & Rogers, Y. (1999). Cognitive strategies in web searching. Proceedings of the 5th Conference on Human Factors and the Web, 43-56. http://zing.ncsl.nist.gov/hfweb/proceedings/navarro-prieto/index.html.
Exploration of availability definition not provided Shneiderman, B. (1997). Designing information-abundant web sites: Issues and recommendations. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 47(1), 5-29.
Explorative Task Pharo, N., & Nordlie, R. (2012). Examining the effect of task stage and topic knowledge on searcher interaction with a "digital bookstore".In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium (4-11). New York, NY: ACM.
Exploratory "The exploratory task is more open-ended; there are no specific answers to such task type unlike the factual task" (p.41). Kinley, K., Tjondronegoro, D., Partridge, H., & Edwards, S. (2012). Relationship between the nature of the search task types and query reformulation behaviour. In Proceedings of the Seventeenth Australasian Document Computing Symposium (39-46) New York, NY: ACM.
Exploratory "an exploratory task involves general or illdefined questions and typically evolves as search progresses, possibly over multiple sessions" (p.445) Capra, R., Marchionini, G., Oh, J. S., Stutzman, F., & Zhang, Y. (2007). Effects of structure and interaction style on distinct search tasks. Paper presented at the JCDL 2007: Proceedings of the 7th ACM/IEEE Joint Conference on Digital Libraries, Vancouver, B.C.
Exploratory General question & general answer Kim, J. (2006). Task difficulty as a predictor and indicator of web searching interaction. In CHI '06 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 959-964). Montreal, Quebec, Canada: ACM.
Exploratory "A search topic is given along with suggested search terms. There can be many items that fit the criteria." (p.708) Ramdeen, S., & Hemminger, B. (2012). A tale of two interfaces: How facets affect the library catalog search experience. JASIST, 63(4), 702-715.
Exploratory (EX) "The product of a search task [is]... intellectual (to enhance the user’s understanding of a topic). The goal of a search task [is]... amorphous (ill-defined or unclear goals that may evolve along with the user’s exploration)." (p.608) Jiang, J., He, D., & Allan, J. (2014). Searching, browsing, and clicking in a search session: Changes in user behavior by task and over time. SIGIR Proceedings, 607-616.
exploratory (open) search "it is more exploratory in nature (open)." (p. 861) Pu, H. (2010). User evaluation of textual results clustering for web search. Online Information Review, 34(6), 855 - 874.
exploratory browsing "In this research, the term browsing refers to exploratory browsing rather than examination of the results from information retrieval, and the term searching means direct searching with a single search box, not including advanced search functions that contain multiple search boxes." (p. 364) Yeh, S-T. & Liu, Y. (2011). Integrated Faceted Browser and Direct Search to Enhance Information Retrieval in Text-Based Digital Libraries. International Journal of Human Computer Interaction, 27(4): 364-382.
exploratory information problems not defined Wu, W., Kelly, D., & Huang, K. (2012). User evaluation of query quality. In Proceedings of the 35th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 215-224.
Exploratory Learning "The final search task (exploratory learning)... gave less information to the participants aside from searching on time management strategies and finding a seminar locally. The final answer was to find a time management seminar but the task required the participants to explore what information was available and learning something about possible time management strategies in order to evaluate the seminars." (p.38) Poddar, A., & Ruthven, I. (2010). The emotional impact of search tasks. In Proceeding of the third symposium on information interaction in context. (35-44). New York, NY: ACM.
Exploratory search The searcher’s aim is to obtain a general idea of the search topic or possibly to retrieve a couple of documents as an example. p. 6 Aula, A. (2003). Query Formulation in Web Information Search. Proc. IADIS International Conference WWW/Internet 2003, Volume I, 403-410.
Exploratory search "a complex task, which included learning and investigative activities. Marchionini (2006) calls searching for these purposes an exploratory search" (p.668) Vakkari, P., & Huuskonen, S. (2012). Search effort degrades search output but improves task outcome. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(4), 657-670.
Exploratory search Allowing the searchers to find relevant information that cannot be found while working individually Pickens, J., Golovchinsky, G., Shah, C., Qvarfordt, P., & Back, M. (2008). Algorithmic mediation for collaborative exploratory search. Proceedings of the 31st Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 315-322.
Exploratory search ...requires the user to perform multiple iterations of their queries and to interpret a variety of information representations while performing qualitative judgments of the information retrieved. Portnoy, F. (2012). Avoiding Ad Avoidance: Factors Affecting The Perception Of Online Banner Ads. Unpublished dissertation, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Exploratory search Not defined Shah, C. (2013). Effects of awareness on coordination in collaborative information seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 64(6): 1122-1143.
Exploratory search Qvarfordt, P., Golovchinsky, G., Dunnigan, T., & Agapie, E. (2013). Looking ahead: query preview in exploratory search. In Proceedings of the 36th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 243-252.
Exploratory search not defined Mu, X., Lu, K., & Ryu, H. (2014). Explicitly integrating MeSH thesaurus help into health information retrieval systems: An empirical user study. Information Processing & Management, 50(1): 24-40
Exploratory search not defined Shah, C., Liu, J., Gonzalez-Ibanez, R., & Belkin, N. (2012). Exploration of dynamic query suggestions and dynamic search results for their effects on search behaviors. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49(1): 1-10.
Exploratory search "exploratory searches often involve topics that are broad (less specific) and hard to define." (p. 2) Gong, X., Ke, W. & Khare, R. (2012). Studying scatter/gather browsing for web search. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
Exploratory search not defined Saito, H., Egusa, Y., Terai, H., Kando, N., Nakashima, R., Takaku, M. & Miwa, M. (2011). Changes in users' knowledge structures before and after Web search on a topic: Analysis using the concept map. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 48, 1-4.
Exploratory search "White and Roth [17] said that people engaged in exploratory searches are generally: (1) unfamiliar with the domain of their goal; (2) unsure about the ways to achieve their goals; and/or even (3) unsure about their goals." (p. 177) Egusa, Y., Saito, H., Takaku, M., Terai, H., Miwa, M., & Kando, N. (2010). Using a concept map to evaluate exploratory search. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 175-184.
Exploratory search "Exploratory search is a non-static information retrieval setting in which information needs are not discretely anticipated, but rather emerge as the users iteratively seek, learn, and reflect on complex information." (p. 2) Ruotsalo, T., Athukorala, K., Głowacka, D., Konyushkova, K., Oulasvirta, A., Kaipiainen, S., Kaski, S., & Jacucci, G. (2013). Supporting Exploratory Search Tasks with Interactive User Modeling. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-10.
exploratory search "A high-level scenario was constructed around an exploratory search task for journalists. A simulated work task (Borlund, 2003) provided a ‘cover story’ and an indicative task that instructed participants to conduct a short web search to generate 8–10 ideas for newspaper articles on a given topic." (466) Kules, B., & Shneiderman, B. (2008). Users can change their Web search tactics: Design guidelines for categorized views. Information Processing & Management, 44(2), 463-484.
Exploratory Search "Exploratory search activity can operate as either a screening process that identifies candidates for goal-directed search or as an information gathering device when search environment, and the task-relevant experiences of goal-directed search routines are inadequate. Exploratory search is a moment-by-moment activity, always ready to defer to goal-directed search routines, but always active as the baseline visual search system. Thus, an exploratory search routine is a process that can determine whether or not attention should shift and where attention should shift to when necessary." Janiszewski, C. (1998). The influence of display characteristics on visual exploratory search behaviour. Journal of Consumer Research, 25(3), 290-301.
Exploratory search task "We wanted to observe the search process for exploratory queries, or ones that involve incremental learning and investigating (Marchionini, 2006). Thus, we required questions that were unfamiliar and also “Google-hard.” We determined that a question was “Google-hard” if, even after several attempts in major search engines, very few result listings had high information scent" (681). Evans, B. M., Kairam, S., & Pirolli, P. (2010). Do your friends make you smarter?: An analysis of social strategies in online information seeking. Information Processing and Management, 46(6), 679-692.
exploratory search task "the objective was to address a general topic" (p. 57) Diriye, A., Blandford, A., & Tombros, A. (2010). When is system support effective?. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 55-64.
Exploratory search tasks Exploratory tasks inherently have uncertainty, ambiguity, iteration, and discovery as common aspects... They can be roughly characterized as learning-oriented or investigative, thus distinguishing them from lookup-oriented tasks. (p.115) Kules, B., & Capra, R. (2012). Influence of training and stage of search on gaze behavior in a library catalog faceted search interface. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(1), 114-138.
exploratory search tasks not defined Singer, G., Norbisrath, U., Vainikko, E., Kikkas, H., & Lewandowski, D. (2011). Search-logger analyzing exploratory search tasks. In Proceedings of the 2011 ACM Symposium on Applied Computing, 751-756.
Exploratory search tasks "Search Task 1 and Search Task 2 were designed to examine tourists’ collaborative search behavior with no prior knowledge/experiences (i.e., nobody on the team had any relevant knowledge) and with prior knowledge/experiences (i.e., at least one of the team had relevant prior knowledge) about a destination, respectively." (p.2289) Arif, A.S.M., Du, J.T., & Lee, I. (2015). Understanding tourists' collaborative information retrieval behavior to inform design. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(11), 2285-2303.
Exploratory search, decision search "make a decision between two options based on a set of criteria." (p. 1097) O'brien, H. L. & Toms, E. G. (2013). Examining the generalizability of the User Engagement Scale (UES) in exploratory search. Journal Information Processing and Management, 49(5): 1092-1107.
Exploratory task An exploratory task is basically motivated by searcher desire to broaden his or her knowledge of a topic. As it is open-ended, it can be difficult to phrase and it often includes multiple aspects or a number of concepts. Also, it is difficult to determine when the best answer is found. It has a vaguely structured information need because the information required to accomplish it cannot be determined in advance. So, it follows the expanding search pattern, which follows the paths leading to new or unknown areas. (p.58) Kim, J. (2006). Task as a Predictable Indicator of Information Seeking Behavior on the Web. Unpublished dissertation, Rutgers University.
Exploratory task No specific answers Kinley, K., Tjondronegoro, D., Partridge, H., & Edwards, S. (2014). Modeling users' web search behavior and their cognitive styles. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 65(6), 1107-1123.
Exploratory task "The exploratory tasks were phrased in the form of simulated work task situations (Borlund, 2000), i.e., short search scenarios that were designed to reflect real-life search situations and allow subjects to develop personal assessments of relevance. ... The exploratory search tasks required subjects to gather information on a particular topic to allow them to perform some action (e.g., help a friend construct a letter of complaint, decide on an art gallery to visit)." (p. 690) White, R. W., & Marchionini, G. (2007). Examining the effectiveness of real-time query expansion. Information Processing & Management, 43(3), 685-704.
Exploratory Task "the exploratory task is a vaguely structured as well as completely open-ended task, and its outcome is a collection of data." (174) Kim, J. (2008). Task as a context of information seeking: An investigation of daily life tasks on the web. LIBRI 58(3): 172-181.
Exploratory task "An exploratory task is motivated by the searcher's desire to broaden his or her knowledge of a topic, i.e. to foster learning or investigation. As it is completely open-ended, muddled topical need, and it can be difficult to phrase and often includes multiple aspects or a number of concepts. It has a vaguely structured information need because the information required to accomplish it cannot be determined in advance. So it follows the expanding search pattern, which follows the paths leading to new or unknown areas." (p. 683) Kim, J. (2009). Describing and Predicting Information-Seeking Behavior on the Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 60(4): 679-693.
Exploratory tasks "Exploratory tasks inherently have uncertainty, ambiguity and discovery as common aspects (White, Kules, et al.; Marchionini 2006)." (p.18) Operational characteristics include: 1) answers are not found on the first interaction, 2) searchers interact with the results and/or reformulate their queries, and 3) searchers search for multiple items. (p.18) Desirable characteristics: uncertainty/ambiguity in information need; suggest a knowledge acquisition, comparison or discovery task; in an unfamiliar domain for the searcher; low level of specificity about information necessary, how to find it, and how to recognize it. Kules, B., & Capra, R. (2008). Creating exploratory tasks for a faceted search interface. HCIR 2008: Proceedings of the Second Workshop on Human-Computer Interaction and Information Retrieval, 18-21. http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/ryenw/hcir2008/doc/HCIR08-Proceedings.pdf.
Exploratory tasks Desirable characteristics of exploratory search tasks: uncertainty, ambiguity, discovery, be an unfamiliar domain for the searcher, provide a low-level of specificity about how to find the information, and be a situation that provides enough imaginative context for the participant to relate and apply the situation. (p.315) Kules, B., Capra, R., Banta, M., & Sierra, T. (2009). What do exploratory searchers look at in a faceted search interface? Proceedings of the 9th ACM/IEEE-CS Joint Conference on Digital Libraries, 313-322.
Exploratory tasks "Exploratory tasks were phrased as simulated work task situations [5], i.e., short search scenarios that were designed to reflect real-life information needs. These tasks generally required subjects to gather background information on a topic or gather sufficient information to make an informed decision." (p.162) White, R.W., Bilenko, M., & Cucerzan, S. (2007). Studying the use of popular destinations to enhance Web search interaction. Proceedings of the 30th Annual International ACM SIGIR conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 159-166.
exploratory tasks not defined Moraveji, N., Morris, M.R., Morris, D., Czerwinski, M., & Riche, N. (2011). ClassSearch: Facilitating the development of web search skills through social learning. Proceedings of the 2011 Annual Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '11), 1797-1806.
Exploratory tasks Not defined Shah, C., & Marchionini, G. (2010). Awareness in collaborative information seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(10), 1970-1986.
Exploratory Web search "The tasks were designed in a way, which meant that there were no final answers as such to them" (p.253) Langer, L., & Frokjaer, E. (2008). Improving Web search transparency by using a Venn diagram interface. Proceedings of the 5th Nordic Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (NordCHI): Building Bridges, 249-256.
Exploring "The purpose of exploration in on-line inquiry is to have students gain background knowledge necessary to ask good questions and then to perform searches that will help them to find appropriate sources of information about their questions. Since students might be looking at topics that are not part of their classroom curriculum, it was necessary to provide them with on-line opportunities to find information about their topics quickly and easily. " (12) Lyons, D. J., et al. (1997). An investigation of the use of the World Wide Web for online inquiry in a science classroom (Report No.). (ERIC Document No. ED 406158).
Exploring task The exploring task required users to explore each digital library. Xie, I., & Cool, C. (2009). Understanding helpseeking within the context of searching digital libraries. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(3), 477-494.
Extended fact finding Not defined Reiterer, H., Mussler, G., Mann, T.M., & Handschuh, S. (2000). INSYDER - An information assistant for business intelligence. Proceedings of the 23rd Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 112-119.
Extended fact-finding Not defined here; adopting definition from Shneiderman (1997) Pansanato, L.T.E., & Fortes, R.P.M. (2007). System description: An orienteering strategy to browse semantically-enhanced educational wiki pages. In Franconi,E., Kifer, M., & May, W. (eds.), The Semantic Web: Research and Applications (4th European Semantic Web Conference, ESWC 2007, Innsbruck, Austria, June 3-7, 2007. Proceedings). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4519, 809-818. Springer.
Extended fact-finding definition not provided Shneiderman, B. (1997). Designing information-abundant web sites: Issues and recommendations. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 47(1), 5-29.
Fact finding "First, choose the chapter category] that is most likely to include this fact and write its number [letter] in the space provided. Then choose and write in the numbers [letters] of the second and third most likely chapters [categories] in the same way. Having done so, estimate the probability that this fact will fail in each of these three chapters [categories] or "all other chapters [categories]." These probabilities should be numbers from 0% to 100% and add to 100%." (225) Fischhoff, B., & MacGregor, D. (1986). Calibrating databases. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 37(4), 222-233.
Fact Finding "Fact Finding is defined as a task in which you are looking for specific facts or pieces of information. These are usually short-lived tasks that are completed over a single session because you either find the answer or you do not. Examples include looking for tomorrow’s weather, a pizza-dough recipe, or printer drivers for your printer." (1005) Kellar, M., Watters, C., & Shepherd, M. (2007). A field study characterizing web-based information-seeking tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(7), 999-1018. doi:10.1002/asi.20590
Fact Finding The objective is to find specific facts or pieces of information Toms, E.G., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., Toze, S., Dawe, E., & MacNutt, A. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. In Focused Access to XML Documents, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4862, (pp. 359-372).
Fact finding n/a Larsen, B., Malik, S., & Tombros, A. (2008). A comparison of interactive and ad-hoc relevance assessments. Lecture Notes in Computer science, 4862, 348-358.
Fact finding Specific accurate or correct information or physical things that can be grouped into classes or categories for easy reference. Malik, S., Tombros, A., & Larsen, B. (2007). The Interactive Track at INEX 2006. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4518, 387-399.
Fact Finding The goal of a fact finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value; a date). Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., & Liu, J. (2010). Helping identify when users find useful documents: examination of query reformulation intervals. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 215-224). New York, NY: ACM.
Fact finding "The objective is to find a specific piece of information" (p.462) Balatsoukas, P., & Demian, P. (2010). Effects of granularity of search results on the relevance judgment behavior of engineers: Building systems for retrieval and understanding of context. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(3), 453-467.
Fact Finding Qu, P., Liu, C., & Lai, M. (2010). The effect of task type and topic familiarity on information search behaviors. In Proceeding of the third symposium on information interaction in context. (371-376). New York, NY: ACM.
Fact Finding (FF) "The goal of a fact finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value; a date)." (p. 1) Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., & Belkin, N. (2010). Analysis of query reformulation types on different search tasks. In proceedings of the 2010 iSchool iConference, 477-485.
Fact Finding - Hierarchical "The goal of a fact-finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value, a date). This type of task also is referred to as a known-item search (Li & Belkin, 2008)." (p.2454) "The tasks also were divided into three categories that depended on the structure of the underlying information need... (b) Hierarchical (H), where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept (a depth search)." (p.2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(12), 2452-2464.
Fact Finding - Parallel "The goal of a fact-finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value, a date). This type of task also is referred to as a known-item search (Li & Belkin, 2008)." (p.2454) "The tasks also were divided into three categories that depended on the structure of the underlying information need... (c) Parallel (P), where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy (a breadth search)." (p.2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(12), 2452-2464.
Fact Finding - Simple "The goal of a fact-finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value, a date). This type of task also is referred to as a known-item search (Li & Belkin, 2008)." (p.2454) "The tasks also were divided into three categories that depended on the structure of the underlying information need, (a) Simple (S), where the information need is satisfied by a single piece of information (By definition, simple task is of the fact-finding type.)." (p.2454-2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(12), 2452-2464.
Fact Finding Task "we composed three question sets: “The Reign of the Dinosaurs”, “Early Humans”, and “Life Cycles of All Things.” Pilot testing trimmed each set to four questions that: Were nontrivial and potentially interesting to our subjects • Were answered completely by at least one video clip in the library • Could be naturally rephrased into queries that return at least 12 clips from the library (the best 12 clips were presented in the study)" p 2-3 Christel, M.G., Winkler, D.B., & Taylor, C.R. (1997). Improving access to a digital video library. In INTERACT '97: Proceedings of the IFIP TC13 International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction. London: Chapman & Hall, 524-531.
Fact Finding, Hierarchical Fact finding: "The objective is to find specific facts or pieces of information"; Hierarchical: "The search uses a single concept for which multiple attributes or characteristics are sought; this is a depth search, that is, a single topic explored more widely" (p.362) Toms, E., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., & Toze, S. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. Workshop Pre-Proceedings in Initiative for the Evaluation of XML Retrieval (pp. 359-372).
Fact Finding, Hierarchical Structure "The goal of a fact finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value; a date)... [A task with hierarchical structure is one] where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept (a depth search)" (p.2) Gwizdka, J. (2008). Revisiting search task difficulty: Behavioral and individual difference measures. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 45, 12 pages.
Fact Finding, Parallel Fact finding: "The objective is to find specific facts or pieces of information"; Parallel: "The search uses multiple concepts that exist on the same level in a conceptual hierarchy; this is a breadth search" (p.362) Toms, E., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., & Toze, S. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. Workshop Pre-Proceedings in Initiative for the Evaluation of XML Retrieval (pp. 359-372).
Fact Finding, Parallel Structure "The goal of a fact finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value; a date)... [A task with parallel structure is one] where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy (a breadth search)" (p.2) Gwizdka, J. (2008). Revisiting search task difficulty: Behavioral and individual difference measures. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 45, 12 pages.
Fact Finding, Simple Structure "The goal of a fact finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value; a date)... [A task with simple structure is one] where the information need is satisfied by a single piece of information" (p.2) Gwizdka, J. (2008). Revisiting search task difficulty: Behavioral and individual difference measures. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 45, 12 pages.
fact retrieval definition not provided Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
fact retrieval find the answers to the fact retrieval questions (50) Liebscher, P. (1993). Information seeking in hypertext: Multiple access methods in a full-text hypertext database. University of Maryland.
Fact retrieval questions "All questions required retrieval of specific facts from one or more articles in the database." (p.201) Wang, X., & Liebscher, P. (1988). Information seeking in hypertext: Effects of physical format and search strategy. Proceedings of the 51st ASIS Annual Meeting, 200-204.
Fact retrieval questions "Some asked participants to retrieve a single fact from the database, e.g., in what year was penicillin first synthesized. Others asked them to retrieve multiple facts, e.g., list the names of planetary moons that appear in the database... The number of facets in the questions and the number of possible answers in the text were parallel for each of the four sets of four questions." (p.41) Marchionini, G., & Liebscher, P. (1991). Performance in electronic encyclopedias: Implications for adaptive systems. Proceedings of the 54th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science, 39-48.
fact search definition not provided White, R. W. (2004). Implicit feedback for interactive information retrieval (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Department of Computing Science Faculty of Computing Science, Mathematics and Statistics University of Glasgow, Scotland.
fact search definition not provided White, RW., Jose, JM., & Ruthven, I. 2005. Using top-ranking sentences for facilitate effective information access. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 56(10): 1113-1125.
Fact search Example: finding a named persons current e-mail address (p.178) White, RW., Jose, JM., & Ruthven, I. (2006). An implicit feedback approach for interactive information retrieval. Information Processing & Management 42(1), 166-190.
fact search "The fact search asked subjects to find a single item of information." (5) White, R., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J. (2002). Finding relevant documents using top-ranking sentences: an evaluation of two alternative schemes. In Proceedings of the 25th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference (SIGIR 2002).
Fact searching "The tasks involved searching for discrete pieces of information or general sections in the book, and could be completed via several conceivable methods. This kind of information retrieval task is known as 'fact searching' " (p.521) Berg, S. A., Hoffmann, K., & Dawson, D. (2010). Not on the same page: Undergraduates' information retrieval in electronic and print books. the Journal of Academic Librarianship, 36(6), 518-525.
Fact-based search Fact-based tasks are usually simple, certain, and uncomplicated-in nature. Such tasks have a target answer that may be a date, a location of an address, a lifespan of an animal, and the like. Bilal, D. and Kirby, J. (2001). Factors influencing children's and adults' information seeking on the Web: Results of two studies. Proceedings of the 64th ASIST Annual Meeting, November 4-8, 2001, Washington, DC (pp. 126-140). Medford, NJ: Information Today, Inc.
fact-based search definition not provided Bilal, D. (2000). Children's use of Yahooligans! Web search engine: I. Cognitive, physical, and affective behaviors on fact-based search tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(7), 646-665.
Fact-based search task Not defined Han, H. (2018). Children's help-seeking behaviors and effects of domain knowledge in using Google and Kids.gov: Query formulation and results evaluation stages. Library & Information Science Research, 40(3), 208-218.
fact-based search tasks not defined Jochmann-Mannak, H., Huibers, T., Lentz, L., & Sanders, T. (2010). Children searching information on the Internet: Performance on children's interfaces compared to Google. Workshop on Accessible Search Systems, 33rd International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 1-9.
fact-based task "A fact-based task was given to both groups to search in Yahooligans! Fact-based tasks are usually simple, certain, and uncomplicated in nature. Such tasks have a target answer that may be a date, a location of an address, a lifespan of an animal, and the like. As Vakkari (1999) maintains, ‘‘simple tasks are routine information processing tasks where the elements of the task are predetermined, i.e., [the user] knows them’’ (p. 826); meaning that the requirements of the task (e.g., the amount of information needed) can be determined by the user." (p.656) Bilal, D., & Kirby, J. (2002). Differences and similarities in information seeking: children and adults as Web users. Information Processing & Management, 38(5), 649-670.
fact-based task definition not provided Bilal, D. (2002). Perspectives on children's navigation of the world wide web: Does the type of search task make a difference? Online Information Review, 26(2), 108-117.
fact-based, finding search tasks "The first search task was intended to require searchers to generate concepts and corresponding search terms other than those given in the task instructions." (5) Ford, N., Miller, D., & Moss, N. (2003). Web search strategies and approaches to studying. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 54(6), 473-89.
fact-based, finding search tasks In the second task, by contrast, the essential concepts were fully specified. The first of the terms given (“JavaScript”) was highly appropriate as a search term. It was anticipated that the wording of the second concept would not be particularly effective, and would require translation into a more appropriate search formulation using a term such as “beginners.”" Ford, N., Miller, D., & Moss, N. (2003). Web search strategies and approaches to studying. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 54(6), 473-89.
fact-based, finding search tasks "The third task was comparable to the first in terms of the number of principle facets and the fact that it was anticipated that some transformation from the key words given to effective search terms would be necessary for effective retrieval. Conversely to the first task, the expected transformations were from the general to the more specific, because it was presumed unlikely that documents relevant to the topic would contain words as general as “sportsperson” or “emergency services” but would rather entail reference to a particular sport and a particular emergency service." Ford, N., Miller, D., & Moss, N. (2003). Web search strategies and approaches to studying. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 54(6), 473-89.
Fact-based/finding task 1. Clearly defined goal state requiring a correct answer, enabling the searcher easily to know when to stop searching; 2. Low complexity task with low number of facets; 3. Task requirements completely specified in the task instructions. Relatively simple pattern matching required between concepts given in task specification and information retrieved. (Table 1, p.34) Ford, N., Miller, D., & Moss, N. (2002). Web search strategies and retrieval effectiveness: An empirical study. Journal of Documentation, 58(1), 30-48.
Fact-finding "answering a well-defined question" (p.1189). MacKay, B., & Watters, C. (2012). An examination of multisession web tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63(6), 1183-1197.
Fact-finding "Tasks where the objective is to find 'specific accurate or correct information or physical things that can be grouped into classes or categories for easy reference'" (p.1720) Pharo, N., & Krahn, A. (2011). The effect of task type on preferred element types in an XML-based retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 62(9), 1717-1726.
Fact-finding No definition was provided Aula, A. (2003). Query Formulation in Web Information Search. Proc. IADIS International Conference WWW/Internet 2003, Volume I, 403-410.
Fact-finding Gwizdka, J. (2009). What a difference a tag cloud makes: Effects of tasks and cognitive abilities on search results interface use. Information Research: An International Electronic Journal, 14(4)
Fact-Finding "Seeking information with the goal of finding specific factual information to answer a well-specified question or fill a known gap in knowledge" (p.3) Fruend, L. & Berzowska, J. (2010) The Goldilocks Effect: Task-Centred Assessments of E-Government Information. In Proceedings of the 73rd ASIS&T Annual Meeting on Navigating Streams in an Information Ecosystem. New York, NY: ACM.
Fact-Finding "The first search task (fact finding) asked participants to find a single, factual answer... Although the answer would be a single fact... there might be several ways of finding the information and the answer could vary according to the information uncovered during searching." (p.37) Poddar, A., & Ruthven, I. (2010). The emotional impact of search tasks. In Proceeding of the third symposium on information interaction in context. (35-44). New York, NY: ACM.
fact-finding information problems not defined Wu, W., Kelly, D., & Huang, K. (2012). User evaluation of query quality. In Proceedings of the 35th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 215-224.
Fact-finding questions Each question required the participant "to find out a particular fact (time, place, person’s name, system name etc.)" (p.177) Smyth, B., & Balfe, E. (2006). Anonymous personalization in collaborative web search. Information Retrieval, 9(2), 165-190.
Fact-Finding Search Task definition not provided Lazonder, A. W. (2005). Do two heads search better than one? effects of student collaboration on web search behaviour and search outcomes. British Journal of Educational Technology,36(3), 465-475.
fact-finding task not defined Benoit, G. & Agarwal, N. (2012). All-visual retrieval: How people search and respond to an affect-driven visual information retrieval system. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
fact-finding task "finding a fact that satisfied specified criteria" (p. 2) Gwizdka, J. (2013). Searchers Switch Tactics Under Increased Mental Load. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-3.
fact-finding tasks not defined Moraveji, N., Morris, M.R., Morris, D., Czerwinski, M., & Riche, N. (2011). ClassSearch: Facilitating the development of web search skills through social learning. Proceedings of the 2011 Annual Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '11), 1797-1806.
fact-finding tasks the goal was to find one specific answer to a simple question (1682) Aula, A., & Nordhausen, K. (2006). Modeling successful performance in Web searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 57, 1678-1693.
Fact-Finding, Multi-Faceted All search problems involved multiple facets and were close-ended (fact finding or known item). Fu, X. 2010. Towards a model of implicit feedback for web search. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 61 (1): 30-49.
Fact-Finding, Multiple Fact-finding tasks (FF tasks asked users to locate some short, specific information) that ask the user to locate multiple pieces of information Liu, J., Gwizdka, J., Liu, C., Belkin, N. (2010). Predicting Task Difficulty for Different Task Types. In Proceedings of the 73rd ASIS&T Annual Meeting on Navigating Streams in an Information Ecosystem. New York, NY: ACM.
Fact-Finding, Single Fact-finding tasks (FF tasks asked users to locate some short, specific information) that ask the user to locate only a single piece of information Liu, J., Gwizdka, J., Liu, C., Belkin, N. (2010). Predicting Task Difficulty for Different Task Types. In Proceedings of the 73rd ASIS&T Annual Meeting on Navigating Streams in an Information Ecosystem. New York, NY: ACM.
Fact/Nontext a single fact; physical format of the target entry (text or nontext) Mynatt B.T., Leventhal L.M., Instone K., Farhat J., & Rohlman D.S. (1992). Hypertext or book: Which is better for answering questions? Proceedings of Computer-Human Interface '92, 19-25.
Fact/Text/Contents a single fact; physical format of the target entry (text or nontext); the location of a matching keyword (entry title or entry content) Mynatt B.T., Leventhal L.M., Instone K., Farhat J., & Rohlman D.S. (1992). Hypertext or book: Which is better for answering questions? Proceedings of Computer-Human Interface '92, 19-25.
Fact/Text/Title a single fact; physical format of the target entry (text or nontext); the location of a matching keyword (entry title or entry content) Mynatt B.T., Leventhal L.M., Instone K., Farhat J., & Rohlman D.S. (1992). Hypertext or book: Which is better for answering questions? Proceedings of Computer-Human Interface '92, 19-25.
Factual Specific question & specific answer Kim, J. (2006). Task difficulty as a predictor and indicator of web searching interaction. In CHI '06 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 959-964). Montreal, Quebec, Canada: ACM.
Factual "The factual task is a fact-finding search task, such as finding three laws on child safety while travelling in vehicles." (p.41) Kinley, K., Tjondronegoro, D., Partridge, H., & Edwards, S. (2012). Relationship between the nature of the search task types and query reformulation behaviour. In Proceedings of the Seventeenth Australasian Document Computing Symposium (39-46) New York, NY: ACM.
factual information search task "In the factual information search task, there existed a Web page providing the correct answer to the question given, and the participants were asked to continue their search until they located the Web page and to make a bookmark of it." Kim, K.-S. (2000). Users, tasks and the Web: Their impact on the information- seeking behavior. Proceedings of the 21st National Online Meeting, USA.
factual information search task "a task of this type requires the searcher to find a piece of factual information for an item known to exist, which provides a specific answer to the question given" [p. 6]. "In the factual information search task, there existed a Web page providing the correct answer to the question given, and the participants were asked to continue their search until they located the Web page and to make a bookmark of it." (p.6) Allen, B.L., & Kim, K.-S. (2001). Person and context in information seeking: Interactions between cognitive and task variables. New Review of Information Behaviour Research, 2, 1-16.
factual information search task (FACT) "a task requiring the searching to find a piece of factual information for an item known to exist, which gives a specific answer to the question given." (45) Kim, K.-S. (1998). Information-seeking behavior on the World Wide Web: Effects of cognitive style, online database search experience and task types on search performance. (Doctoral dissertation). University of Texas at Austin.
factual information task "A factual task is defined as an information seeking task where the user seeks a specific piece of data (e.g., the name of a person or an organization, a product information, a numerical value; a date; an address; etc.)." (p. ) Gwizdka, J., & Spence, I. (2006). What can searching behavior tell us about the difficulty of information tasks? A study of web navigation. Paper presented at the ASIST Proceedings 2006.
factual information task "A factual task is defined as an information finding task where the user seeks a specific piece of data (e.g., the name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value; a date; an address; etc.)." (361) Gwizdka, J., & Spence, I. (2007). Implicit measures of lostness and success in Web navigation. Interacting with Computers, 19(3), 357-369.
factual questions "The two search questions simulate the type of factual questions recorded at a reference desk ... Both questions involve multiple concepts." (p. 249) Wang, P., Hawk, W. B., & Tenopir, C. (2000). Users' interaction with World Wide Web resources: An exploratory study using a holistic approach. Information Processing & Management, 36, 229-251.
Factual questions "Factual questions can be answered with a single sentence. Tasks like this can typically be answered with a single query." (p. 132) Eickhoff, C., Dekker, P., & de Vries, A. P. (2012). Supporting children's web search in school environments. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 129-137.
Factual search n/a Wang, P., & Tenopir, C. (1998). An exploratory study of users' interaction with World Wide Web resources: Information skills, cognitive styles, affective states, and searching behaviors. In M. E. Williams (Ed.), Nineteenth National Online Meeting Proceedings (pp. 445-454). New York: Information Today.
Factual search n/a Wang, P., Tenopir, C., Layman, E., Penniman, D., & Collins, S. (1998). An exploratory study of user searching of the World Wide Web: A holistic approach. In C. M. Preston (Ed.), Proceedings of the 61st ASIS Annual Meeting (pp. 389-399). Medford, NJ: Information Today.
Factual search questions n/a Hawk, W. B., & Wang, P. (1999). Users' interaction with the World Wide Web: Problems & problem-solving. In L. Woods (Ed.), Proceedings of the 62nd ASIS Annual Meeting (pp. 256-270). Medford, NJ: Information Today.
Factual task A factual task is an 'asking a fact' task. It includes naming, defining, identifying, describing, and listing. A factual task has a definite answers, which is explicitly represented in the text. The expected outcome for a factual task is often a named entity.. Since the answer is easily recognizable when it was found, the searcher knows exactly when to end the search. (p.57) Kim, J. (2006). Task as a Predictable Indicator of Information Seeking Behavior on the Web. Unpublished dissertation, Rutgers University.
Factual Task The factual task is a closed task which has a defi nite answer Kim, J. (2008). Task as a context of information seeking: An investigation of daily life tasks on the web. LIBRI 58(3): 172-181.
Factual task "A factual task is a "asking a fact" task, such as naming, identifying, or listing. Its inherent need is verificative and structured as a closed question. It generally has a definite answer, which is explicitly represented in the text so it has a closed-structure. The expected outcome for the factual task is often a named entity, represented as noun phrases, such as the name, time, location, or attribute of an object, as well as a qualifying short phrase or sentence, which is represented as identification, a definition, clarification, a list, or a label." (p. 683) Kim, J. (2009). Describing and Predicting Information-Seeking Behavior on the Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 60(4): 679-693.
Factual task Fact-finding search task Kinley, K., Tjondronegoro, D., Partridge, H., & Edwards, S. (2014). Modeling users' web search behavior and their cognitive styles. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 65(6), 1107-1123.
Factual task As defined by Li & Belkin, 2008 Liu, J., Kim, C.S., & Creel, C. (2015). Exploring search task difficulty reasons in different task types and user knowledge groups. Information Processing & Management, 51, 273-285.
facual task "Finding specific information (similar to a factual question)" (p.4, based on Pfaffenberger, 1996); user requires "a pinpointed factual answer" (p.7) Bhavnani, S.K., Drabenstott, K., & Radev, D. (2001). Towards a unified framework of IR tasks and strategies. ASIST 2001: Proceedings of the 64th ASIST Annual Meeting, 38, n.p.
fiction searching not defined Oksanen, S. & Vakkari, P. (2012). In search of a good novel, neither reading activity nor querying matter, but examining search results does. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 12-20.
Find Zhang, Y., & Salaba, A. (2012). What do users tell us about FRBR-based catalogs? Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, 50(5-7), 705-723.
find peripheral mention of something or someone definition not provided Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
Finding comments; searching, then scanning "A person is in the process of preparing a talk for a conference. She or he recalls some germane comments from a known electronic book, but cannot remember the exact contents. She or he needs to find out the exact quotations. She or he recalls that a certain electronic book might be very helpful, but cannot remember the exact name of the book." (p.1992) Yuan, X., & Belkin, N.J. (2010). Evaluating an integrated system supporting multiple information-seeking strategies. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(10), 1987-2010.
Finding information in one hypertext node Not further defined Hsu, Y.-C., & Schwen, T.M. (2003). The effects of structural cues from multiple metaphors on computer users' information search performance. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 58(1), 39-55.
Finding information in two different notes Not further defined Hsu, Y.-C., & Schwen, T.M. (2003). The effects of structural cues from multiple metaphors on computer users' information search performance. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 58(1), 39-55.
Finding news articles; scanning, then searching "A person is very interested in one particular topic. She or he wants to find some good documents on this topic from a system which is composed of several databases, but has no idea about which of the many possible databases to search." (p.1991) Yuan, X., & Belkin, N.J. (2010). Evaluating an integrated system supporting multiple information-seeking strategies. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(10), 1987-2010.
Finding tasks "tasks that asked them [the participants] to look for certain information on the Web" (p.38) Capra, R. G., & Perez-Quinones, M. A. (2005) Using web search engines to find and refind information. Computer, 38(10), 36-42.
Finding tasks "involved finding information on the Internet using a web browser" (p.4) Capra, R.B., & Perez-Quinones, M.A. (2003). Re-finding found things: An exploratory study of how users re-find information. http://arxiv.org/abs/cs/0310011.
Follow-up task Not defined Haggerty, A., White, R.W., & Jose, J.M. (2004). NewsFlash: Adaptive TV news delivery on the web. In Nurnberger, A., & Detyniecki, M. (eds.), Adaptive Multimedia Retrieval 2003. Springer. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3094, 72-86.
Formal search "The individual makes a deliberate or planned effort to obtain specific information or types of information about a particular issue. Search is formal because it is structured according to some pre-established procedure or methodology. The granularity of information is fine, as search is relatively focused to find detailed information. The overall purpose is to systematically retrieve information relevant to an issue in order to provide a basis for developing a decision or course of action." (p.6) Choo, C. W., Detlor, B., & Turnbull, D. (2000). Information seeking on the Web - an integrated model of browsing and searching. First Monday, 5(2). http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/729/638.
Formal search tasks In terms of Daft and Weick’s taxonomy of organizational scanning (Daft and Weick 1984; Choo, Detlor and Turnbull 1998), the tasks are formal searches, because they involve a deliberate effort to find information about a specific issue. In terms of Ellis’s model of information-seeking behavior (Ellis 1989; Choo et al. 1998), the main information-seeking behavior is differentiating,meaning a person filters and selects among the sources scanned. Jenkins, C., Corritore, C. L., & Wiedenbeck, S. (2003). Patterns of information seeking on the Web: A qualitative study of domain expertise and Web expertise. IT & Society, 1, 66-89.
Free exploration task not defined Fagan, J.C. (2010). Usability studies of faceted browsing: A literature review. Information Technology and Libraries, 29(2), 58-66.
Free Text ...one searches on terms or phrases that appear in the text of the record, as in the title and the abstract. Bates, M. J. (1981). Search techniques. In M.E. Williams (Ed.), Annual review of information science and technology (pp. 139-169). New York: Knowledge Industry for American Society for Information Science.
Fully self-generated task fully self-generated by the participants (children). Bilal, D. (2002). Children's use of the Yahooligans! Web search engine. III. Cognitive and physical behaviors on full self-generated search tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(13), 1170-1183.
Fully specified search task definition not provided Toms, E., Freund, L., Kopak, R., & Bartlett, J.C. (2003). The effect of task domain on search. Proceedings of CASCON '03: Conference of the Centre for Advanced Studies on Collaborative Research, 303-312.
Fully specified [search] tasks n/a Hersh, W., Over, P. (2001). TREC-2001 Interactive Report. The Tenth Text REtrieval Conference, pp. 38-41.
fully-specified user given the complete task (p. 2) Hersh, W., Sacherek, L., Olson, D. Observations of Searchers: OHSU TREC 2001 Interactive Track. The Tenth Text REtrieval Conference, TREC 2010. Retrieved on November 30, 2010 from http://trec.nist.gov/pubs/trec10/papers/Hersh.pdf
General Self Generated topic -realistic task - a research paper (with specific requirements). Teacher assigned task, similar to class assignment Hirsh, S. G. (1999). Children's relevance criteria and information seeking on electronic resources. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50(14), 1265-1283.
General Naturalistic queries provided by the users of the system, consisting of "a statement about their patient and the information sought" (p.481) Hersh, W. R., & Hickam, D. H. (1995). An evaluation of interactive boolean and natural language searching with an online medical textbook. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 46(7), 478-489.
General Finding an answer to each question in a set of three questions. Questions from an evidence-based medicine project at McMaster (Converted to yes-no format). 4 sets of 3 questions were used. 2/3 therapeutic, 1/3 diagnostic. Hersh, W., Pentecost, J., & Hickam, D. (1996). A task-oriented approach to information retrieval evaluation. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 47(1), 50-56.
General Novice (end-user) vs. experienced (professional) searchers Familiar vs. unfamiliar topics to searcher (based on domain knowledge) Hsieh-Yee, I. (1993). Effects of search experience and subject knowledge on the search tactics of novice and experienced searchers. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 44(3), 161-174.
General Assigned “a set of predesigned search tasks with graduated levels of difficulty”(p.492). No further details. Meadow, C. T., Wang, J., & Yuan, W. (1995). A study of user performance and attitudes with information retrieval interfaces. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 46(7), 490-505.
General definition not provided de Bliek, R., Friedman, C. P., Wildemuth, B. M., Martz, J. M., File, D., Twarog, R. G., Reich, G. M., & Hoekstra, L. (1993). Database access and problem solving in the basic sciences. In C. Safran (Ed.), Proceedings of the Seventeenth Annual Symposium on Computer Applications in Medical Care: A Conference of the American Medical Informatics Association (pp. 678-682). New York: McGraw-Hill.
General new search, interpreted by student Madden, A. D., Ford, N. J., Miller, D., & Levy, P. (2006). Children's use of the internet for information-seeking. What strategies do they use, and what factors affect their performance? Journal of Documentation, 62, 744-761.
General The questions were formed in a way that avoided keywords and provided the participant who knew the answer to the question a way to find information regarding the answer quicker than those who did not know the answer. Downing, R.E., Moore, J.L., & Brown, S.W. (2005). The effects and interaction of spatial visualization and domain expertise on information seeking. Computers in Human Behavior, 21, 195-209.
General The search topic was intended to require searchers to generate search terms other than those contained in the topic as given—for example, more general search terms such as “health and safety.” Ford, N., Miller, D., & Moss, N. (2001). The role of individual differences in internet searching: An empirical study. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 52, 1049-1066.
General to search for images that would be suitable for a ‘‘Summer Greetings Card‘‘ and ‘‘Favorite Landscape’’ respectively and to retrieve an image/s from the database. We did not impose a time limit on this exercise nor did we restrict the number of images that subjects could retrieve (725) Fukumoto, T. (2006). An analysis of image retrieval behavior for metadata type image database. Information Processing & Management, 42(3), 723-728.
General The first search task was to identify at least five different vacation destinations that would be enhance the subjects’ personal relationship within the constraints of the $5,000 budget and available time. Subjects also were instructed to think about the different places and how they compare with each other based on the information found between the first and second session. The second search task was to compare the different places subjects identified in the first episode in terms of what they offer, how much each will cost, convenience, possibilities for different types of activities, entertainment, restaurants, or other things subjects cared about doing during their vacation. Subjects were instructed to decide on the final destination between the second and third episodes. The third search episode was to search for information that would help make a detailed plan for the vacation. Subjects were told to base the vacation plan on the information they found in all three sessions, their personal interests, and the task requirements; the vacation plan needed to be as detailed and as specific as possible, including at least destination, transportation, accommodation, activities, etc Lin, S.J., & Belkin, N.J. (2005) Validation of a model of information seeking over multiple search sessions. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 56(4), 393-415.
General Undefined Lee, E., Whalen, T., McEwen, S., & Latremouille, S. (1984). Optimizing the design of menu pages for information retrieval. Ergonomics, 27, 1051-1069.
General image search task not defined Wang, X. & Erdelez, S. (2013). Medical image users' search tactics across different search tasks. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-4.
General purpose, participant's choice definition not provided Thatcher, A. (2006). Information-seeking behaviours and cognitive search strategies in different search tasks on the WWW. International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 36(12), 1055-1068.
General purpose, researcher's choice definition not provided Thatcher, A. (2006). Information-seeking behaviours and cognitive search strategies in different search tasks on the WWW. International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 36(12), 1055-1068.
General queries "Queries representing a desire for information about a class of products" (p.1953) Jansen, B.J., & Resnick, M. (2006). An examination of searcher's perceptions of nonsponsored and sponsored links during ecommerce web searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 57(14), 1949-1961.
General questions Questions that "requested the reading and integration of 2-5 separate passages" in the text (p.415) Rouet, J. (2003). What was I looking for? The influence of task specificity and prior knowledge on students' search strategies in hypertext. Interacting with Computers, 15(3), 409-428.
General questions "two requested the reading and integration of 2–5 separate passages" Rouet, J.-F. (2003). What was I looking for? The influence of task specificity and prior knowledge on students' search strategies in hypertext. Interacting with Computers, 15(3), 409-428.
General search "Finding images of kind of person, group, thing, event, place, condition, or action." (p. 335) Hung, T.-Y. (2005). Search moves and tactics for image retrieval in the field of journalism: A pilot study. Journal of Education Media & Library Sciences, 42(30), 329-346.
General search task "conduct a search on the experimental system to find general information about hypertext systems" (p.6) Qiu, L. (1993). Analytical searching vs. browsing in hypertext information retrieval systems. Canadian Journal of Library & Information Science, 18, 1-13.
General search task "a search.. to find general information about hypertext systems. This information included definition, history, etc., for writing up a one-page encyclopedia entry. Qiu, L. (1993). Markov models of search state patterns in a hypertext information retrieval system. JASIS, 44(7), 413-427.
General search task Find general information about hypertext system (stimuli). Desired information included definition, history, etc., for the purpose of writing up a one-page encyclopedia entry. Qiu, L. (1994). Frequency distributions of hypertext path patterns: A pragmatic approach. Information Processing & Management, 30(1), 131-140.
General subject search definition not provided Gross, J. & Sheridan, L. (2011). Web scale discovery: The user experience. New Library World, 112(5/6), 236-247.
General subject search Not specified Dimitroff, A., Wolfram, D., & Volz, A. (1996). Affective response and retrieval performance: Analysis of contributing factors. Library & Information Science Research, 18(2), 121-132.
General subject search Not defined Wolfram, D., Volz, A., & Dimitroff, A. (1996). The effect of linkage structure on retrieval performance in a hypertext-based bibliographic retrieval system. Information Processing & Management, 32(5), 529-541.
general task not defined Liu, J. & Belkin, N. J. (2011). Search task difficulty: the expected vs. the reflected. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 1183-1184.
General task "a task having a solution not requiring special knowledge." (p. 323) Satio H., & Miwa K. (2002). A cognitive study of information seeking processes in the WWW: The effects of searcher's knowledge and experience. In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Web Information Systems Engineering, 1, 321-327.
general task to find a few pieces of information for a rather general and broad question Kim, K.-S. (2008). Effects of emotion control and task on Web searching behavior. Information Processing & Management, 44(1), 373-385.
General Task "Two tasks were chosen to represent a continuum from specific information needs such as those that may be expressed using keywords in a precise search statement, to subjective information needs that may be difficult to express verbally and are dependent on characteristics of a scene as interpreted by an individual. The two tasks were adapted from existing user queries to the CNN database for environmental images, and were modified somewhat to correspond to the image content present in the test collection." (177) Goodrum, A.A. (2001). Multidimensional scaling of video surrogates. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 52(2), 174-182.
General tasks Not defined Pharo, N. (2008). The effect of granularity and order in XML element retrieval. Information Processing & Management, 44(5), 1732-1740.
General tasks (Study 1) Not defined Goker, A., & Myrhaug, H. (2008). Evaluation of a mobile information system in context. Information Processing & Management, 44(1), 39-65.
General topic searches "They were then given ten topical search problems that could be answered using the news database, and asked to find as many articles as they could that were relevant to each question. The questions were general topical searches" (4) Dumais, S. T., & Schmitt, D. G. (1991). Iterative searching in an online database. In Proceedings of the Human Factors Society 35th Annual Meeting (pp. 398-402).
general Web search not defined Russell, D. M., & Grimes, C. (2007). Assigned tasks are not the same as self-chosen Web search tasks. In Proceedings of the 40th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS '07), 83-91.
generation of list "generating a subfile of items which meet the criteria of the search expression" (9) Timbie, M., & Coombs, D. (1969). An interactive retrieval system: Case studies on the use of DIALOG to search the ERIC document file. Stanford University, ERIC Clearinghouse of Educational Media and Technology, Stanford, CA. ED 034 431.
Generic object/action General: "queries wchih require only 'general everyday knowledge' to recognize the objects or scenes" (p.2454); Object/action not defined Smith, G., Brien, C., & Ashman, H. (2012). Evaluating implicit judgments from image search clickthrough data. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(12), 2451-2462.
Generic scene General: "queries wchih require only 'general everyday knowledge' to recognize the objects or scenes" (p.2454); Scene not defined Smith, G., Brien, C., & Ashman, H. (2012). Evaluating implicit judgments from image search clickthrough data. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(12), 2451-2462.
Generic tasks "outlined the kinds of tak, but did not restrict the specific information problems" (p.149) Rieh, S.Y. (2002). Judgment of information quality and cognitive authority in the Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 53(2), 145-161.
Generic tasks "outlined the kinds of task, but did not restrict the specific information problems." (p.149) Rieh, S.Y. (2002). Judgment of information quality and cognitive authority in the Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(2), 145-161.
Genuine decision tasks "are unexpected, new, and unstructured. Thus, neither the result, the process, nor the information requirements can be characterized in advance. The first concern is task structuring. Example: the collapse of Soviet Union from the viewpoint of other governments." (194) Bystrom, K. & Jarvelin, K. (1995). Task complexity affects information seeking and use. Information Processing and Management, 31, 191-213.
Global comparison "Global comparison tasks required comparison of several nodes in disparate parts of the tree." (p.30) Pirolli, P., Card, S., Van Der Wege, M. (2001). The effects of information scent on visual search in the hyperbolic tree browser. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(1), 20-53.
Global comparison "Global comparison tasks required comparison of several nodes in disparate parts of the tree." (p.30) Pirolli, P., Card, S.K., & van der Wege, M.M. (2003). The effects of information scent on visual search in the Hyperbolic Tree Browser. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(1), 20-53.
go to page hyperlink, back/forward, bookmark, history list, and provide URL Byrne, M.D., John, B.E., Wehrle, N.S., & Crow, D.C. (1999). The tangled Web we wove: A taskonomy of WWW use. CHI Proceedings, 544-551.
Goal Directed Search The directed search for information focusses users' attention on content that is expected to contain relevant information to answer the search tasks. The underlying process is a top-down process, i.e. users direct their attention consciously towards areas of the Web site where they anticipate relevant information. This process is guided by cognitive schemata that play an important role for the direction of visual attention. They structure the information processing and help the user anticipate what information needs to be voluntarily selected. Pagendarm, M., & Schaumburg, H. (2001). Why Are Users Banner-Blind? The Impact of Navigation Style on the Perception of Web Banners. Journal of Digital Information, 2(1). Retrieved from http://journals.tdl.org/jodi/article/viewArticle/36/38
Goal Directed Search definition not provided Calisir, F., & Karaali, D. (2008). The impacts of banner location, banner content and navigation style on banner recognition. Computers in Human Behavior, 24(2), 535-543.
Goal-Directed Search Planned acquisition of data using a search routine stored in memory ( e.g., scanning from left-to-right ) or generated for the current task ( e.g., the feature ‘‘yellow’’ can be used to locate the mustard containers in a condiment aisle). Janiszewski, C. (1998). The influence of display characteristics on visual exploratory search behaviour. Journal of Consumer Research, 25(3), 290-301.
Goal-directed tasks definition not provided Jansen, M., Bos, W., van der Vet, P., Huibers, T., & Hiemstra, D. (2010). TeddIR: Tangible information retrieval for children. In Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on interaction design and children (282-285). New York, NY: ACM.
goal-oriented task "comprised of a searching activity that involved finding useful information" (p. A5) Nadkarni, S., and Gupta, R. (2004). Perceived Website Complexity, Telepresence and User Attitudes: The Moderating Role of Online User Tasks. Paper presented at the Academy of Management Annual Conference, New Orleans, August 2004, pp. A1-A6.
Hard "Six search tasks of varying difficulty were identified for use in the study. The easier tasks had wording identical or similar to the wording in links pointing to answer locations, while the more difficult tasks required more interpretation." (178) Khan, K., & Locatis, C. (1998). Searching through cyberspace: The effects of link cues and correspondence on information retrieval from hypertext on the World Wide Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 49(14), 1248-1253.
Hard definition not provided Liu, J., Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., and Belkin, N. J. (2010). Can search systems detect users' task difficulty?: some behavioral signals. Proceeding of the 33rd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Geneva, Switzerland.
Hard Condition "In the more difficult, Hard Condition, two thirds of the distractors shared two features with the target." (p.55) Chun, M. M., & Wolfe, J. M. (1996). Just say no: How are visual searches terminated when there is no target present? Cognitive Psychology, 30, 39-78.
Hard queries "Queries taken from the TREC-8 collection (hard queries)" (p.127) Dennis, S., Bruza, P., & McArthur, R. (2002). Web searching: A process-oriented experimental study of three interactive search paradigms. Journal of the American society for Information Science & Technology, 53(2), 120-133.
Hard topics Topics with which subjects are less familiar (participant ratings of familiarity lower than 2.5) Mana-Lopez, M.J., de Buenaga, M., & Gomez-Hidalgo, J.M. (2004). Multidocument summarization: An added value to clustering in interactive retrieval. ACM Transactions on Information Systems, 22(2), 215-241.
Hard topics Those topics "with the fewest (expert-identified) relevant documents (M = 46)", as "measured by the mean number of relevant documents in the Tipster collection as identified by information retrieval experts associated with TREC" (p.215) Pirolli, P., Schank, P., Hearst, M., & Diehl, C. (1996). Scatter/gather browsing communicates the topic structure of a very large text collection. Proceedings of the ACM SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 213-220.
HC Task: High Complexity definition not provided White, R. W., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J. M. (2005). A study of factors affecting the utility of implicit relevance feedback. In Proceedings of the 28th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval (pp. 35-42). Salvador, Brazil: ACM.
Heading The question includes "one or more words from the topic heading immediately preceding the target information" (p.40) Egan, D.E., Remde, J.R., Gomez, L.M., Landauer, T.K., Eberhardt, J., & Lochbaum, C.C. (1989). Formative design-evaluation of SuperBook. ACM Transactions on Information Systems, 7(1),30-57.
Health-related questions Birru, M.S., Monaco, V.A., Charles, L., Drew, H., Njie, V., Bierria, T., Detlefsen, E., & Steinman, R.A. (2004). Internet usage by low-literacy adults seeking health information: An observational analysis. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 6(3), e25.
Health-related questions Hansen, D.L., Derry, H.A., Resnick, P.J., & Richardson, C.R. (2003). Adolescents searching for health information on the Internet: An observational study. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 5(4), e25.
Help.yahoo.com tasks Not defined Chi, E., Rosien, A., Supattanasiri, G., Williams, A., Royer, C., Chow, C., Robles, E., Dalal, B., Chen, J., Cousins, S. (2003). The Bloodhound project: Automating discovery of web usability issues using the InfoScent simulator. CHI '03, 505-512.
Hierarchical "Hierarchical (H), where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept; this is a depth search, where a single topic is explored" Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., Liu, J., Xu, T., & Belkin, N. (2010). Analysis and Evaluation of Query Reformulations in Different Task Types. In Proc. the American Society for Information Science and Technology. New York, NY: ACM.
Hierarchical The search uses a single concept for which multiple attributes or characteristics are sought; this is a depth search, that is, a single topic explored more widely. Toms, E.G., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., Toze, S., Dawe, E., & MacNutt, A. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. In Focused Access to XML Documents, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4862, (pp. 359-372).
Hierarchical fact finding "The goal of a fact-finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value, a date)." (p.2454) "Hierarchical, where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept (a depth search)." (p.2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60, 2452-2464.
Hierarchical fact finding task (known item search) FF task: "the goal... is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value; a date)"; Hierarchical: "the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept; this is a depth search, where a single topic is explored" (p.2173) Gwizdka, J. (2010). Distribution of cognitive load in web search. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(11), 2167-2187.
Hierarchical information gathering "The goal of an information-gathering task is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic." (p.2454) "Hierarchical, where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept (a depth search)." (p.2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60, 2452-2464.
Hierarchical Information Gathering Qu, P., Liu, C., & Lai, M. (2010). The effect of task type and topic familiarity on information search behaviors. In Proceeding of the third symposium on information interaction in context. (371-376). New York, NY: ACM.
Hierarchical information gathering task (topical search) IG task: "the goal... is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic"; Simple: "the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept; this is a depth search, where a single topic is explored" (p.2173) Gwizdka, J. (2010). Distribution of cognitive load in web search. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(11), 2167-2187.
Hierarchical search (H) where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept; this is a depth search, where a single topic is explored Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., & Liu, J. (2010). Helping identify when users find useful documents: examination of query reformulation intervals. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 215-224). New York, NY: ACM.
Hierarchical/dependent tasks "where the search uses a single concept for which multiple attributes or characteristics are sought" (p.3) Liu, J. & Belkin, N. (2014). Multi-aspect information use task performance: The roles of topic knowledge, task structure, and task stage. Proceedings of the Annual meeting of the Association for Information Science & Technology (ASIS&T).
High complexity task "a vaguely formulated task requiring information from multiple sources" (p. 4) Lopatovska, I. (2009). Searching for good mood: Examining relationships between search task and mood. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 46(1), 1-13.
high-complexity definition not provided White, R., & Ruthven, I. (2006). A study of interface support mechanisms for interactive information retrieval. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 57(7), 933-948.
High-complexity task Consistent high difficulty evaluations from participants in pilot experiment. Lopatovska, I. (2014), Toward a model of emotions and mood in the online information search process. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 65: 1775-1793. doi: 10.1002/asi.23078
High-complexity task "High complexity task was defined as a vaguely formulated task requiring information from multiple sources." (p.4) Lopatovska, I. (2009). Searching for good mood: examining relationships between search task and mood. Proceedings of the 72th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science and Technology. November 6-11, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
High-Level Search Questions definition not provided Rouet, J.-F., Vidal-Abarca, E., Bert-Erboul, A., & Millogo, V. (2001). Effects of information search tasks on the comprehension of instructional text. Discourse Processes, 31 (2), 163-186.
highest complexity tasks "Bell and Ruthven [4] proposed to control the task complexity by changing the amount of information on a task (e.g., information need, process, and outcome) provided in the simulated work-task situation form. They created a LC task by providing a greater amount of information in the situation form, and created a HC task by providing less." (69) Joho, H., & Jose, J. M. (2006). Slicing and dicing the information space using local contexts. In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Information Interaction in Context (pp. 66-74). Copenhagen, Denmark: ACM.
HivInSite tasks Not defined Chi, E., Rosien, A., Supattanasiri, G., Williams, A., Royer, C., Chow, C., Robles, E., Dalal, B., Chen, J., Cousins, S. (2003). The Bloodhound project: Automating discovery of web usability issues using the InfoScent simulator. CHI '03, 505-512.
Hobbies and Personal Interests definition not provided White, R. W., & Kelly, D. (2006). A study on the effects of personalization and task information on implicit feedback performance. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 297-306). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Homepage "participants were asked to locate the homepage of an individual whom they did not know" (p. 177) "Characteristics - Requires genre classification (correct pages somewhat textual, many incorrect pages entirely textual)" (p. 177, Table 1) Woodruff, A., Rosenholtz, R., Morrison, J. B., Faulring, A., & Pirolli, P. (2002). A comparison of the use of text summaries, plain thumbnails, and enhanced thumbnails for web search tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(2), 172-185.
Homepage "Participants were asked to locate the homepage of an individual they did not know." (p.202) Woodruff, A., Faulring, A., Rosenholtz, R., Morrison, J., and Pirolli, P. (2001). Using thumbnails to search the Web. In Proceedings of the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2001 (Seattle).
Homepage finding Task - navigational The homepage finding task is a known-item task where the goal is to find the homepage (or site entry page) of the site described in a user query. Users are interested in finding a certain site. For example, Where is the site of John Hopkins Medical Institutions? or John Hopkins Medical Institutions  is the query of the homepage finding task. The goal of this query is finding the entry page of John Hopkins Medical Institutions. Kang, I., & Kim, G. C. (2004). Integration of multiple evidences based on a query type for web search. Information Processing and Management, 40(3), 459-478
How to get there: Deciding on transportation methods Chang, S. L. (2009). Information research in leisure: Implications from an empirical study of backpackers. Library Trends, 57(4), 711-728.
How to use “extra time” Allocating down time (e.g., transportation connections, waiting to check into a room, etc.) Chang, S. L. (2009). Information research in leisure: Implications from an empirical study of backpackers. Library Trends, 57(4), 711-728.
Hypothetical scenario undefined Keselman, A., Browne, A.C., & Kaufman, D.R. (2008). Consumer health information seeking as hypothesis testing. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, 15(4), 484-495.
identification "identify those [news] stories within a given pool that satisfy the given request (e.g., find stories about a person, place, thing, or topic)" (p.394) Merlino, A., & Maybury, M. (1999). An empirical study of the optimal presentation of multimedia summaries of broadcast news. In Mani, I., & Maybury, M.T. (Eds.), Advances in Automatic Text Summarization (pp. 391-401). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
identification and selection "identifying and selecting index terms" (9) Timbie, M., & Coombs, D. (1969). An interactive retrieval system: Case studies on the use of DIALOG to search the ERIC document file. Stanford University, ERIC Clearinghouse of Educational Media and Technology, Stanford, CA. ED 034 431.
Identify Zhang, Y., & Salaba, A. (2012). What do users tell us about FRBR-based catalogs? Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, 50(5-7), 705-723.
IH, Intellectual, High objective task complexity Product: intellectual versus decision/solution Objective complexity: low, moderate, or high Li, Y., & Belkin, N.J. (2010). An exploration of the relationships between work task and interactive information search behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(9), 1771-1789.
IL, Intellectual, Low objective task complexity Product: intellectual versus decision/solution Objective complexity: low, moderate, or high Li, Y., & Belkin, N.J. (2010). An exploration of the relationships between work task and interactive information search behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(9), 1771-1789.
ill-defined "Ill-defined tasks described a problem, but gave no specific way to solve it." [p. 56] Henninger, S. (1994) Using iterative refinement to find reusable software. IEEE Software, 11 (5), 48-59.
ill-defined searching task The ill-defined searching task was defined as having (a) vague goals, (b) a large number of open constraints requiring resolution, (c) many possible solutions, and (d)no clear directions for when to stop solving the problem (Churchman, 1971; Howard, 1983; Rietman, 1965; Rittel & Webber, 1973; Simon, 1973; Sinnott, 1983; Voss & Post, 1988)." (p. 844) Schacter, J., Chung, G.K.W.K., & Dorr, A. (1998). Children's Internet searching on complex problems: Performance and process analyses. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 49(9), 840-849.
Ill-defined topic Not defined Skov, M., & Ingwersen, P. (2008). Exploring information seeking behaviour in a digital museum context. Proceedings of the Second International Symposium on Information Interaction in Context (IIiX), 110-115.
Ill-defined topic (broad and semantically open) Not defined Skov, M., & Ingwersen, P. (2008). Exploring information seeking behaviour in a digital museum context. Proceedings of the Second International Symposium on Information Interaction in Context (IIiX), 110-115.
Ill-defined topical information need Not defined Skov, M. (2009). The Reinvented Museum: Exploring Information Seeking Behaviour in a Digital Museum Context. PhD thesis, Royal School of Library and Information Science, Denmark. pure.iva.dk/ws/files/30768221/MetteSkovThesis.pdf
IM, Intellectual, Moderate objective task complexity Product: intellectual versus decision/solution Objective complexity: low, moderate, or high Li, Y., & Belkin, N.J. (2010). An exploration of the relationships between work task and interactive information search behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(9), 1771-1789.
Image of a particular object "searching for an image of a particular object, e.g. a swan" (p.82) McDonald, S., & Tait, J. (2003). Search strategies in content-based image retrieval. In ACM SIGIR Proceedings, (pp. 80-87).
Image retrieval tasks "We asked them to imagine that they were a freelance designer, with responsibility for the design of leaflets on various subjects for the Scottish Tourist Board. We supplied them with a template for one of these leaflets, which identified the locations and the varying characteristics of 3 ‘slots’ where photographs were to be inserted. (One slot on the front page, for instance, was to be superimposed with some title text; another was to be inlaid with smaller images.) We told each subject to assume that their task was to make a selection, from a large collection of images, of those 3 images that in their opinion would be most appropriate for filling the slots in a leaflet covering a particular theme." (p.235) Jose, J.M., Furner, J., & Harper, D.J. (1998). Spatial querying for image retrieval: A user-oriented evaluation. Proceedings of the 21st ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development of Information Retrieval, 232-240.
Image search The participants engaged in finding images on the web as part of their normal activities. Choi, Y. (2013). Analysis of image search queries on the web: Query modification patterns and semantic attributes. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 64(7): 1423-1441.
Image search not defined Wang, X., Erdelez, S., Lu, Y., Allen, C., Anderson, B., Cao, H. & Shyu, C. R. (2011). Search tactics for medical image retrieval. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 48, 1-4.
Image search not defined Bar-Ilan, J., Zhitomirsky-Geffet, M., Miller, Y., & Shoham, S. (2010). Tag, cloud and ontology based retrieval of images. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 85-94
Image search not defined Kim, Y. (2010). Social tags in text and image search. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 353-358.
Image search not defined Bar-Ilan, J., Zhitomirsky-Geffet, M., Miller, Y., & Shoham, S. (2012). Tag-based retrieval of images through different interfaces: a user study. Online Information Review, 36(5), 739 - 757.
Image search "Participants searched in image databases for visual clues that might provide clues for fiirther text searches (such as the date or the name of a queen either found within an image of the queen or used to label the image)." (p. 133) Bowler, L. (2009). Genres of search: A concept for understanding successive search behavior. Canadian Journal of Information Science, 33(3), 119-140.
image search not defined Russell, D. M., & Grimes, C. (2007). Assigned tasks are not the same as self-chosen Web search tasks. In Proceedings of the 40th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS '07), 83-91.
image search not defined Chen, H. l. (2001). An analysis of image queries in the field of art history. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 52(3), 260-273.
image search not defined Choi, Y., & Rasmussen, E.M. (2002). User's relevance criteria in image retrieval in American history. Information Processing and Management, 38(5), 695-726.
Implementation Task definition not provided Hertzum, M., & Frokjaer, E. (1996). Browsing and querying in online documentation: A study of user interfaces and the interaction process. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 3(2), 136-161.
implicit feedback "the same system as the second experiment but with the voting buttons removed; users were told to use our system as they would any other web search service." (99) Thomas, P., & Hawking, D. (2006). Evaluation by comparing result sets in context. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 94-101). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
in-depth or exhaustive task "Collecting everything on a topic that is, conducting an exhaustive search to retrieve all available material." (p.4, based on Pfaffenberger, 1996); user requires "an in-depth or exhaustive collection of information" (p.7) Bhavnani, S.K., Drabenstott, K., & Radev, D. (2001). Towards a unified framework of IR tasks and strategies. ASIST 2001: Proceedings of the 64th ASIST Annual Meeting, 38, n.p.
Index Search Participant reads journal article; scenario of doing a term paper on the same topic; search Reader’s Guide on that topic and identify relevant items. "The stimulus document was an abridged version of the article: Eron, L. D. (1980). Prescription for reduction of aggression, American Psychologist, 35 (3), 244-252." (p.301) Allen, B. L. (1992). Cognitive differences in end-user searching of a CD-ROM index. Paper presented at the SIGIR 92: The 15th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval.
Index Search A few minutes ago you read a short article on a topic. Now, assume that you are doing a term paper on that topic for one of your courses. To do your term paper, you want to find additional information about the topic. You will be searching a computerized index called Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature to find additional articles about the topic. Allen, B. (1993). Logical reasoning and retrieval performance. Library & Information Science Research, 15(1), 93-105.
Index searching n/a Penniman, W. D. (1975). A Stochastic Process Analysis of Online User Behavior. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science, 12, 147-148.
Inferential/Nontext an inference drawn from combining two or more facts; physical format of the target entry (text or nontext) Mynatt B.T., Leventhal L.M., Instone K., Farhat J., & Rohlman D.S. (1992). Hypertext or book: Which is better for answering questions? Proceedings of Computer-Human Interface '92, 19-25.
Inferential/Text an inference drawn from combining two or more facts; physical format of the target entry (text or nontext) Mynatt B.T., Leventhal L.M., Instone K., Farhat J., & Rohlman D.S. (1992). Hypertext or book: Which is better for answering questions? Proceedings of Computer-Human Interface '92, 19-25.
Informaiton specialist/consultant Not defined Hansen, P., & Karlgren, J. (2005). Effects of foreign language and task scenario on relevance assessment. Journal of Documentation, 61(5), 623-639.
Informal search "The individual actively looks for information to deepen the knowledge and understanding of a specific issue. It is informal in that it involves a relatively limited and unstructured effort. The overall purpose is to gather information to elaborate an issue so as to determine the need for action by the organization." (p.6) Choo, C. W., Detlor, B., & Turnbull, D. (2000). Information seeking on the Web - an integrated model of browsing and searching. First Monday, 5(2). http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/729/638.
Information (without specification of numbers of types of entities) definition not provided Hert, C.A. (1996). User goals on an online public access catalog. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 47(7), 504-518.
Information about entities definition not provided Hert, C.A. (1996). User goals on an online public access catalog. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 47(7), 504-518.
Information gathering N/A Melguizo, M.C.P., Vidya, U., & Oostendorp, H. (2012). Seeking information online: The influence of menu type, navigation path complexity and spatial ability on information gathering tasks. Behaviour & Information Technology, 31(1), 59-70.
Information Gathering The goal of an information gathering task is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic. This type of task is also referred to as a topical search. Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., & Liu, J. (2010). Helping identify when users find useful documents: examination of query reformulation intervals. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 215-224). New York, NY: ACM.
Information gathering Gwizdka, J. (2009). What a difference a tag cloud makes: Effects of tasks and cognitive abilities on search results interface use. Information Research: An International Electronic Journal, 14(4)
Information Gathering Information Gathering involves the collection of information, often from multiple sources. This type of task can take place over a single day or may stretch out over several days. Unlike Fact Finding, you do not always know when you have completed the task, and there is no one specific answer. Examples include building a bibliography for a research paper, researching different car models when buying a new car, or planning an upcoming vacation." (1005) Kellar, M., Watters, C., & Shepherd, M. (2007). A field study characterizing web-based information-seeking tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(7), 999-1018. doi:10.1002/asi.20590
Information Gathering The objective is to collect information about a topic, often from more than one source Toms, E.G., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., Toze, S., Dawe, E., & MacNutt, A. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. In Focused Access to XML Documents, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4862, (pp. 359-372).
Information gathering "in-depth searching to make a decision or gather knowledge" (p.1190). MacKay, B., & Watters, C. (2012). An examination of multisession web tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63(6), 1183-1197.
Information gathering n/a Larsen, B., Malik, S., & Tombros, A. (2008). A comparison of interactive and ad-hoc relevance assessments. Lecture Notes in Computer science, 4862, 348-358.
Information gathering The objective is to collect miscellaneous information about a topic Malik, S., Tombros, A., & Larsen, B. (2007). The Interactive Track at INEX 2006. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4518, 387-399.
Information Gathering (IG) "The goal of an information gathering task is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic." (p. 1) Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., & Belkin, N. (2010). Analysis of query reformulation types on different search tasks. In proceedings of the 2010 iSchool iConference, 477-485.
Information Gathering - Hierarchical "The goal of an information-gathering task is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic. This type of task also is referred to as a topical search." (p.2454) "The tasks also were divided into three categories that depended on the structure of the underlying information need... (b) Hierarchical (H), where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept (a depth search)." (p.2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(12), 2452-2464.
Information Gathering - Hierarchical "The goal of an information-gathering task is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic. This type of task also is referred to as a topical search." (p.2454) "The tasks also were divided into three categories that depended on the structure of the underlying information need... (c) Parallel (P), where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy (a breadth search)." (p.2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(12), 2452-2464.
Information gathering task "x The task should indicate uncertainty or ambiguity in information need, or need for discovery. x The task should require knowledge acquisition, comparison, or discovery. x The task should provide a low level of specificity about the information required in the task and how to find such information. x The task should provide enough imaginative contexts for the study participants to be able to relate and apply the situation." (p.1690) Alhenshiri, A., Watters, C., Shepherd, M., & Duffy, J. (2012). Building support for Web information gathering tasks. Proceedings of the 45th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), 1687-1696.
information gathering tasks not defined Benoit, G. & Agarwal, N. (2012). All-visual retrieval: How people search and respond to an affect-driven visual information retrieval system. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
information gathering tasks "information gathering about several items and selecting those that satisfied several criteria" (p. 2) Gwizdka, J. (2013). Searchers Switch Tactics Under Increased Mental Load. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-3.
Information Gathering, Hierarchical Information Gathering: "The objective is to collect information about a topic, often from more than one source"; Hierarchical: "The search uses a single concept for which multiple attributes or characteristics are sought; this is a depth search, that is, a single topic explored more widely" (p.362) Toms, E., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., & Toze, S. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. Workshop Pre-Proceedings in Initiative for the Evaluation of XML Retrieval (pp. 359-372).
Information Gathering, Hierarchical Structure "The goal of an information gathering task is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic... [A task with hierarchical structure is one] where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple characteristics of a single concept (a depth search)" (p.2) Gwizdka, J. (2008). Revisiting search task difficulty: Behavioral and individual difference measures. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 45, 12 pages.
Information gathering, Multiple Information gathering tasks (which involve the collection of information for which there is no one specific answer) that ask the user to locate multiple pieces of information. Liu, J., Gwizdka, J., Liu, C., Belkin, N. (2010). Predicting Task Difficulty for Different Task Types. In Proceedings of the 73rd ASIS&T Annual Meeting on Navigating Streams in an Information Ecosystem. New York, NY: ACM.
Information Gathering, Parallel Information Gathering: "The objective is to collect information about a topic, often from more than one source"; Parallel: "The search uses multiple concepts that exist on the same level in a conceptual hierarchy; this is a breadth search" (p.362) Toms, E., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., & Toze, S. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. Workshop Pre-Proceedings in Initiative for the Evaluation of XML Retrieval (pp. 359-372).
Information Gathering, Parallel Structure "The goal of an information gathering task is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic... [A task with parallel structure is one] where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy (a breadth search)" (p.2) Gwizdka, J. (2008). Revisiting search task difficulty: Behavioral and individual difference measures. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 45, 12 pages.
information location and comprehension require the ability to locate and understand info displayed by the online cataog Sit, R. A. (1998). Online library catalog search performance by older adult users. Library & Information Science Research, 20(2), 115-131.
Information problem-solving task Study task, which require the students to develop a writing product. Brand-Gruwel, S., Wopereis, I., & Vermetten, Y. (2005). Information problem solving by experts and novices: Analysis of a complex cognitive skill. Computers in Human Behavior, 21, 487-508.
Information retrieval ...information retrieval is a sub-task of an information seeking-task. Whereas information-seeking tasks focus on the satisfaction of an entire information need through the consultation of several sources, information-retrieval tasks focus on the satisfaction of a separable fraction of an information need through the consultation of a single source. Thus, one information-seeking task may include several information- retrieval tasks or in cases where the whole information need is satisfied by using a single source, an information seeking-task becomes equal to an information-retrieval task. Bystrom, K. and Hansen, P. (2002). Work tasks as units for analysis in information seeking and retrieval studies. In: Emerging Frameworks and Methods: Fourth International Conference on Conceptions of Library and Information Science (CoLIS4) , 21-25 July 2002, Seattle, Washington, USA.
Information Search definition not provided Allen, B. (1994). Perceptual speed, learning and information retrieval performance. Paper presented at the SIGIR '94: The Seventeenth Annual International ACM-SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, Dublin, Ireland.
Information Search definition not provided Brucks, M. (1985). The Effects of Product Class Knowledge on Information Search Behavior, Journal of Consumer Research, 12 (June) , 1-15.
information search task "The search task began with an instruction page, followed by the navigation aid for a given condition." (101) Boechler, P. M., & Dawson, M. R. W. (2002). Effects of navigation tool information on hypertext navigation behavior: A configural analysis of page-transition data. Journal of Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia, 11(2), 95-115.
Information search task definition not provided Lykke, M., Price, S., & Delcambre, L. (2012). How doctors search: A study of query behaviour and the impact on search results. Information Processing and Management, 48(6), 1151.
Information search task "Subjects were asked to find information on an assigned topic and then copy-paste the URLs and portions of website content they found useful for the task into a Word document... Subjects were given up to 10 minutes for each information search task." (p.10) Rieh, S.Y. (2014). Credibility assessment of online information in context. Journal of Information Science Theory and Practice, 2(3), 6-17.
information search tasks "participants carried out navigational and content-related tasks"(1039) Chevalier, A., & Kicka, M. (2006). Web designers and web users: Influence of ergonomic quality of the web site on the information search. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 64, 1031-1048.
Information seeking purposive seeking for information as a consequence of a need to satisfy some goal Rieh, S.Y. and Hilligoss, B. (2007). College students' credibility judgments in the information seeking process. In Metzger, M. and Flanagin, A. (Eds.) Digital Media, Youth, and Credibility. MA: The MIT Press.
Information seeking Information seeking is a central part of information intensive work tasks. It may also be seen as a "task" that includes task construction, task performance, and task completion. Task construction consists of the analysis of the information needed. Task performance is comparable with actual information seeking, that is, the actions taken to gather the needed information. Task completion for information seeking tasks may be described as the evaluation of the results of information seeking. As a part of the work task, information-seeking tasks are also outlined by the work organization. This means that information-seeking tasks depend on the work task being attended to but the range of information needs and the resources required to satisfy them are limited (occasionally) for no apparent reason. Bystrom, K. and Hansen, P. (2002). Work tasks as units for analysis in information seeking and retrieval studies. In: Emerging Frameworks and Methods: Fourth International Conference on Conceptions of Library and Information Science (CoLIS4) , 21-25 July 2002, Seattle, Washington, USA.
Information Seeking definition not provided Bowler, L. (2010). The self-regulation of curiosity and interest during the information search process of adolescent students.Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(7), 1332-n/a.
information tasks not defined Liu, J., Kim, C. S., & Creel, C. (2013). Why Do Users Feel Search Task Difficult? In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-4.
Information-exploration task n/a Golovchinsky, G. (1997). What the query told the link: the integration of hypertext and information retrieval. Proceedings of the eighth ACM Conference on Hypertext, 67-74.
Information-gathering "Tasks 'where the objective is to collect miscellaneous information about a topic'" (p.1720) Pharo, N., & Krahn, A. (2011). The effect of task type on preferred element types in an XML-based retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 62(9), 1717-1726.
Information-seeking Information-seekers were users with specific information goals for a Web-viewing session. Li, H. and Bukovac, J. L. (1999). Cognitive impact of banner ad characteristics: An experimental study. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, Vol. 76(2), 341-353.
informational "asking subjects to find a specific bit of information" (p. 155) Joachims, T., Granka, L., Pan, B., Hembrooke, H. & Gay, G. (2005). Accurately interpreting clickthrough data as implicit feedback. SIGIR '05: Proceedings of the 28th annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 154-161
Informational None given Buscher, G., Dumais, S. and Cutrell, E. (2010). The good, the bad, and the random: An eye-tracking study of ad quality in Web search. In Proceedings of SIGIR.
Informational "[A]sking subjects to find a specific bit of information." (p.155) Joachims, T., Granka, L., Gay, G., Hembrooke, H., & Pan, B. (2005). Accurately interpreting click-through data as implicit feedback. Proceedings of the Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval (SIGIR '05) (pp. 154-161), Salvador, Brazil.
informational "For finding information on one or two web pages" (p.528) Kim, J., Thomas, P., Sanakaranarayana, R., Gedeon, T., & Yoon, H.-J. (2015). Eye-tracking analysis of user behavior and performance in web search on large and small screens. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(3), 526-544.
Informational "Informational tasks require finding a particular fact..." Pan, B., Hembrooke, H., Joachims, T., Lorigo, L., Gay, G., and Granka, L. (2007). In Google we trust: users' decisions on rank, position, and relevance. Journal of CMC 12, 801-823.
Informational n/a Dumais, S., Buscher, G., and Cutrell E. (2010) Individual Differences in Gaze Patterns for Web Search. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Search results and snippets (pp. 185-194). New York, NY: ACM.
Informational The intent is to acquire some information assumed to be present on one or more web pages. (p.5) Broder, A. (2002). A taxonomy of web search. SIGIR Forum, 36(2), 3-10.
informational search "Where the topic is unknown to the searcher, the query intent is “informational” and the searcher uses the query results to form an understanding of the topic." (p. 2456) Smith, G., Brien, C. & Ashman, H. (2012). Evaluating implicit judgments from image search clickthrough data. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(12), 2451-2462.
informational search not defined Hu, R., Lu, K., & Joo, S. (2013). Effects of Topic Familiarity and Search Skills on Query Reformulation Behavior. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-9.
Informational task ...the goal is to acquire some kind of information irrespective of where it might be located. Cutrell, E., Guan, Z. (2007). What Are You Looking For? An Eye-tracking Study of Information Usage in Web Search. CHI 2007 Proceedings, 407-416.
Informational task ...involve the intent to acquire some information assumed to be present on one or more web pages.. Terai, H., Saito, H., Egusa, Y., Takatu, M., Miwi, M., and Kando, N. (2008). Differences between informational and transactional tasks in information seeking on the web. Proceedings of the second international symposium on Information interaction in context, pp. 152-159
informational tasks "informational tasks arise when the intent is to find information about a topic that may reside on one or more web pages" (p.1124) Lorigo, L., Pan, B., Hembrooke, H., Joachims, T., Granka, L., & Gay, G. (2006). The influence of task and gender on search and evaluation behavior using Google. Information Processing & Management, 42(4), 1123-1131.
informational tasks tasks that ask subjects to find a specific piece of information Joachims, T., Granka, L., Pan, B., Hembrooke, H., Radlinski, F., & Gay, G. (2007). Evaluating the accuracy of implicit feedback from clicks and query reformulations in Web search. ACM Trans. Inf. Syst., 25(2), 7.
Instance finding task "Subjects are asked to find as many different instances or answers to the query as possible" (p.43) Joho, H., Sanderson, M., & Beaulieu, M. (2004). A study of user interaction with a concept-based interactive query expansion support tool. Advances in Information Retrieval. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 2997, 42-56.
Instance recall Task Subjects followed the guidelines set forth for the Interactive Track, in that they were instructed to ``identify as many aspects as possible for each topic, within a 20-min time period for each topic''. Following TREC Interactive Track protocol, each searcher was given a prede®ned set of six topics to search. Belkin, NJ., Cool, C., Kelly, D., Lin, SJ., Park, SY., Perez-Carballo, J., & Sikora, C. 2001. Iterative exploration, design and evaluation of support for query reformation in interactive information retrieval. Information Processing & Management 37(3): 403-434.
Instance recall tasks "Instance recall was defined as the number of instances of a topic retrieved" (p.226) Turpin, A.H., & Hersh, W. (2001). Why batch and user evaluations do not give the same results. Proceedings of the 24th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 225-231.
Instance recall tasks Not defined Wu, M., Fuller, M., & Wilkinson, R. (2001). Using clustering and classification approaches in interactive retrieval. Information Processing & Management, 37(3), 459-484.
Intellectual task As defined by Li & Belkin, 2008 Liu, J., Kim, C.S., & Creel, C. (2015). Exploring search task difficulty reasons in different task types and user knowledge groups. Information Processing & Management, 51, 273-285.
Intelligence Tasks The tasks that the information systems participate in are realistic. In our studies, after given an RFI, an analyst starts to explore large volumes of data from various sources with the help of information systems and generates a short summary of information collected, typically a two-page point report. This is the real information exploration process, and the outcome is real too. The tasks modeled in the framework are complex. Each task is related to a seminal event. The information requests specified in an RFI are focused on that event itself and its different aspects. The events can have multiple aspects. The assigned tasks usually include specific subtasks, all of which are connected to the overall task.  These tasks are dynamic. Events naturally evolve over time. An intelligence analyst then may have to track the development of the events over several sessions before producing the final point paper.  Information collected is at passage level. Although documents would still play important roles in task-based information exploration – because the outcome is a point paper – the useful information is typically contained in specific text passages (snippets). Because of their high density of useful information and small size, these passages are perfect for investigation or report writing. He, D., Brusilovsky, P., Ahn, J., Grady, J., Farzan, R., Peng, Y., Yang, Y., & Rogati, M. (2008). An evaluation of adaptive filtering in the context of realistic task-based information exploration. Information Processing and Management, 44(2), 511-533.
Intermediary search n/a Hurt, C.D. (1983). Intermediaries, self-searching, and satisfaction. Proceedings of the National Online Meeting, Medford, N.J.: Learned Information, 231-8.
Intermediate "Six search tasks of varying difficulty were identified for use in the study. The easier tasks had wording identical or similar to the wording in links pointing to answer locations, while the more difficult tasks required more interpretation." (178) Khan, K., & Locatis, C. (1998). Searching through cyberspace: The effects of link cues and correspondence on information retrieval from hypertext on the World Wide Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 49(14), 1248-1253.
Internet queries "Generated to be a broad brushstroke of interesting Internet queries" (p.124) Dennis, S., Bruza, P., & McArthur, R. (2002). Web searching: A process-oriented experimental study of three interactive search paradigms. Journal of the American society for Information Science & Technology, 53(2), 120-133.
Interpretive Specific question & general answer Kim, J. (2006). Task difficulty as a predictor and indicator of web searching interaction. In CHI '06 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 959-964). Montreal, Quebec, Canada: ACM.
Interpretive (IN) "The product of a search task [is]... intellectual (to enhance the user’s understanding of a topic). The goal of a search task [is]... specific (well-defined and fully developed)." (p.608) Jiang, J., He, D., & Allan, J. (2014). Searching, browsing, and clicking in a search session: Changes in user behavior by task and over time. SIGIR Proceedings, 607-616.
Interpretive Task "the interpretive task is a rather open-ended but goal-oriented task which requires a paragraph(s) or passage(s) for its answer" (174) Kim, J. (2008). Task as a context of information seeking: An investigation of daily life tasks on the web. LIBRI 58(3): 172-181.
Interpretive task "An interpretive task is a "thinking/understanding and searching" task, that is, a task to configure an answer rather than simply and concisely locate one. It is rather open-ended but more focused and goal-oriented than an exploratory task. It may have more than one answer that can be supported with evidence from the text. The expected outcome for the interpretive task is a paragraph(s) or passage(s) to summarize, describe, explain, interpret, infer, contrast, predict, associate, distinguish, estimate, differentiate, or discuss, etc." (p. 683) Kim, J. (2009). Describing and Predicting Information-Seeking Behavior on the Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 60(4): 679-693.
Interpretive task An interpretive task is a 'thinking/understanding and searching' task, that is, a task to configure an answer rather than simply and concisely locate one. It is rather open-ended, but more focused and goal-oriented than an exploratory task. It may have more than one answer that can be supported with evidence from the text. The expected outcome... is a paragraph(s) or passage(s) to summarize, describe, explain, interpret, infer, contract, predict, associate, distinguish, estimate, differentiate, or discuss, etc. (p.58) Kim, J. (2006). Task as a Predictable Indicator of Information Seeking Behavior on the Web. Unpublished dissertation, Rutgers University.
Interview Preparation "INT is a Mixed Product, because defining expertise is intellectual, and contact information is a fact; it is at the Document Level, because expertise is determined by a whole page; Goal Quality is Mixed, because determining expertise is amorphous but contact information is specific; it has Low Objective Complexity because only two people need to be found." (p.72) Liu, J., Cole, M., Liu, C., Bierig, R., Gwizdka, J., Belkin, N., Zhang, J., Zhang, X. (2010). Search behaviors in different task types. In Proceedings of the 10th annual joint conference on digital libraries (69-78.) New York, NY: ACM.
Interview Preparation (INT) not defined Liu, J., Liu, C., & Belkin, N. (2013). Examining the effects of task topic familiarity on searchers' behaviors in different task types. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 50, Article No. 38.
Interview Preparation (INT) INT is a Mixed Product, because defining expertise is intellectual, and contact information is a fact. It is at the Document Level, because expertise is determined by a whole page. The Goal Quality is Mixed, because determining expertise is amorphous but contact information is specific. It is Unnamed because the search targets are not specifically identified in the task. It has Low Complexity because only two people need to be found. p. 5 Cole, M.J., Gwizdka, J., Liu, C., & Belkin, N.J. (2011). Dynamic assessment of inforamtion acquisition effort during interactive search. ASIST Proceedings, n.p.
IR task "The scenario for this investigation builds on selecting a popular Associated Press story, providing a brief synopsis of the story and asking participants to find related news articles. Participants were asked to conduct this IR task to find more information on the subject of the news story." (Table 2 note, p.828) Koshman, S. (2005). Testing user interaction with a prototype visualization-based information retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 56(8), 824-833.
IR tasks Not defined further Koshman, S. (2004). Comparing usability between a visualization and text-based system for information retrieval. Journal of Documentation, 60(5), 565-580.
item search "Participants performed a search task for 30 items using the web site." Salmeron, L., Canas, J.J., & Fajardo, I. (2005). Are expert users always better searchers? Interaction of expertise and semantic grouping in hypertext search tasks. Behaviour & Information Technology, 24, 471-475.
Item tasks "Item tasks involve looking for a particular email or web page, perhaps to pass on to someone else or when the entire contents are needed to complete the task." p.26 Elsweiler, D., & Ruthven, I. (2007). Toward task-based personal information management evaluations. Proceedings of the 30th ACM Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 22-30.
Item tasks Item tasks involve looking for a particular email or web page, perhaps to pass on to someone else or when the entire contents are needed to complete the task. Elsweiler, D. and Ruthven, I. (2007). Towards task-based personal information management evaluations. Proceedings of the 30th annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, pp. 23 - 30.
Item tasks ...where a single email [item] is required... Elsweiler, D., Baillie, M., & Ruthven, I. (2008). Exploring memory in email refinding. ACM Transactions on Information Systems. 26(4), Article 21.
Item tasks "Item tasks involved finding complete emails perhaps to print out or forward to someone else." (p. 27) Elsweiler, D., Losada, D. E., Toucedo, J. C., & Fernandez, R. T. (2011). Seeding simulated queries with user-study data for personal search evaluation. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 25-34.
Jobs/Career/Funding definition not provided White, R. W., & Kelly, D. (2006). A study on the effects of personalization and task information on implicit feedback performance. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 297-306). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Keyword searching using a “key” word found in a record’s title or description, using the catalog’s keyword searching funciton Sit, R. A. (1998). Online library catalog search performance by older adult users. Library & Information Science Research, 20(2), 115-131.
keyword searching not defined Zhang, T. (2013). User-Centered Evaluation of a Discovery Layer System with Google Scholar. In Marcus A. (Ed). Design, User Experience, and Usability. Web, Mobile, and Product Design. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer Berlin Heidelberg: 313-322.
keyword searching not defined Burt, M. & Liew, C. L. (2012). Searching with clustering: An investigation into the effects on users' search experience and satisfaction. Online Information Review, 36(2), 278 - 298.
keyword-based search definition not provided Wolfram, D., & Dimitroff, A. (1997). Preliminary findings on searcher performance and perceptions of performance in a hypertext bibliographic retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 48(12), 1142-1145.
Keywords task Participants... were requested to generate and type in as many keywords as possible that were relevant to the corresponding topic domain. (p.630) Kammerer, Y., Nairn, R., Pirolli, P., & Chi, E.H. (2009). Signpost from the masses: Learning effects in an exploratory social tag search browser. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 625-634.
knowledge-intensive tasks not defined Wu, I. C. (2011). Toward supporting information-seeking and retrieval activities based on evolving topic-needs. Journal of Documentation, 67(3): 525-561.
Known "A complete description of the item is given. There is only one item that fits the criteria given." (p.708) Ramdeen, S., & Hemminger, B. (2012). A tale of two interfaces: How facets affect the library catalog search experience. JASIST, 63(4), 702-715.
Known item (graphic based) search definition not provided Hsieh-Yee, I. (1998). Search tactics of Web users in searching for texts, graphics, known items and subjects: A search simulation study. In H. Iyer (Ed.), Electronic Resources: Use and User Behavior (pp. 61-83). New York: Haworth Press.
Known item (KI) "The product of a search task [is]... factual (to locate facts)... The goal of a search task [is]... specific (well-defined and fully developed)." (p.608) Jiang, J., He, D., & Allan, J. (2014). Searching, browsing, and clicking in a search session: Changes in user behavior by task and over time. SIGIR Proceedings, 607-616.
Known item (or song) searches Not defined further Taheri-Panah, S., & MacFarlane, A. (2004). Music information retrieval systems: Why do individuals use them and what are their needs? Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Music Information Retrieval (ISMIR). http://ismir2004.ismir.net/proceedings/p083-page-455-paper110.pdf.
Known item (text based) search definition not provided Hsieh-Yee, I. (1998). Search tactics of Web users in searching for texts, graphics, known items and subjects: A search simulation study. In H. Iyer (Ed.), Electronic Resources: Use and User Behavior (pp. 61-83). New York: Haworth Press.
Known item + data element Not defined Skov, M., & Ingwersen, P. (2008). Exploring information seeking behaviour in a digital museum context. Proceedings of the Second International Symposium on Information Interaction in Context (IIiX), 110-115.
Known item search Not specified Dimitroff, A., Wolfram, D., & Volz, A. (1996). Affective response and retrieval performance: Analysis of contributing factors. Library & Information Science Research, 18(2), 121-132.
Known item search Author and/or title Wolfram, D., Volz, A., & Dimitroff, A. (1996). The effect of linkage structure on retrieval performance in a hypertext-based bibliographic retrieval system. Information Processing & Management, 32(5), 529-541.
Known Item search Subjects were shown an image and asked to retrieve it so that they could become accustomed to the system. (724) - This was used as the training task Fukumoto, T. (2006). An analysis of image retrieval behavior for metadata type image database. Information Processing & Management, 42(3), 723-728.
Known Item Search N/A Tagliacozzo, R., & Kochen, M. (1970). Information seeking behavior of catalog users. Information Storage and Retrieval, 6(5), 363-381.
Known item search task "This task asked participants to find the information about a topic which was previously known by the searcher. In out experiment, participants were asked to find the current whereabouts of a person who assumed to be a previous colleague of the searcher." (p.306) Joho, H., & Jose, J.M. (2006). A comparative study of the effectiveness of search result presentation on the Web. Advances in Information Retrieval. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3936, 302-313.
Known item task "This task asked participants to find information about a topic which was previously known." [p.230] Joho, H., & Jose, J. M. (2008). Effectiveness of additional representations for the search result presentation on the web. Information Processing and Management, 44, 226-241.
Known item, book citation definition not provided Gross, J. & Sheridan, L. (2011). Web scale discovery: The user experience. New Library World, 112(5/6), 236-247.
Known item, electronic reserve definition not provided Gross, J. & Sheridan, L. (2011). Web scale discovery: The user experience. New Library World, 112(5/6), 236-247.
Known item, journal citation definition not provided Gross, J. & Sheridan, L. (2011). Web scale discovery: The user experience. New Library World, 112(5/6), 236-247.
Known item/data n/a Westman, S., Lustila, A., and Oittinen, P. (2008). Search strategies in multimodal image retrieval. Proceedings of the second international symposium on Information interaction in context (London, United Kingdom), 13-20.
Known subject (KS) "The product of a search task [is]... factual (to locate facts)... The goal of a search task [is]... amorphous (ill-defined or unclear goals that may evolve along with the user’s exploration)." (p.608) Jiang, J., He, D., & Allan, J. (2014). Searching, browsing, and clicking in a search session: Changes in user behavior by task and over time. SIGIR Proceedings, 607-616.
known, genuine decision tasks "the type and structure of the result is a priori known, but permanent procedures for performing the tasks have not emerged yet. Thus, the process is largely indeterminable and so are its information requirements. Example: deciding about the location for a new factory or medium-range planning in organizations." (194) Bystrom, K. & Jarvelin, K. (1995). Task complexity affects information seeking and use. Information Processing and Management, 31, 191-213.
Known-item definition not provided Turner, N. B. (2011). Librarians do it differently: Comparative usability testing with students and library staff. Journal of Web Librarianship, 5(4), 286-298.
Known-item questions Not defined Dalrymple, P.W. (1990). Retrieval by reformulation in two library catalogs: Toward a cognitive model of searching behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 41(4), 272-281.
Known-item search Discrete and well-structured objects such as numbers, names, short statements, or specific files of text or other media. Portnoy, F. (2012). Avoiding Ad Avoidance: Factors Affecting The Perception Of Online Banner Ads. Unpublished dissertation, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
known-item search not defined Huang, C., Joo, S. & Xie, I. (2012). Effects of learning styles on the application of search tactics: A preliminary result. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
known-item search not defined Jozsa, E., Koles, M., Komlodi, A., Hercegfi, K., & Chu, P. (2012). Evaluation of search quality differences and the impact of personality styles in native and foreign language searching tasks. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 310-313
Known-item search Not defined Xie, I., & Joo, S. (2010). Tales from the field: Search strategies applied in web searching. Future Internet, 2(3), 259-281.
known-item search clearly specified tasks in which the query preview attributes are not relevant to the task Tanin, E., Lotem, A., Haddadin, I., Shneiderman, B., Plaisant, C., & Slaughter, L. (2000). Facilitating data exploration with query previews: a study of user performance and preference. Behaviour & Information Technology, 19(6), 393-403.
known-item search tasks "searchers were required to iden- tify a known piece of information" (p. 57) Diriye, A., Blandford, A., & Tombros, A. (2010). When is system support effective?. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 55-64.
Known-item searches not defined Akeroyd, J. (1990). Information Seeking in Online Catalogues. Journal of Documentation, 46(1), 33-52.
Known-item searching Not defined Xie, I., & Joo, S. (2012). Factors affecting the selection of search tactics: Tasks, knowledge, process, and systems. Information Processing and Management, 48(2), 254-270.
Known-item task "The known-item search tasks required subjects search for particular pieces of information (e.g., an email address, a name, a date or time)." (p. 690) White, R. W., & Marchionini, G. (2007). Examining the effectiveness of real-time query expansion. Information Processing & Management, 43(3), 685-704.
Known-item tasks Not defined Kules, B., & Capra, R. (2008). Creating exploratory tasks for a faceted search interface. HCIR 2008: Proceedings of the Second Workshop on Human-Computer Interaction and Information Retrieval, 18-21. http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/ryenw/hcir2008/doc/HCIR08-Proceedings.pdf.
Known-item tasks definition not provided Kules, B., Capra, R., Banta, M., & Sierra, T. (2009). What do exploratory searchers look at in a faceted search interface? Proceedings of the 9th ACM/IEEE-CS Joint Conference on Digital Libraries, 313-322.
Known-item tasks "The known-item search tasks required search for particular items of information (e.g., activities, discoveries, names) for which the target was well-defined." (p.162) White, R.W., Bilenko, M., & Cucerzan, S. (2007). Studying the use of popular destinations to enhance Web search interaction. Proceedings of the 30th Annual International ACM SIGIR conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 159-166.
Known-item tasks "known item searches are specific and easy to formulate queries" (p. 1) Gong, X., Ke, W. & Khare, R. (2012). Studying scatter/gather browsing for web search. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
Known-item tasks "The test person gets the assignment to find a known article based upon a complete title." (p. 482) Klas, C., Fuhr, N., & Schaefer, A. (2004). Evaluating Strategic Support for Information Access in the DAFFODIL System. In Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries (pp. 476-487). Presented at the ECDL 2004, Berlin: Springer.
Labelling of Categories Generated from Grouped-items Stimuli (353) "The other instrument produced labels for a subject category defined by three category members and explicitly asked the student to name a subject label and an alternate subject label for each group of items. The data substantiated grade level differences established by instrument one and allowed comparison between presentations of single versus multiple category members and match-success." (352) Brown, M.E. (1995). By any other name: Accounting for failure in the naming of subject categories. Library and Information Science Research, 17(4), 347-385.
Labelling of Categories Generated from Single-item Stimuli (353) "The first instrument produced labels for a subject category defined by a single category member and explicitly asked the student to name a subject label and an alternate subject label for each item. The data addressed the effects of grade level distinctions in affordance patterns and shifts in affordances on match-success." (352) Brown, M.E. (1995). By any other name: Accounting for failure in the naming of subject categories. Library and Information Science Research, 17(4), 347-385.
LC Task: Low Complexity definition not provided White, R. W., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J. M. (2005). A study of factors affecting the utility of implicit relevance feedback. In Proceedings of the 28th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval (pp. 35-42). Salvador, Brazil: ACM.
Learning "Seeking information with the goal of becoming familiar with an unfamiliar topic; gaining a general orientation and an understanding of key concepts" (p.3) Fruend, L. & Berzowska, J. (2010) The Goldilocks Effect: Task-Centred Assessments of E-Government Information. In Proceedings of the 73rd ASIS&T Annual Meeting on Navigating Streams in an Information Ecosystem. New York, NY: ACM.
less complex defined as less complex with only 2 facets (p. 745) Ford, N., Miller, D., Moss, N. (2005). Web search strategies and human individual differences: cognitive and demographic factors, Internet attitudes, and approaches. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 56(7), 741-756.
Library database search task complex command syntax, database field specification, keyword specification, and the use of Boolean operators
library-catalog searching not defined Comeauxa, D. J. (2012). Usability Testing of a Web-Scale Discovery System at an Academic Library. College & Undergraduate Libraries, 19(2-4): 189-206.
library-catalog searching not defined Bechera, M. & Schmidta, K. (2011). Taking Discovery Systems for a Test Drive. Journal of Web Librarianship, 5(3): 199-219.
library-catalog tasks not defined Emmanuel, J. (2011). Usability of the VuFind Next-Generation Online Catalog. Information Technology and Libraries, 30(1): 44-52.
Line question "Questions asking about relationships between one topic and many other topics, whose answer resides in many 'dots' over a 'line'" in the diagram (p.8) Qu, Y., Furnas, G., & Walstrum, B. (2006). Using category information for relationship exploration in textual data. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 43, n.p.
List tasks "List type tasks asked searchers to create a list of products that are connected to the topic of their tasks (e.g. a list of found speech recognition software)." (p.1070) Szlavik, Z., Tombros, A., & Lalmas, M. (2006). Investigating the use of summarisation for interactive XML retrieval. Proceedings of the 2006 ACM symposium on Applied computing, 1068-1072.
List type tasks "List type tasks asked searchers to create a list of products that are connected to the topic of their tasks (e.g. a list of speech recognition software)." (p.79) Szlavik, Z., Tombros, A., & Lalmas, M. (2006). The use of summaries in XML retrieval. In Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries (Proceedings of the 10th European Conference on Digital Libraries, Alicante, Spain, September 17-22, 2006), 75-86.
literature search definition not provided Proud, V. K., Schmidt, F. J., Johnson, E. D., & Mitchell, J. A. (1989). Teaching human genetics in biochemistry by computer literature searching. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 44, 597.
Literature search task definition not provided Vanopstal, K., Stichele, R. V., Laureys, G., & Buysschaert, J. (2012). PubMed searches by Dutch‐speaking nursing students: The impact of language and system experience. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology,63(8), 1538-1552.
Local comparison "Local comparison tasks involved comparison of several nodes that were reasonably close together in the tree structures." (p.30) Pirolli, P., Card, S.K., & van der Wege, M.M. (2003). The effects of information scent on visual search in the Hyperbolic Tree Browser. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(1), 20-53.
Local comparison "Local comparison tasks involved comparison of several nodes that were reasonably close together in the tree structures." (p.30) Pirolli, P., Card, S., Van Der Wege, M. (2001). The effects of information scent on visual search in the hyperbolic tree browser. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(1), 20-53.
local information not defined Russell, D. M., & Grimes, C. (2007). Assigned tasks are not the same as self-chosen Web search tasks. In Proceedings of the 40th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS '07), 83-91.
locate on page something "interesting", related concept, tagged information, specific string, and image Byrne, M.D., John, B.E., Wehrle, N.S., & Crow, D.C. (1999). The tangled Web we wove: A taskonomy of WWW use. CHI Proceedings, 544-551.
Location-specific queries "Queries representing a desire for information about a product in a specific geographical location" (p.1953) Jansen, B.J., & Resnick, M. (2006). An examination of searcher's perceptions of nonsponsored and sponsored links during ecommerce web searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 57(14), 1949-1961.
look-up tasks not defined Singer, G., Norbisrath, U., Vainikko, E., Kikkas, H., & Lewandowski, D. (2011). Search-logger analyzing exploratory search tasks. In Proceedings of the 2011 ACM Symposium on Applied Computing, 751-756.
Lookup ...involve finding specific information... Elsweiler, D., Baillie, M., & Ruthven, I. (2008). Exploring memory in email refinding. ACM Transactions on Information Systems. 26(4), Article 21.
Lookup tasks Lookup tasks involve searching for specific information from within a resource, for example an email or a web page, where the resource may or may not be known. Elsweiler, D. and Ruthven, I. (2007). Towards task-based personal information management evaluations. Proceedings of the 30th annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, pp. 23 - 30.
Lookup tasks "Lookup tasks involved finding specific pieces of information, such as passwords or phone numbers from an email." (p. 27) Elsweiler, D., Losada, D. E., Toucedo, J. C., & Fernandez, R. T. (2011). Seeding simulated queries with user-study data for personal search evaluation. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 25-34.
Lookup tasks "Lookup tasks involve searching for specific information from within a resource, for example an email or a web page, where the resource may or may not be known." p.25 Elsweiler, D., & Ruthven, I. (2007). Toward task-based personal information management evaluations. Proceedings of the 30th ACM Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 22-30.
Low complexity task "a task that provided subjects with more information on what needs to be found" (p. 4) Lopatovska, I. (2009). Searching for good mood: Examining relationships between search task and mood. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 46(1), 1-13.
low-complexity definition not provided White, R., & Ruthven, I. (2006). A study of interface support mechanisms for interactive information retrieval. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 57(7), 933-948.
Low-complexity task Consistent low difficultly evaluations from participants in pilot experiment. Lopatovska, I. (2014), Toward a model of emotions and mood in the online information search process. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 65: 1775-1793. doi: 10.1002/asi.23078
Low-complexity task "Low complexity task was defined as a task that provided subjects with more information on what needs to be found." (p.4) Lopatovska, I. (2009). Searching for good mood: examining relationships between search task and mood. Proceedings of the 72th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science and Technology. November 6-11, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Low-Level Search Questions definition not provided Rouet, J.-F., Vidal-Abarca, E., Bert-Erboul, A., & Millogo, V. (2001). Effects of information search tasks on the comprehension of instructional text. Discourse Processes, 31 (2), 163-186.
lowest complexity tasks "Bell and Ruthven [4] proposed to control the task complexity by changing the amount of information on a task (e.g., information need, process, and outcome) provided in the simulated work-task situation form. They created a LC task by providing a greater amount of information in the situation form, and created a HC task by providing less." (69) Joho, H., & Jose, J. M. (2006). Slicing and dicing the information space using local contexts. In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Information Interaction in Context (pp. 66-74). Copenhagen, Denmark: ACM.
Maintenance "changing or updating an online resource such as a web page" (p.1190). MacKay, B., & Watters, C. (2012). An examination of multisession web tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63(6), 1183-1197.
Manual n/a Bates, M. J. (1981). Search techniques. In M.E. Williams (Ed.), Annual review of information science and technology (pp. 139-169). New York: Knowledge Industry for American Society for Information Science.
Manual search n/a Bartolo, L. M. and Smith, T. D. (1993). Interdisciplinary work and the information search process: A comparison of manual and online searching. College and Research Libraries, 54(4), 344-353.
Many items search "the subjects [were asked] to compile a list of interesting things to do over a weekend stay in the city of Kyoto" (p.385) Tombros, A., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J.M. (2003). Searchers' criteria for assessing Web pages. Proceedings of the 26th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 385-386.
Many items task "In this task the participants were asked to compile a list of items. This task specifically asked the participants to compile a list of interesting things to do over a weekend in the city of Kyoto." (p.331) Tombros, A., Ruthven, I. and Jose, J.M. (2005). How users assess web pages for information-seeking. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 56(4), 327-344.
Many items task "This task asked participants to find as many items as they feel necessary about a certain topic. In this experiment, the task involved finding out interesting things to do at the city of Kyoto in Japan for a free weekend there. This task was a variant of aspectual search devised in the Interactive Track of TREC-7." (p.84) Joho, H., Birbeck, R.D., & Jose, J.M. (2007). An ostensive browsing and searching on the web. Proceedings of the 2nd International Workshop on Context-Based Information Retrieval, 81-92.
MC Task: Moderate Complexity definition not provided White, R. W., Ruthven, I., & Jose, J. M. (2005). A study of factors affecting the utility of implicit relevance feedback. In Proceedings of the 28th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval (pp. 35-42). Salvador, Brazil: ACM.
Mediated Search not defined Spink, A., Wilson, T.D., Ford, N., Foster, A., & Ellis, D. (2002). Information seeking and mediated searching study. Part 3. Successive searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 53(9), 716-727.
medical definition not provided Hersh, W.R., Crabtree, M.K., Hickam, D.H., Sacherek, L., Friedman, C.P., & Tidmarsh, P. (2002). Factors associated with success in searching MEDLINE and applying evidence to answer clinical questions. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, 9, 283-293.
Medium difficulty "The information search tasks consisted of three increasingly difficult search assignments" (p.109) Rosman, T., Mayer, A.-K., & Krampen, G. (2016). A longitudinal study on information-seeking knowledge in psychology undergraduates: Exploring the role of information literacy instruction and working memory capacity. Computers & Education, 96, 94-108.
Medium search task "We selected 20 topics by ranking the topics using normalized discounted cumulated gain (nDCG) [3] at depth 50 for queries that were collected from subjects in a prior study [4] that used all 50 topics... The nDCG values were averaged for each topic and topics were sorted into four bins: easy, medium, moderate, and difficult" (p.812). Bailey, E.W., Kelly, D., & Gyllstrom, K. (2009). Undergraduates' evaluations of assigned search topics. Proceedings 32nd Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 812-813.
Medium topics Those topics "about the median number of relevant documents... (M = 303), as "measured by the mean number of relevant documents in the Tipster collection as identified by information retrieval experts associated with TREC" (p.215) Pirolli, P., Schank, P., Hearst, M., & Diehl, C. (1996). Scatter/gather browsing communicates the topic structure of a very large text collection. Proceedings of the ACM SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 213-220.
mental searches "participants were asked to perform four "mental" searches during which they "talked" through a search in an imaginary system" (51) Liebscher, P. (1993). Information seeking in hypertext: Multiple access methods in a full-text hypertext database. University of Maryland.
Moderate search task "We selected 20 topics by ranking the topics using normalized discounted cumulated gain (nDCG) [3] at depth 50 for queries that were collected from subjects in a prior study [4] that used all 50 topics... The nDCG values were averaged for each topic and topics were sorted into four bins: easy, medium, moderate, and difficult" (p.812). Bailey, E.W., Kelly, D., & Gyllstrom, K. (2009). Undergraduates' evaluations of assigned search topics. Proceedings 32nd Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 812-813.
moderate-complexity definition not provided White, R., & Ruthven, I. (2006). A study of interface support mechanisms for interactive information retrieval. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 57(7), 933-948.
moderately ill-structured tasks The five experimental reference-seeking tasks were derived from the real examples of online bibliographic searches obtained by Vibert et al. (2007). Because the goal of two thirds of these examples was just to find “a few references” or “the most recent references” on a topic (see above), the experimental tasks were designed to be rather specific, with precise requirements, and the participants were asked to find only one or two references. Hence, all five experimental tasks were moderately ill-structured compared with more open reference search tasks. Vibert, N., Ros, C., Le Bigot, L., Ramond, M., Gatefin, J., & Rouet, J.-F. (2009). Effects of domain knowledge on reference search with the PubMed database: An experimental study. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(7), 1423-1447.
Monitoring definition not provided Kellar, M., Watters, C., & Shepherd, M. (2007). A field study characterizing web-based information-seeking tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(7), 999-1018. doi:10.1002/asi.20590
More complex queries "The second category required AND operators for joining three terms in the first case, two terms and a phrase in the second case, and two phrases in the third case. This categorization was based on data from our pilot study, which found these three cases to be of equivalent difficulty for searchers." (p.393) Topi, H., & Lucas, W. (2005). Searching the Web: Operator assistance required. Information Processing & Management, 41(2), 383-403.
Most complex queries "Queries associated with information requests in the third category were the most complex in that they required at least four terms or phrases and the use of the negation operator, NOT. In two of these cases, more compact queries could be formed by applying the NOT operator to a group of terms joined with disjunctive ORs." (p.393) Topi, H., & Lucas, W. (2005). Searching the Web: Operator assistance required. Information Processing & Management, 41(2), 383-403.
Muddled topical information need "You would like to explore an unknown topic" (p.187) Borlund, P., Dreier, S., & Bystrom, K. (2012). What does time spent on searching indicate? Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context (IIiX), 184-193.
Muddled topical information need "You would like to explore an unknown topic" (p.497) Borlund, P., & Dreier, S. (2014). An investigation of the search behaviour associated with Ingwersen's three types of information needs. Information Processing & Management, 50(4), 493-507.
Multi-item tasks "Multi-item tasks were tasks that required information that was contained within numerous web pages or email messages." p.26 Elsweiler, D., & Ruthven, I. (2007). Toward task-based personal information management evaluations. Proceedings of the 30th ACM Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 22-30.
Multi-item tasks Multi-item tasks were tasks that required information that was contained within numerous web pages or email messages. Often these tasks required the user to process or collate the information in order to solve the task. Elsweiler, D. and Ruthven, I. (2007). Towards task-based personal information management evaluations. Proceedings of the 30th annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, pp. 23 - 30.
Multi-item tasks ...where information needs to be recovered from multiple emails... Elsweiler, D., Baillie, M., & Ruthven, I. (2008). Exploring memory in email refinding. ACM Transactions on Information Systems. 26(4), Article 21.
Multi-item tasks "multi-item tasks involved re-finding multiple email messages and sometimes process- ing to content of those mails to complete the task." (p. 27) Elsweiler, D., Losada, D. E., Toucedo, J. C., & Fernandez, R. T. (2011). Seeding simulated queries with user-study data for personal search evaluation. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 25-34.
Multi-session tasks "there are many tasks that cannot be accomplished in one session but require multiple sessions for various reasons, such as the complexity of the task, the difficulty in locating desired information, time constraints, and so on." (p. 1058) Liu, J., Belkin, N. J., Zhang, X., & Yuan, X. (2013). Examining users' knowledge change in the task completion process. Journal Information Processing and Management, 49(5): 1058-1074.
Multi-step questions "Multi-step questions require advanced reasoning to combine information acquired over multiple queries in a session" (p. 132) Eickhoff, C., Dekker, P., & de Vries, A. P. (2012). Supporting children's web search in school environments. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 129-137.
multifaceted search topics definition not provided Dimitroff, A., & Wolfram, Z. (1995). Searcher response in a hypertext-based bibliographic information retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 46, 22-36.
Multiple choice questions "Designed to measure a user’s reading comprehension of a set of articles that have been summarized, and in which users are asked to find the answers to key factual questions surrounding the articles" (p.939) Otterbacher, J., Radev, D., & Kareem, O. (2008). Hierarchical summarization for delivering information to mobile devices. Information Processing & Management, 44(2), 931-947.
Multitasking Web search "Multiple information problems consisted of original information problems (OIP) which initiated study participants' Web search and evolving information problems (EIP) which were generated during the searching process." (p. 3.) Du, J. T. (2011). Study of multitasking, cognitive coordination and cognitive shifts in Web search: Preliminary findings. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 48: 1-6.
Name search n/a Wallace, P.M. (1993). How do patrons search the online catalog when no one's looking? Transaction log analysis and implications for bibliographic instruction and system design. RQ, 33, 239-252.
Natural Language Natural Language searching on words in the title and abstract (p. 5) Cleverdon, C. W. (1977). A comparative evaluation of searching by controlled language and natural language in an experimental NASA database. European Space Agency, Space Documentation Service. Draft Report.
Natural Language and Associated Concepts Natural Language also making use of the Associated Concepts File (p. 5) Cleverdon, C. W. (1977). A comparative evaluation of searching by controlled language and natural language in an experimental NASA database. European Space Agency, Space Documentation Service. Draft Report.
natural queries "Our second experiment considered the same questions and used the same technique, but participants were not assigned search tasks: users were instead encouraged to use our software in place of their regular Web search engine." (99) Thomas, P., & Hawking, D. (2006). Evaluation by comparing result sets in context. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 94-101). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
naturalistic "The Task Questionnaires elicited the tasks that were of current interest, or that were expected to be of interest, to the user during the study. Task was defined for this study as the goal of information-seeking behavior. Subjects were asked to think about their online information-seeking activities in terms of tasks, and to create personal labels for each task. They were provided with some example tasks such as “writing a research paper,” “travel,” and “shopping,” but in no other way were they directed, influenced or biased in their choice of tasks. Indeed, anything that a user believed was a task was permitted." (p.378) Kelly, D., & Belkin, N. J. (2004). Display time as implicit feedback: Understanding task effects. Paper presented at the Proceedings of SIGIR 2004, Sheffield, UK.
naturalistic "Two questionnaires, a pre-serach questionnaire and a post-search questionnaire, were used in this study. The self-administered pre-search questionnaires were used to collect each users' image search topic, a description of the topic, and keywords or phrases which they planned to use in their searches. They also drew pictures to represent their search topics. The participants were required to fill out the questionnaire and return it to the investigator before they started their searches. The self-administered post-search questionnaire was used to collect keywords or phrases whcih participants used in their searches. The post-search questionnaire also asked the participants to draw pictures they retrieved."(p.707) Chen, H.-l. (2001). An analysis of image retrieval tasks in the field of art history. Information Processing & Management, 37(5), 701-720.
Navigation "...navigational tasks involve searching for a particular Web page (Broder, 2002)." Pan, B., Hembrooke, H., Joachims, T., Lorigo, L., Gay, G., and Granka, L. (2007). In Google we trust: users' decisions on rank, position, and relevance. Journal of CMC 12, 801-823.
Navigation task definition not provided Laberge, J.C., & Scialfa, C.T. (2005). Predictors of Web navigation performance in a life span sample of adults. Human Factors, 47, 289-302.
navigational "asking subjects to find a specific Web page or homepage" (p. 155) Joachims, T., Granka, L., Pan, B., Hembrooke, H. & Gay, G. (2005). Accurately interpreting clickthrough data as implicit feedback. SIGIR '05: Proceedings of the 28th annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 154-161
Navigational None given Buscher, G., Dumais, S. and Cutrell, E. (2010). The good, the bad, and the random: An eye-tracking study of ad quality in Web search. In Proceedings of SIGIR.
Navigational "[A]sking subjects to find a specific Web page or homepage." (p.155) Joachims, T., Granka, L., Gay, G., Hembrooke, H., & Pan, B. (2005). Accurately interpreting click-through data as implicit feedback. Proceedings of the Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval (SIGIR '05) (pp. 154-161), Salvador, Brazil.
navigational "For reaching a particular page" (p.528) Kim, J., Thomas, P., Sanakaranarayana, R., Gedeon, T., & Yoon, H.-J. (2015). Eye-tracking analysis of user behavior and performance in web search on large and small screens. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(3), 526-544.
Navigational n/a Dumais, S., Buscher, G., and Cutrell E. (2010) Individual Differences in Gaze Patterns for Web Search. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Search results and snippets (pp. 185-194). New York, NY: ACM.
Navigational The immediate intent is to reach a particular site. (p.5) Broder, A. (2002). A taxonomy of web search. SIGIR Forum, 36(2), 3-10.
navigational searcg "Where the searcher knows something about what they are searching for, the query intent is “navigational,” that is, the searcher's purpose is to locate resources about a known topic." (p. 2456) Smith, G., Brien, C. & Ashman, H. (2012). Evaluating implicit judgments from image search clickthrough data. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(12), 2451-2462.
Navigational task ...users are trying to find a specific Web site or homepage that they have in mind; the goal is simply to get to their destination Cutrell, E., Guan, Z. (2007). What Are You Looking For? An Eye-tracking Study of Information Usage in Web Search. CHI 2007 Proceedings, 407-416.
Navigational tasks "tasks where the users intent is to find a particular web page, such as a homepage" (p.1124) Lorigo, L., Pan, B., Hembrooke, H., Joachims, T., Granka, L., & Gay, G. (2006). The influence of task and gender on search and evaluation behavior using Google. Information Processing & Management, 42(4), 1123-1131.
navigational tasks tasks that ask subjects to find a specific Web page or homepage Joachims, T., Granka, L., Pan, B., Hembrooke, H., Radlinski, F., & Gay, G. (2007). Evaluating the accuracy of implicit feedback from clicks and query reformulations in Web search. ACM Trans. Inf. Syst., 25(2), 7.
Neither text or heading The question does not include either "words from the topic heading immediately preceding the target information" or "words taken from the text in the neighborhood of the target information" (p.40) Egan, D.E., Remde, J.R., Gomez, L.M., Landauer, T.K., Eberhardt, J., & Lochbaum, C.C. (1989). Formative design-evaluation of SuperBook. ACM Transactions on Information Systems, 7(1),30-57.
New Area search "The most complex task (level four) is to let the test person find literature about a specific subject." (p. 482) Klas, C., Fuhr, N., & Schaefer, A. (2004). Evaluating Strategic Support for Information Access in the DAFFODIL System. In Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries (pp. 476-487). Presented at the ECDL 2004, Berlin: Springer.
New category, multiple parents "The subject was asked to... add a new category to the directory scheme" and "the target category and requested response involved... multiple parents/paths" (p.706) Risden, K., Czerwinski, M.P., Munzner, T., & Cook, D.B. (2000). An initial examination of ease of use for 2D and 3D information visualizations of web content. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 53(5), 695-714.
New category, one parent "The subject was asked to... add a new category to the directory scheme" and "the target category and requested response involved a single parent/path" (p.706) Risden, K., Czerwinski, M.P., Munzner, T., & Cook, D.B. (2000). An initial examination of ease of use for 2D and 3D information visualizations of web content. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 53(5), 695-714.
News and Weather definition not provided White, R. W., & Kelly, D. (2006). A study on the effects of personalization and task information on implicit feedback performance. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 297-306). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
News monitoring Not defined Hansen, P., & Karlgren, J. (2005). Effects of foreign language and task scenario on relevance assessment. Journal of Documentation, 61(5), 623-639.
News reading task Not defined O'Brien, H. L. & Lebow, M. (2013) Mixed-methods approach to measuring user experience in online news interactions. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 64(8): 1543-1556.
news search not defined Russell, D. M., & Grimes, C. (2007). Assigned tasks are not the same as self-chosen Web search tasks. In Proceedings of the 40th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS '07), 83-91.
Newspaper Article Task A few minutes ago you read an article on a topic. Now, assume that you have been asked to write an article in the student newspaper on this topic. To do this, you want to find additional information about the topic. You will be searching an experimental information retrieval system to find as many articles as you can about the topic so that you can write a well-informed article. Allen, B.L., & Kim, K.-S. (2001). Person and context in information seeking: Interactions between cognitive and task variables. New Review of Information Behaviour Research, 2, 1-16.
No type definition not provided Watters, C., Shepherd, M. A., & Qiu, L. (1994). Task-oriented access to data files: An evaluation. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 45(4), 251-262.
No-answer questions "Questions for which no information existed in the database." (p.1055) Lee, E., Whalen, T., McEwen, S., & Latremouille, S. (1984). Optimizing the design of menu pages for information retrieval. Ergonomics, 27, 1051-1069.
non-dividable search not defined Gonzalez-Ibanez, R. & Shah, C. (2012). Investigating positive and negative affects in collaborative information seeking: A pilot study report. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
non-navigational search tasks definition not provided Sushmita, S., Joho, H., & Lalmas, M. 2009. A task-based evaluation of an aggregated search interface. In Karlgren, J., Tarhio, J., & Hyyro, H. (Eds.) String Processing and Information Retrieval, Proceedings 5721, (pp. 322-333). Presented at 16th International Symposium on String Processing and Information Retrieval. Saariselka, Finland.
nonalphabetic characters definition not provided Woelfl, N. (1984). Individual differences in online search behavior: The effect of learning styles and cognitive abilities on process and outcome. Unpblished doctoral dissertation, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH.
None Type not described Bellardo, T. (1985). An investigation of online searcher traits and their relationship to search outcome. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 36(4), 241-250.
none type not described Underwood, J., Spavold, J., & Underwood, G. (1990). Novice use of a relational database: A case study of a local history data file. Computers in Education, 15(1-3), 227-232.
None "Eight questions asked at a public library or undergraduate academic library were searched on Dialog's version of MASAP (see Table 2, extracted from [10])." (p.111) Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
None Not defined Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
None definition not provided Willoughby, T., Anderson, S. A., Wood, E., Mueller, J., & Ross, C. (2009). Fast searching for information on the internet to use in a learning context: The impact of domain knowledge.Computers & Education, 52(3), 640-648.
None asks a yes/no question (p. 70) Thomas, P., Noack, K., & Paris, C. (2010). Evaluating Interfaces for Government Metasearch. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Interfaces and Systems (pp.65-74). New York, NY: ACM.
None asks for a list of answers (p. 70) Thomas, P., Noack, K., & Paris, C. (2010). Evaluating Interfaces for Government Metasearch. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Interfaces and Systems (pp.65-74). New York, NY: ACM.
None asks for a single answer (p. 70) Thomas, P., Noack, K., & Paris, C. (2010). Evaluating Interfaces for Government Metasearch. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Interfaces and Systems (pp.65-74). New York, NY: ACM.
None definition not provided Eastin, M.S., Yang, M. & Nathanson, A. (2006) Children of the net: An empirical exploration into the evaluation of internet content. Journal of Broadcasting &Electronic Media, 50(2), 211-230.
None definition not provided Gardois, P., Calabrese, R., Colombi, N., Deplano, A., Lingua, C., Longo, F., Villanaccit, M., Miniero, R., Piga, A. (2011). Effectiveness of bibliographic searches performed by paediatric residents and interns assisted by librarians. A randomised controlled trial. Health Information and Libraries Journal, 28(4), 273-284.
None definition not provided Hargittai, E., Fullerton, L., Menchen-Trevino, E., & Thomas, K. Y. (2010). Trust online: Young adults' evaluation of web content. International Journal of Communication, 4, 468-494.
None definition not provided Lokker, C., Haynes, R. B., Wilczynski, N. L., McKibbon, K. A., & Walter, S. D. (2011). Retrieval of diagnostic and treatment studies for clinical use through PubMed and PubMed's clinical queries filters. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA, 18(5), 652-659.
nonspecific browsing "...acquire information about something interesting..." pp.175 Chen, B., Wang, H., Proctor, R. W., & Salvendy, G. (1997). A human-centered approach for improving WorldWide Web Browsers. Behavior Research Methods, Vol.29(2), pp. 172-179.
Normal decision tasks "are still quite structured, but in them cased-based arbitration has a major role. Example: hiring an employee or evaluating student’s term paper." (194) Bystrom, K. & Jarvelin, K. (1995). Task complexity affects information seeking and use. Information Processing and Management, 31, 191-213.
Normal information-processing tasks "are almost completely a priori determinable, but require some case-based arbitration concerning, for instance, the sufficiency of the information normally collected. Thus, part of the process and information needed is a priori indeterminable. Example: Tax coding is mostly rule-based, but some cases require additional clarification (i.e., case-dependent information collection)." (194) Bystrom, K. & Jarvelin, K. (1995). Task complexity affects information seeking and use. Information Processing and Management, 31, 191-213.
Normal Internet queries definition not provided Dennis, S., Bruza, P., & McArthur, R. (2002). Web searching: a progress-oriented experimental study of three interactive search paradigms. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(2), 120-133.
Not named definition not provided Hargittai, E. (2002). Second-level digital divide: Differences in people's online skills. First Monday, 7(4).
Not named Not defined Allen, B. (1998). Information space representation in interactive systems: Relationship to spatial abilities. Proceedings of the Third ACM Conference on Digital Libraries, 1-10.
Not specified definition not provided Kelly, D., Cushing, A., Dostert, M., Niu, X., & Gyllstrom, K. (2010). Effects of popularity and quality on the usage of query suggestions during information search. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 45-54.
Not specified Not specified Allan, J., Leuski, A., Swan, R., & Byrd, D. (2001). Evaluating combinations of ranked lists and visualizations of inter-document similarity. Information Processing & Management, 37, 435-458.
Not specified Not specified Berenci, E., Carpineto, C., Giannini, V., & Mizzaro, S. (2000). Effectiveness of keyword-based display and selection of retrieval results for interactive searches. International Journal on Digital Libraries, 3(3), 249-260.
Not specified Not specified Brajnik, G., Mizzaro, S., & Tasso, C. (1996). Evaluating user interfaces to information retrieval systems: A case study on user support. SIGIR '96: Proceedings of the ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 128-136.
Not specified Not specified Hert, C. (2002). Developing and evaluating scenarios for use in designing the National Statistical Knowledge Network. Retrieved June 21, 2013, from http://ils.unc.edu/govstat/papers/scenario_paper_nov_14_2002.doc.
Not specified Subjects were "asked to identify the best book they could find in the library about that [given] topic". (p.106) Das Neves, F.A., & Fox, E.A. (2000). A study of user behavior in an immersive virtual environment for digital libraries. Proceedings of the Fifth ACM Conference on Digital Libraries, 103-111.
Not specified Not specified Finkelstein, L., Gabrilovich, E., Matias, Y., Rivlin, E., Solan, Z., Wolfman, G., & Ruppin, E. (2002). Placing search in context: The concept revisited. ACM Transactions on Information Systems, 20(1), 116-131.
Not specified Not specified Gauch, S., & Smith, J.B. (1991). Search improvement via automatic query reformulation. ACM Transactions on Information Systems, 9(3), 249-280.
Not specified Not specified Meyyappan, N., Foo, S., & Chowdhury, G.G. (2004). Design and evaluation of a task-based digital library for the academic community. Journal of Documentation, 60(4), 449-75.
Not specified "Participants were asked to find a web page that contained the answer to a question, from among a list of ten search results... questions were constructed with a unique answer that could be found in only one of the ten results" displayed (p.731) Paek, T., Dumais, S., & Logan, R. (2004). WaveLens: A new view onto internet search results. Proceedings of the ACM SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 727-734.
Not specified Not defined Vakkari, P., Jones, S., MacFarlane, A., & Sormunen, E. (2004). Query exhaustivity, relevance feedback and search success in automatic and interactive query expansion. Journal of Documentation, 60(2), 109-127.
Not specified definition not provided Xu, Y., & Liu, C. (2007). The dynamics of interactive information retrieval behavior, part II: An empirical study from the activity theory perspective. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(7), 987-998.
not specified "...tasks meant to discover the difficulty level of locating and retrieving information resources from the library's Web site." Task difficulty was described in terms of percent of participants who completed it successfully, percent whose first click was on the “best” route to the needed result, and the percent whose first click was on any direct route to the needed result (applicable to only 4 of the 8 search tasks). (Table 3) Mack, T., Manoff, M., Miller, T.J., & Smith, A.D. (2004). Designing for experts: How scholars approach an academic library Web site. Information Technology and Libraries, 23, 16-22.
Not specified definition not provided Large, A., Beheshti, J., & Moukdad, H. (1999). Information seeking on the Web: navigational skills of grade-six primary school students. Proceedings of the 62nd ASIS Annual Meeting, 84-97.
Not specified definition not provided Xu, Y., & Wang, D. 2008. Order effect in relevance judgment. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 59(8): 1264-1275.
Not specified Carevic, Z., Lusky, M., van Hoek, W., & Mayr, P. (2018). Investigating exploratory search activities based on the stratagem level in digital libraries. International Journal on Digital Libraries, 19(2-3), 231-251.
Not specified Wu, W. & Kelly, D. (2014). Online search stopping behaviors: An investigation of query abandonment and task stopping. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Association for Information Science & Technology (ASIST).
Not specified; single task type definition not provided Rodden, K., Basalaj, W., Sinclair, D., & Wood, K. (2001). Does organisation by similarity assist image browsing? ACM SIG CHI Proceedings, 190-197.
Novice/Constant these are experimental conditions rather than task types (User is novice with respect to topic, and feedback is provided constantly) Hembrooke, H.A., Granka, L.A., Gay, G.K., & Liddy, E.D. (2005). The effects of expertise and feedback on search term selection and subsequent learning. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 56, 861-871.
Novice/Intermittent these are experimental conditions rather than task types (User is novice with respect topic, and feedback is provided intermittently) Hembrooke, H.A., Granka, L.A., Gay, G.K., & Liddy, E.D. (2005). The effects of expertise and feedback on search term selection and subsequent learning. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 56, 861-871.
Obtain Zhang, Y., & Salaba, A. (2012). What do users tell us about FRBR-based catalogs? Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, 50(5-7), 705-723.
Online n/a Bates, M. J. (1981). Search techniques. In M.E. Williams (Ed.), Annual review of information science and technology (pp. 139-169). New York: Knowledge Industry for American Society for Information Science.
online catalog search definition not provided Allen, B. (1991). Topic knowledge and online catalog search formulation. Library Quarterly, 61, 188-213.
online catalog search definition not provided Allen, B. (1991). Topic knowledge and online catalog search formulation. Library Quarterly, 61, 188-213.
online news task, a simulated task not defined O'Brien, H. L. (2011). Exploring user engagement in online news interactions. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 48, 1-10.
Online Search N/A Logan, E. L. and Woelfl, N. N. (1986). Individual differences in online searching behavior of novice searchers. In J. M. Hurd (Ed.), ASIS '86: Proceedings of the 49th ASIS Annual Meeting (pp. 163 165). Medford, NJ.: Learned Information.
Online search n/a Bartolo, L. M. and Smith, T. D. (1993). Interdisciplinary work and the information search process: A comparison of manual and online searching. College and Research Libraries, 54(4), 344-353.
Online searching n/a Jackson, W. J. (1982) Staff selection and training for quality online searching. RQ, 2, 48-54.
Open Option Students were free to use the search box or browse Holmes, J., Robins, D., Zhang, Y., & Salaba, A. (2008). An exploratory study of school-age children's use of a heterogeneous resource site. Journal of Web Librarianship, 2(2-3), 263-285.
open questions "that asked about the topic in general terms" Allen, B. (1990). Knowledge Organization in an Information Retrieval Task. Information Processing & Management, 26(4), 535-542.
Open task This task "required students to find information about women who have traveled in space. Three main facets were also combined for this task: person, place, and activity. This was termed an open task because there were many possible names and associated facts to retrieve." (p. 57) Marchionini, G. (1989). Information-Seeking Strategies of Novices Using a Full-Text Electronic Encyclopedia. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 40(1), 54-66.
Open task definition not provided Fidel, R., Davies, R.K., Douglass, M.H., Holder, J.K., Hopkins, C.J., Kushner, E.J., Miyagishima, B.K., & Toney, C.D. (1999). A visit to the information mall: Web searching behavior of high school students. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50, 24-37.
Open task definition not provided Fidel, R., Davies, R.K., Douglass, M.H., Holder, J.K., Hopkins, C.J., Kushner, E.J., Miyagishima, B.K., & Toney, C.D. (1999). A visit to the information mall: Web searching behavior of high school students. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50, 24-37.
Open, Simple, Implicit See general definition. Madden, A. D., Eaglestone, B., Ford, N. J., & Whittle, M. (2007). Search engines: a first step to finding information: preliminary findings from a study of observed searches. Information Research, 12(2).
Open-book essay question These questions "required users to gather a variety of information and explore the documentation in a way less constrained than the search questions." (p.44) Egan, D.E., Remde, J.R., Gomez, L.M., Landauer, T.K., Eberhardt, J., & Lochbaum, C.C. (1989). Formative design-evaluation of SuperBook. ACM Transactions on Information Systems, 7(1),30-57.
Open-ended Unspecified answer(s)), and with single or multiple answer(s). Liu, J., Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., and Belkin, N. J. (2010). Can search systems detect users' task difficulty?: some behavioral signals. Proceeding of the 33rd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Geneva, Switzerland.
Open-ended ...required the subjects to navigate through more than a single finding aid in order to be answered, and had different sub topics. Fachry, K. N., Kamps, J. Zhang, J. (2008). Access to archival material in context. Proceedings of the second international symposium on Information interaction in context, pp. 102-109.
open-ended This type has two parts. "The first part is similar to the simple fact type in that specific answers can be found and judged correct immediately. The second part is vague and open-ended and answers are less easily evaluated for correctness." (p.131) Marchionini, G., Lin, X., & Dwiggins, S. (1990). Effects of search and subject expertise on information seeking in a hypertext environment. In Proceedings of the 53rd Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science (pp.129-137). Toronto, Canada.
Open-ended definition not provided Tu, Y., Shih, M., & Tsai, C. (2008). Eighth graders' web searching strategies and outcomes: The role of task types, web experiences and epistemological beliefs. Computers & Education, 51(3), 1142-1153.
Open-ended Unspecified answer(s), and with single or multiple answer(s). Liu, J., Liu, C., Yuan, X., & Belkin, N.J. (2011). Understanding searchers' perception of task difficulty: Relationships with task type. ASIST Proceedings, n.p.
Open-ended browsing definition not provided Shneiderman, B. (1997). Designing information-abundant web sites: Issues and recommendations. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 47(1), 5-29.
Open-ended browsing Not defined here; adopting definition from Shneiderman (1997) Pansanato, L.T.E., & Fortes, R.P.M. (2007). System description: An orienteering strategy to browse semantically-enhanced educational wiki pages. In Franconi,E., Kifer, M., & May, W. (eds.), The Semantic Web: Research and Applications (4th European Semantic Web Conference, ESWC 2007, Innsbruck, Austria, June 3-7, 2007. Proceedings). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4519, 809-818. Springer.
Open-ended questions "Open-ended questions express exploratory information needs that aim towards acquiring broad knowl- edge about a given topic" (p. 132) Eickhoff, C., Dekker, P., & de Vries, A. P. (2012). Supporting children's web search in school environments. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 129-137.
Open-ended questions "there is no one 'right' answer" (p.54) Marchionini, G., Dwiggins, S., Katz, A., & Lin, X. (1993) Information seeking in full-text end-user-oriented search systems: The roles of domain and search expertise. Library and Information Science Research, 15(1), 35-69.
Open-ended search tasks Wu, W.-C., Kelly, D., & Sud, A. (2014). Using information scent and need for cognition to understand online search behavior. Proceedings of the 37th International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research & Development in Information Retrieval, 557-566.
Open-ended, general information "a question for which there was no specific answer" (p.44) Marchionini, G., Dwiggins, S., Katz, A., & Lin, X. (1993) Information seeking in full-text end-user-oriented search systems: The roles of domain and search expertise. Library and Information Science Research, 15(1), 35-69.
Open/predicable source "Open questions have no one exact answer; searchers applyjudgment in developing acceptable responses, sometimes incorporating or synthesizing information from multiple sources... With predictable source questions, searchers know or can guess with a high probability of success where relevant information can be found... In this study, a question is considered to have a predictable source if a specific proper name that can be readily associated with a Web site is included in the question." (p.211) White, M.D., & Iivonen, M. (2002). Assessing level of difficulty in Web search questions. Library Quarterly, 72(2), 205-233.
open/predictable definition not provided White, M.D., & Iivonen, M. (2001). Questions as a factor in Web search strategy. Information Processing & Management, 37, 721-740.
open/unpredictable definition not provided White, M.D., & Iivonen, M. (2001). Questions as a factor in Web search strategy. Information Processing & Management, 37, 721-740.
Open/unpredictable source "Open questions have no one exact answer; searchers applyjudgment in developing acceptable responses, sometimes incorporating or synthesizing information from multiple sources... unpredictable source questions may require some searching to find appropriate sources, if they exist... In this study, a question is considered to have a predictable source if a specific proper name that can be readily associated with a Web site is included in the question." (p.211) White, M.D., & Iivonen, M. (2002). Assessing level of difficulty in Web search questions. Library Quarterly, 72(2), 205-233.
operationalist search "a move that uses the system features in order to modify a retrieved set without changing the conceptual meaning it represents" (212) Fidel, R. (1984). Online searching styles: A case-study based model of online searching behavior. Journal of the American Society of Information Science, 35, 211-221.
Original task Not defined Haggerty, A., White, R.W., & Jose, J.M. (2004). NewsFlash: Adaptive TV news delivery on the web. In Nurnberger, A., & Detyniecki, M. (eds.), Adaptive Multimedia Retrieval 2003. Springer. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3094, 72-86.
Other A final category of Other was provided to participants in the event they encountered tasks during the study in which they either were not sure how to categorize or which did not fit within any of the predefined categories. Participants also were instructed to categorize their homepage as “Other” if they did not use it as part of task since it loads each time the Web browser loads, and these pages were not included in our analysis. Kellar, M., Watters, C., & Shepherd, M. (2007). A field study characterizing web-based information-seeking tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(7), 999-1018. doi:10.1002/asi.20590
Other tasks Not defined Olston, C., & Chi, E.H. (2003). ScentTrails: Integrating browsing and searching on the web. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(3), 177-197.
overlapping result sets a mixture of the first and second experiment queries Thomas, P., & Hawking, D. (2006). Evaluation by comparing result sets in context. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 94-101). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Overview n/a Lopes, C., & Ribeiro, C. (2010). Context Effect on Query Formulation and Subjective Relevance in Health Searches. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 205-214). New York, NY: ACM.
own-item information-seeking not defined Chu, P., Jozsa, E., Komlodi, A., & Hercegfi, K. (2012). An exploratory study on search behavior in different languages. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 318-321.
Page collection task (difficult) Participants... were requested to find as many pages as possible relevant to specific queries... The second [Page Collection task was] difficult, based on the difficulty ratings obtained in pilot tests. (p.629) Kammerer, Y., Nairn, R., Pirolli, P., & Chi, E.H. (2009). Signpost from the masses: Learning effects in an exploratory social tag search browser. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 625-634.
Page collection task (easy) Participants... were requested to find as many pages as possible relevant to specific queries. The first Page Collection task was easy... based on the difficulty ratings obtained in pilot tests. (p.629) Kammerer, Y., Nairn, R., Pirolli, P., & Chi, E.H. (2009). Signpost from the masses: Learning effects in an exploratory social tag search browser. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 625-634.
paper selection "search questions for which participants had to select from the four access methods to a database one or more that they believed was most appropriate for finding the answer to a question" (50) Liebscher, P. (1993). Information seeking in hypertext: Multiple access methods in a full-text hypertext database. University of Maryland.
Parallel The search uses multiple concepts that exist on the same level in a conceptual hierarchy Liu, J. and Belkin, N. (2010). Personalizing information retrieval for multi-session tasks: the roles of task stage and task type. Proceeding of the 33rd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Geneva, Switzerland.
Parallel "Parallel (P), where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy; this is a breadth search." Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., Liu, J., Xu, T., & Belkin, N. (2010). Analysis and Evaluation of Query Reformulations in Different Task Types. In Proc. the American Society for Information Science and Technology. New York, NY: ACM.
Parallel fact finding task "The goal of a fact-finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value, a date)." (p.2454) "Parallel, where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy (a breadth search)." (p.2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60, 2452-2464.
Parallel fact finding task (known item search) FF task: "the goal... is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value; a date)"; Parallel: "the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy; this is a breadth search" (p.2173) Gwizdka, J. (2010). Distribution of cognitive load in web search. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(11), 2167-2187.
Parallel Information Gathering Qu, P., Liu, C., & Lai, M. (2010). The effect of task type and topic familiarity on information search behaviors. In Proceeding of the third symposium on information interaction in context. (371-376). New York, NY: ACM.
Parallel information gathering task "The goal of an information-gathering task is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic." (p.2454) "Parallel, where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy (a breadth search)." (p.2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60, 2452-2464.
Parallel information gathering task (topical search) IG task: "the goal... is to collect several pieces of information about a given topic"; Parallel: "the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy; this is a breadth search" (p.2173) Gwizdka, J. (2010). Distribution of cognitive load in web search. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(11), 2167-2187.
Parallel search (P) where the information need is satisfied by finding multiple concepts that exist at the same level in a conceptual hierarchy; this is a breadth search Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., & Liu, J. (2010). Helping identify when users find useful documents: examination of query reformulation intervals. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 215-224). New York, NY: ACM.
Parallel task A task in which "the accomplishment of on subtask is not necessarily based on that of others" (p.64) Liu, J., & Belkin, N.J. (2015). Personalizing information retrieval for multi-session tasks: Examining the roles of task stage, task type, and topic knowledge on the interpretation of dwell time as an indicator of document usefulness. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(1), 58-81.
Parallel tasks "Where the search uses multiple concepts that exist on the same level in a conceptual hierarchy" (p.3) Liu, J. & Belkin, N. (2014). Multi-aspect information use task performance: The roles of topic knowledge, task structure, and task stage. Proceedings of the Annual meeting of the Association for Information Science & Technology (ASIS&T).
Parallel: The search uses multiple concepts that exist on the same level in a conceptual hierarchy; this is a breadth search (and, in a traditional Boolean system likely was a series of OR relationships). Toms, E.G., O'Brien, H., Mackenzie, T., Jordan, C., Freund, L., Toze, S., Dawe, E., & MacNutt, A. (2008). Task effects on interactive search: The query factor. In Focused Access to XML Documents, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4862, (pp. 359-372).
Parcweb tasks Not defined Chi, E., Rosien, A., Supattanasiri, G., Williams, A., Royer, C., Chow, C., Robles, E., Dalal, B., Chen, J., Cousins, S. (2003). The Bloodhound project: Automating discovery of web usability issues using the InfoScent simulator. CHI '03, 505-512.
Partially known "A partially complete description of an item is given. There is only one item that fits the criteria given." (p. 708) Ramdeen, S., & Hemminger, B. (2012). A tale of two interfaces: How facets affect the library catalog search experience. JASIST, 63(4), 702-715.
Partially specified search task definition not provided Toms, E., Freund, L., Kopak, R., & Bartlett, J.C. (2003). The effect of task domain on search. Proceedings of CASCON '03: Conference of the Centre for Advanced Studies on Collaborative Research, 303-312.
Partially specified [search] tasks n/a Hersh, W., Over, P. (2001). TREC-2001 Interactive Report. The Tenth Text REtrieval Conference, pp. 38-41.
partially-specified the user would decide part of the task (p. 2) Hersh, W., Sacherek, L., Olson, D. Observations of Searchers: OHSU TREC 2001 Interactive Track. The Tenth Text REtrieval Conference, TREC 2010. Retrieved on November 30, 2010 from http://trec.nist.gov/pubs/trec10/papers/Hersh.pdf
participant-defined directed searching task Not defined Thatcher, A. (2008). Web search strategies: The influence of Web experience and task type. Information Processing & Management, 44(3), 1308-1329.
participant-defined general-purpose browsing task Not defined Thatcher, A. (2008). Web search strategies: The influence of Web experience and task type. Information Processing & Management, 44(3), 1308-1329.
Personal Communication definition not provided White, R. W., & Kelly, D. (2006). A study on the effects of personalization and task information on implicit feedback performance. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 297-306). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Personal search Looking for bookmarks from one’s own personal collection of bookmarks. (p.28) Millen, D., Yang, M., Whittaker, S., & Feinberg, J. (2007). Social bookmarking and exploratory search. ECSCW '07: Proceedings of the 10th European Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, 21-40.
personalized tasks definition not provided Toms, EG., O'Brien, HL., Kopak, R., & Freund, L. 2005. Searching for relevance in the relevance of search. In Crestini, F., & Ruthven, I. (Eds.) Context: Nature, Impact, and Role, Proceedings 3507: 59-78. Presented at 5th International Conference on Conceptions of Library and Information Sciences (CoLIS 2005). Glasgow, Scotland.
Picture "participants were asked to locate a picture of a given entity." (p.177) "Characteristics - Requires identification of a graphical element" (p. 177, Table 1) Woodruff, A., Rosenholtz, R., Morrison, J. B., Faulring, A., & Pirolli, P. (2002). A comparison of the use of text summaries, plain thumbnails, and enhanced thumbnails for web search tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(2), 172-185.
Picture "Participants were asked to locate a picture of a given entity." (p.202) Woodruff, A., Faulring, A., Rosenholtz, R., Morrison, J., and Pirolli, P. (2001). Using thumbnails to search the Web. In Proceedings of the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2001 (Seattle).
Planning "In an on-line inquiry learning environment, the responsibility for planning lays squarely on the shoulders of the students. Since students generally work in pairs on our projects, planning is as much a cooperative task as it is a personal one." (16) Lyons, D. J., et al. (1997). An investigation of the use of the World Wide Web for online inquiry in a science classroom (Report No.). (ERIC Document No. ED 406158).
poorly-structured, high-complexity task definition not provided Browne, G. J., Pitts, M. G., & Wetherbe, J. C. (2007). Cognitive stopping rules for terminating information search in online tasks. MIS Quarterly, 31(1), 89-104.
popular queries "Users were given queries from Google’s list of popular searches and after each search were prompted onscreen to indicate which set of results were “better”, if either. No further definition of “better” was given." (98) Thomas, P., & Hawking, D. (2006). Evaluation by comparing result sets in context. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 94-101). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Practially impossible tasks "The [task difficulty] levels were controlled by assigning topics with the appropriate number of relevant documents within the corpus (more than 100, less than 20, one or zero), therefore improving or decreasing the chance of one finding relevant documents accordingly." (p.396) Arapakis, I., Jose, J.M., & Gray, P.D. (2008). Affective feedback: An investigation into the role of emotions in the information seeking process. Proceedings of the 31st ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development of Information Retrieval, 395-402.
pre-defined exploratory search undefined Lagun, D., Sud, A., White, R. W., Bailey, P., & Buscher, G. (2013). Explicit feedback in local search tasks. In Proceedings of the 36th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 1065-1068.
Pre-selected searche n/a Howard, H. (1982) Measures that Discriminate Among Online Searchers with Different Training and Experience. Online Review, 6, 315-327.
precise definition not provided Saracevic, T., & Kantor, P. (1988). A study of information seeking and retrieving. II. Users, questions, and effectiveness. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 39(3), 177-196.
Precision based search task ...to quickly find useful information about a topic. Scholer, F. & Turpin, A. (2009). Metric and relevance mismatch in retrieval evaluation. In G.G. Lee et al. (Eds.) The Fifth Asia Information Retrieval Symposium, AIRS: 2009 (pp. 50-62). Sapporo, Japan.
Prevention/Screening n/a Lopes, C., & Ribeiro, C. (2010). Context Effect on Query Formulation and Subjective Relevance in Health Searches. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 205-214). New York, NY: ACM.
Previously seen image "searching for a previously seen image" (p.82) McDonald, S., & Tait, J. (2003). Search strategies in content-based image retrieval. In ACM SIGIR Proceedings, (pp. 80-87).
Problem Task "How can I [the teacher[ research new information for my unit [course subject[ next week?" The problem task was both directed and exploratory in nature; that is, while participants were directed to devise a solution using Netscape@ to find their information, the problem topic selected and methods used to solve the problem varied from individual to individual. Hill, J.R., & Hannafin, M.J. (1997). Cognitive strategies and learning from the World Wide Web. Educational Technology Research and Development, 45(4), 37-64.
Problem-Solving "Seeking information with the goal of identifying possible courses of action that would result in correcting a malfunction or overcoming some obstacle, in particular when the cause of the problem is unknown." (p.3) Fruend, L. & Berzowska, J. (2010) The Goldilocks Effect: Task-Centred Assessments of E-Government Information. In Proceedings of the 73rd ASIS&T Annual Meeting on Navigating Streams in an Information Ecosystem. New York, NY: ACM.
product information not defined Russell, D. M., & Grimes, C. (2007). Assigned tasks are not the same as self-chosen Web search tasks. In Proceedings of the 40th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS '07), 83-91.
Product Task Searching for product information on the Web; "less generic because there might be high level of variance in product search among college students depending on their familiarity or experience with this topic" (p.1140) Rieh, S.Y., Kim, Y.-M., & Markey, K. (2012). Amount of invested mental effort (AIME) in online searching. Information Processing & Management, 48, 1136-1150.
Prognosis/Outcome n/a Lopes, C., & Ribeiro, C. (2010). Context Effect on Query Formulation and Subjective Relevance in Health Searches. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 205-214). New York, NY: ACM.
provide information search string, shipping address, and survey response Byrne, M.D., John, B.E., Wehrle, N.S., & Crow, D.C. (1999). The tangled Web we wove: A taskonomy of WWW use. CHI Proceedings, 544-551.
Queries Not defined Hersh, W.R., & Hickam, D.H. (1992). A comparison of two methods for indexing and retrieval from a full-text medical database. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science, 221-230.
Queries of medium difficulty "queries that had a word in them corresponding with a word occurring in multiple links. These queries had the next shortest search times." (p.1258) Fraser, L., & Locatis, C. (2001). Effects of link annotations on search performance in layered and unlayered hierarchically organized information spaces. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 52(14), 1255-1261.
Query optimising "Searchers [were asked] to generate a so-called optimal or best query based on their search experience of the topic" (p.47) Joho, H., Sanderson, M., & Beaulieu, M. (2004). A study of user interaction with a concept-based interactive query expansion support tool. Advances in Information Retrieval. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 2997, 42-56.
Query tasks Not defined Airio, E. (2008). Who benefits from CLIR in web retrieval? Journal of Documentation, 64(5), 760-778.
Question "The information in a document was used to phrase one question." (p.1053) Lee, E., Whalen, T., McEwen, S., & Latremouille, S. (1984). Optimizing the design of menu pages for information retrieval. Ergonomics, 27, 1051-1069.
Question-answering tasks, type 1 These tasks "required users to find a small number of answers for a topic" (p.227) Turpin, A.H., & Hersh, W. (2001). Why batch and user evaluations do not give the same results. Proceedings of the 24th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 225-231.
Question-answering tasks, type 2 These tasks "asked users to select the correct answer from two given" (p.227) Turpin, A.H., & Hersh, W. (2001). Why batch and user evaluations do not give the same results. Proceedings of the 24th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 225-231.
Questions "subjects were given five questions, one at a time, for five minutes each" (12) Jones, T. (1989). Incidental learning during information retrieval: A hypertext experiment. In H. Maurer (Ed.), Computer assisted learning: Proceedings of the Second International Conference, ICCAL '89 (pp. 235-253), Berlin: Springer-Verlag.
Questions of varying difficulty “To obtain an initial assessment of difficulty, one of the experimenters used ESBI to answer all questions and rated each question with regard to how difficult it was to answer using the ESBI system. We used a scale of 1 to 7; the lower end of the scale represented questions that the experimenter judged as easy because the words used in the question were easily found in the list of query terms and because one or more of these terms fairly obviously would lead the user directly to an appropriate answer; the high end of the scale was used for questions where one or more words in the question did not occur in any of the query terms or where one or more words in the question appeared in many query terms.” (p.1570) Wacholder, N., & Liu, L. (2006). User preference: A measure of query-term quality. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 57(12), 1566-1580.
Re-finding search "When gathering information, some students forgot to note where they had found quotes or important ideas. They had to re-run their searches, but this time to find specific text that they knew existed." (p. 132) Bowler, L. (2009). Genres of search: A concept for understanding successive search behavior. Canadian Journal of Information Science, 33(3), 119-140.
Re-finding tasks "re-finding previously encountered online content" (p.1209) Morris, D., Morris, M.R., & Venolia, G. (2008). SearchBar: A search-centric web history for task resumption and information re-finding. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 1207-1216.
react to environment respond to dialog, respond to display change, and reload Byrne, M.D., John, B.E., Wehrle, N.S., & Crow, D.C. (1999). The tangled Web we wove: A taskonomy of WWW use. CHI Proceedings, 544-551.
real-life information-seeking tasks definition not provided Hoelscher, C., & Strube, G. (2000). Web search behavior of Internet experts and newbies. In Proceedings of the Ninth International World Wide Web Conference (pp. 337-346).
real-life information-seeking tasks definition not provided Holscher, C., & Strube, G. (2000).Web search behavior of Internet experts and newbies. Computer Networks, 33, 337-346.
recall-oriented exploratory search not defined Gonzalez-Ibanez, R., Shah, C. & Cordova-Rubio, N. (2011). Smile! Studying expressivity of happiness as a synergic factor in collaborative information seeking. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 48, 1-10.
recall-oriented exploratory search not defined Shah, C. & Gonzalez-Ibanez, R. (2011). Evaluating the synergic effect of collaboration in information seeking. Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 913-922.
Recall-oriented search task "The task was to find as many relevant documents as possible for a topic." (p.90) Joho, H., Hannah, D., & Jose, J.M. (2008). Comparing collaborative and independent search in a recall-oriented task. Proceedings of the 2nd Symposium on Information Interaction in Context (IIiX), 89-96.
recall-oriented search tasks not defined Zhang, X., Cole, M., & Belkin, N. (2011). Predicting users' domain knowledge from search behaviors. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 1225-1226.
Recalled Failed search previous student-generated failed search Madden, A. D., Ford, N. J., Miller, D., & Levy, P. (2006). Children's use of the internet for information-seeking. What strategies do they use, and what factors affect their performance? Journal of Documentation, 62, 744-761.
Recalled search most recent previous search Madden, A. D., Ford, N. J., Miller, D., & Levy, P. (2006). Children's use of the internet for information-seeking. What strategies do they use, and what factors affect their performance? Journal of Documentation, 62, 744-761.
Refinding tasks "involved re-finding information that had been found during the first session" (p.4) Capra, R.B., & Perez-Quinones, M.A. (2003). Re-finding found things: An exploratory study of how users re-find information. http://arxiv.org/abs/cs/0310011.
Refinding tasks "about a week later, we asked the participants to refind the same or similar data" (p.38) Capra, R. G., & Perez-Quinones, M. A. (2005) Using web search engines to find and refind information. Computer, 38(10), 36-42.
Refined task Used to refine information need. Sahib, N.G., Tombros, A., & Stockman, T. (2014). Investigating the behavior of visually impaired users for multi-session search tasks. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 65(1), 69-83.
REI tasks Not defined Chi, E., Rosien, A., Supattanasiri, G., Williams, A., Royer, C., Chow, C., Robles, E., Dalal, B., Chen, J., Cousins, S. (2003). The Bloodhound project: Automating discovery of web usability issues using the InfoScent simulator. CHI '03, 505-512.
relating "combining or relating index terms by and, or, and not to define a search expression" (9) Timbie, M., & Coombs, D. (1969). An interactive retrieval system: Case studies on the use of DIALOG to search the ERIC document file. Stanford University, ERIC Clearinghouse of Educational Media and Technology, Stanford, CA. ED 034 431.
relevant and focused seeking definition not provided White, R. W. (2004). Implicit feedback for interactive information retrieval (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Department of Computing Science Faculty of Computing Science, Mathematics and Statistics University of Glasgow, Scotland.
relevant seeking definition not provided White, R. W. (2004). Implicit feedback for interactive information retrieval (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Department of Computing Science Faculty of Computing Science, Mathematics and Statistics University of Glasgow, Scotland.
Remember "Retrieving, recognizing, and recalling relevant knowledge from long-term memory." (p.255) Wu, W., Kelly, D., Edwards, A., & Arguello, J. (2012). Grannies, tanning beds, tattoos and NASCAR: Evaluation of search tasks with varying levels of cognitive complexity. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium (254-257). New York, NY: ACM.
Remember "Retrieving, recognizing, and recalling relevant knowledge from long-term memory" (p.439) Arguello, J., Wu, W., Kelly, D., & Edwards, A. (2012). Task complexity, vertical display and user interaction in aggregated search. In Proceedings of the 35th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 435-444.
Remembering Retrieving, recognizing, and recalling relevant knowledge from long-term memory (Table 2); Scenario must have participant describe, list, or name factual information (Table 3) Jansen, B.J., Booth, D., & Smith, B. (2009). Using the taxonomy of cognitive learning to model online searching. Information Processing & Management, 45(6), 643-663.
Research Search tasks embedded within the context of a school project to make poster and oral presentation about the Olympics. Subjects could choose one sport (from a list of 14) and one research topic (from a list of 12) related to that sport. Large, A., Beheshti, J., & Rahman, T. (2002). Gender differences in collaborative web searching behavior: an elementary school study. Information Processing and Management, 38(3), 427-443.
research task complex task - "the topic of the task had multiple facets ... and did not offer a target answer." (p.123) Bilal, D. (2001). Children's use of the Yahooligans! Web search engine: II. Cognitive and physical behaviors on research tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 52(2), 118-136.
Research Task Searching for an academic purpose; designed to be generic, "so that students can adapt their own research topic" (p.1140) Rieh, S.Y., Kim, Y.-M., & Markey, K. (2012). Amount of invested mental effort (AIME) in online searching. Information Processing & Management, 48, 1136-1150.
research-based task definition not provided Bilal, D. (2002). Perspectives on children's navigation of the world wide web: Does the type of search task make a difference? Online Information Review, 26(2), 108-117.
Research-based/searching task 1. Relatively loosely specified goals with no simple correct answer; 2. Higher complexity multifaceted task; 3. Searchers must go beyond the information given in the task instructions, having to construct meaning and make inferences to solve the research problem effectively. (Table 1, p.34) Ford, N., Miller, D., & Moss, N. (2002). Web search strategies and retrieval effectiveness: An empirical study. Journal of Documentation, 58(1), 30-48.
researcher-defined directed search tasks Not defined; Also described as a "fact-finding task" Thatcher, A. (2008). Web search strategies: The influence of Web experience and task type. Information Processing & Management, 44(3), 1308-1329.
researcher-defined general-purpose browsing task Not defined Thatcher, A. (2008). Web search strategies: The influence of Web experience and task type. Information Processing & Management, 44(3), 1308-1329.
Retrieval "subjects selected table rows to express the queries. Subjects in the SOL Choice condition performed a multiple choice task to express the queries. (It was not required that subjects generate selection criteria in either of the TEBI conditions or the SOL choice condition.) Subjects in the SOL Generation group generated the code for the query (except for the first two lines, as mentioned above) . All subjects recorded the time it took to express each query. They also noted, on a five point scale, their confidence in their answer. Subjects were not allowed to turn the page until told to do so. A maximum of five minutes per query was allowed, but the experiment proceeded if all subjects finished earlier. After responding to each query all subjects turned the page simultaneously and performed the shape verification task by writing the letters identifying the shapes meeting the criteria specified in the query." (310) Greene, Sharon. L., Devlin, Susan J., Cannata, Philip. E., & Gomez, Louis M. (1990). No IFs, ANDs or ORs: A study of database querying. International Journal of Man-Machine Studies, 32, 303-326.
Retrieval task Task that requires the user to retrieve information from a data source. Fidel, R. (1997). The image retrieval task: Implications for the design and evaluation of image databases. New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia, 3, 181-199.
Retrieval task Not defined Stein, A. (1997). Usability and assessments of multimodal interaction in the SPEAK! system: An experimental case study. New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia, 3(1), 159-180.
Retrieval tasks Undefined Mohageg, M. F. (1992). The influence of hypertext linking structures on the efficiency of information retrieval. Human Factors, 34, 351-367.
Review-browse Scanning and reviewing interesting information in the presence of transient browse goals that represent changing tasks. Carmel, E., Crawford, S., & Chen, H. (1992). Browsing in hypertext: A cognitive study. IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, 22, 865-884
Routine tasks "Complexity was assessed on the basis of the knowledge the shadowees had when beginning each task on the tools/services to be used on the task, the protocol to be used (‘know how’) and on the assumed outcome of the task. If all of these aspects were known, the task was classified as routine" (p.97) Kumpulainen, S., & Jarvelin, K. (2010). Information interaction in molecular medicine: Integrated use of multiple channels. Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context (IIiX '10), 95-104.
sample task "Collecting a few sources of high quality information" (p.4, based on Pfaffenberger, 1996); user requires "a sampling of documents in the field" (p.7) Bhavnani, S.K., Drabenstott, K., & Radev, D. (2001). Towards a unified framework of IR tasks and strategies. ASIST 2001: Proceedings of the 64th ASIST Annual Meeting, 38, n.p.
Scan-browse Scanning for interesting information (without review). Carmel, E., Crawford, S., & Chen, H. (1992). Browsing in hypertext: A cognitive study. IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, 22, 865-884
Scanning "Spanning a range of time and database entires, intent to do a sequence of 'looking at's' or use of the term browsing or the action of looking through a list of entities which is terminated by a 'finding' or stopping or returning to a list." page 69 Hert, C. A. (1997). Understanding Information Retrieval Interactions: Theoretical and Practical Implications: Ablex.
Scanning, then searching "A person is very interested in one particular topic. S/he wants to find some good documents on this topic from a system which is composed of several databases. But s/he has no idea about which of the many possible databases to search." (p.248) Yuan, X., & Belkin, N.J. (2007). Supporting multiple information-seeking strategies in a single system framework. Proceedings of the 30th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 247-254.
Scenario based search "The participant was given a task scenario and asked to select a search topic. The search scenario for undergraduates was to select a search topic from a pool of predefined simulated class-related topics. The search scenario for graduate students was research-oriented topics either from the topic pool or from their own research interest. For faculty participants, the scenario was to select a topic suitable for an undergraduate course assignment. Each participant described the topic in writing and moved onto searching." (p.109) Tenopir, C., Wang, P., Zhang, Y., Simmons, B., & Pollard, R. (2008). Academic users' interactions with ScienceDirect in search tasks: Affective and cognitive behaviors. Information Processing & Management, 44(1), 105-121.
scenario search task Liu, C., Liu, J., Belkin, N., Cole, M. & Gwizdka, J. (2011). Using dwell time as an implicit measure of usefulness in different task types. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 48, 1-4.
Scenarios Not defined Price, S.L., Nielsen, M.L., Delcambre, L.M.L., & Vedsted, P. (2007). Semantic components enhance retrieval of domain-specific documents. Proceedings of the sixteenth ACM conference on Conference on information and knowledge management, 429-438.
Scenarios Not defined Wacholder, N., Kelly, D., Kantor, P., Rittman, R., Sun, Y., Bai, B., Small, S., Yamrom, B., & Strzalkowski, T. (2008). A model for quantitative evaluation of an end-to-end question-answering system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 58(8), 1082-1099.
Search n/a Ramirez, G., & de Vries, A. (2006). Relevant contextual features in XML retrieval. Proceedings of Information Interaction in Context (IIiX) 2006, 56-65.
Search definition not provided Jansen, B. J. (2005). Seeking and implementing automated assistance during the search process. Information Process and Management, 41(4), 909-928.
Search definition not provided Marchionini, G. (1989b). Information-seeking in electronic encyclopedia. Machine-Mediated Learning, 3 (3), 211-226.
Search n/a Yuan, W. (1997). End-User Searching Behavior in Information Retrieval: A Longitudinal Study. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology Vol.48(3), pp. 218-234.
Search n/a Gray, S., Barber, B. C., & Shasha, D. (1991). Information search with dynamic text vs paper text: An empirical comparison. International Journal of Man-Machine Studies, 35, 575-586.
Search n/a Al-Maskari, A., Sanderson, M., Clough, P., & Airio, E. (2007). The good and the bad system: Does the test collection predict users' effectiveness? Proceedings of the 31st annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 59-66.
Search n/a Hersh, W., Turpin, A., Price, S., Chan, B., Kramer, D., Sacherek, L., & Olson, D. (2000). Do batch and user evaluations give the same results? Proceedings of the 23rd annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 17-24.
Search n/a Hersh, W., Moy, S., Kraemer, D., Sacherel, L., & Olson, D. (2002). More Statistical Power Needed: The OHSU TREC 2002 Interactive Track Experiments. The 11th Text REtrieval Conference.
Search n/a Osdin, R., Ounis, I., & White, R.W. (2002). Using Heirarchical Clustering and Summarisation Approaches for Web Retrieval: Glasgow at the TREC 2002 Interactive Track. The 11th Text Retrieval Conference.
Search definition not provided Dimopoulos, K., & Asimakopoulos, A. (2010). Science on the web: Secondary school students' navigation patterns and preferred pages' characteristics. Journal of Science Education and Technology, 19(3), 246-265.
Search Liu, Y. (2010). On the potential search effectiveness of MeSH (medical subject headings) terms. In Proceeding of the third symposium on information interaction in context. (225-234) New York, NY: ACM.
search "Search is an attempt to find information using keywords or phrases inserted into the text-area of a search tool (either internal to the application software or within a website)." (p. 5) Dorn, B. Stankiewicz, A. & Roggi, C. (2013). Lost while Searching: Difficulties in Information Seeking among End-User Programmers. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-10.
search not defined Bates, M. J. (1977). Factors affecting subject catalog search success. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 28(3), 161-169.
Search not defined Wang, P. & Soergel, D. (1998). A cognitive model of document use during a research project. Study I. Document selection. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 49(2), 115-133.
search not defined Huang, M. (2003). Pausal behavior of end-users in online searching. Information Processing & Management, 39(3), 425-444.
Search "...consisted of all system interactions involving a single topic in one or more databases." page 19 Kirby, M., and Miller, N. (1986). MEDLINE searching on Colleague: Reasons for failure of success of untrained end users. Medical Reference Services Quarterly, 5, 17-34.
Search definition not provided Tenopir, C., Wang, P., Pollard, R., et al. (2004). Use of electronic science journals in the undergraduate curriculum: An observational study. ASIST Proceedings, 64-71.
Search N/A Olah, J. (2005). Shifts between search stages during task-performance in mediated information-seeking interaction. Proceedings of the 68th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 42, n.p.
Search No definition was provided Kelly, D., Shah, C., Sugimoto, C., Bailey, E., Clemens, R., Irvine, A., Johnson, N., Ke, W., Oh, S., Poljakova, A., Rodriguez, M., van Noord, M., & Zhang, Y. (2008). Method bias? The effects of performance feedback on users' evaluations of an interactive IR system. IIiX '08, Information Interaction in Context, pp. 75-82.
Search for a fact "finding a named persons current e-mail address" (p.718) White, R. W., Jose, J. M., & Ruthven, I. (2003). A task-oriented study on the influencing effects of query-biased summarisation in web searching. Information Processing & Management, 39(5), 707-734
Search for a fact N/A White, R; Ruthven, I; Jose, JM. (2001). Web document summarisation: a task-oriented evaluation. 12th Interdisciplinary Workshop on Database and Expert Systems Applications, Proceedings: 951-955. edited by Tjoa, AM; Wagner, RR. presented at 12th International Conference on Database and Expert Systems Applications (DEXA) in Munich, Germany, Sep 03-07, 2001.
Search for a fact Not defined White, R., Jose, J.M., & Ruthven, I. (2001). Query-biased web page summarisation: A task-oriented evaluation. Proceedings of the 24th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 412-413.
Search for a number of items N/A White, R; Ruthven, I; Jose, JM. (2001). Web document summarisation: a task-oriented evaluation. 12th Interdisciplinary Workshop on Database and Expert Systems Applications, Proceedings: 951-955. edited by Tjoa, AM; Wagner, RR. presented at 12th International Conference on Database and Expert Systems Applications (DEXA) in Munich, Germany, Sep 03-07, 2001.
Search for a number of items Example: finding contact details for a number of potential employers (p.178) White, RW., Jose, JM., & Ruthven, I. (2006). An implicit feedback approach for interactive information retrieval. Information Processing & Management 42(1), 166-190.
Search for a number of items Not defined White, R., Jose, J.M., & Ruthven, I. (2001). Query-biased web page summarisation: A task-oriented evaluation. Proceedings of the 24th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 412-413.
Search for a number of items "finding five hotels in Paris, France that offer an online booking service" (p.718) White, R. W., Jose, J. M., & Ruthven, I. (2003). A task-oriented study on the influencing effects of query-biased summarisation in web searching. Information Processing & Management, 39(5), 707-734
search for a number of items definition not provided White, R. W. (2004). Implicit feedback for interactive information retrieval (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Department of Computing Science Faculty of Computing Science, Mathematics and Statistics University of Glasgow, Scotland.
Search for specific data "The user only needs to locate information." (p.1009) Ceaparu, I., & Shneiderman, B. (2004). Finding governmental statistical data on the Web: A study of categorically organized links for the FedStats topics page. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 55(11), 1008-1015.
search information problems definition not provided Spink, A; Dee, C. 2007. Cognitive shifts related to interactive information retrieval. Online Information Review 31(6):845-860.
Search Job n/a Nielsen, M. L. (2004). Task-based evaluation of associative thesaurus in real-life environment. In Proceedings of the ASIST 2004 Annual Meeting: Vol. 67 Managing and Enhancing Information: Cultures and Conflicts (pp. 437-447) Providence, Rhode Island.
Search of a familiar topic N/A The author made an assumption: "The first task, given to all participants, asked the participants to find information on the topic of ‘multimedia information retrieval’. As all participants took part in a compulsory course in Information Retrieval as part of their degree course, this was a topic with which we expected them to be familiar." Page 457 Wen, L., Ruthven, I., & Borlund, P. (2006). The effects of topic familiarity on online search behavior and use of relevance criteria. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 2006, Volume 3936/2006, 456-459.
Search of a non-familiar topic N/A "Participants were asked at the start of the study which of three domains (psychology, history, or architecture) was the least familiar to them and they were then given a search task based on that topic." Wen, L., Ruthven, I., & Borlund, P. (2006). The effects of topic familiarity on online search behavior and use of relevance criteria. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 2006, Volume 3936/2006, 456-459.
Search of new and old songs from the same music genre Not defined further Taheri-Panah, S., & MacFarlane, A. (2004). Music information retrieval systems: Why do individuals use them and what are their needs? Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Music Information Retrieval (ISMIR). http://ismir2004.ismir.net/proceedings/p083-page-455-paper110.pdf.
Search of songs from different genres Not defined further Taheri-Panah, S., & MacFarlane, A. (2004). Music information retrieval systems: Why do individuals use them and what are their needs? Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Music Information Retrieval (ISMIR). http://ismir2004.ismir.net/proceedings/p083-page-455-paper110.pdf.
search path "No instructions were given as to how to carry out the search. This was left entirely to the searcher, as it was hoped that this would give him entire freedom to conduct the search in his natural way." (296) Oldroyd, B.K., & Citroen, C.L. (1977). Study of strategies used in online searching. Online Review, 1, 293-310.
Search problem n/a Meghabghab, D. B. (1995). CD-ROM vs. online vs. Internet: search strategies and evaluation from the user's perspective. Proceedings of the 16th National Online Meeting, May 2-4, 1995, New York (pp. 295-307).
Search query definition not provided Tenopir, C. (1988). Search strategies for full text databases. Proceedings of the 51st ASIS Annual Meeting, 80-86.
Search Query not defined Bilal, D. (2013). Comparing Google's readability of search results to the Flesch Readability Formulae: A preliminary analysis on children's search queries. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50, Article No. 30.
Search Query not defined Senguptay, A. & Dillon, A. (1997). Query by templates: a generalized approach for visual query formulation for text dominated databases. In Proceedings of IEEE International Forum on Research and Technology Advances in Digital Libraries (pp. 36-47). Los Almaitos, CA: IEEE Computer Society
Search question Bellardo, T. (1984). Some Attributes of Online Search Intermediaries that Relate to Search Outcome. Ph.D. dissertation. Philadelphia, PA: Drexel University.
Search scenarios for library staff group "Search scenarios for testing were selected from real reference questions collected at the Library’s central reference desk" (p.571) Ma, W. (2002). A database selection expert system based on reference librarian's database selection strategy: A usability and empirical evaluation. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 53(7), 567-580.
Search scenarios for the library user group "Search scenarios for testing were selected from real reference questions collected at the Library’s central reference desk" (p.571) Ma, W. (2002). A database selection expert system based on reference librarian's database selection strategy: A usability and empirical evaluation. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 53(7), 567-580.
Search session the set of queries issued by a single searcher for a single scenario Price, S. L., Nielsen, M. L., Delcambre, L. M. L., Vedsted, P. & Steinhauer, J. (2009). Using Semantic Components to Search for Domain-Specific Documents: An Evaluation from the System Perspective and the User Perspective. Information Systems, 34 (8). 778-806.
Search task N/A Dumais, S., Cutrell, E., and Chen, H. (2001). Optimizing Search by Showing Results in Context. In Proc. CHI 2001, 277-284.
Search task N/A Kammerer, Y., & Gerjets, P. (2012). Effects of search interface and Internet-specific epistemic beliefs on source evaluations during Web search for medical information: An eye-tracking study. Behaviour & Information Technology, 31(1), 83-97.
Search task n/a Cheng, J., Hu, X., & Heidorn, P.B. (2010). New measures for the evaluation of information retrieval systems: Normalized task completion time and normalized user effectiveness. You have full text access to this content Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Vol. 47(1), pp. 1-9.
Search task n/a Golub, K. and Lykke, M. (2009). Automated Classification of Web Pages in Hierarchical Browsing. Journal of Documentation, Vol. 65(6), pp. 901-925.
Search task definition not provided Barsky, E & Bar-Ilan, J. (2005). From the search problem through query formulation to results on the web. Online Information Review, 29(1), 75-89.
Search task Kinley, K., & Tjondronegoro, D. (2010). User-web interactions: How wholistic/analytic web users search the web? In Proceedings of the 22nd Conference of the Computer-Human Interaction Special Interest Group of Australia on computer-human interaction (344-347). New York, NY: ACM.
Search task Not defined Chung, W., Zhang, Y., Huang, Z., Wang, G., Ong, T.-H., & Chen, H. (2004). Internet searching and browsing in a multilingual world: An experiment on the Chinese Business Intelligence Portal (CBizPort). Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 55(9), 818-831.
Search task "essentially the same as the Citation Task, except that the subject is given only the question and not the citation" (p.305) Egan, D.E., Lesk, M.E., Ketchum, R.D., Lochbaum, C.C., Remde, J.R., Littman, M., & Landauer, T.K. (1991). Hypertext for the electronic library? CORE sample results. Proceedings of the Third Annual ACM Conference on Hypertext, 299-312.
Search task "Among the 3 search tasks, the first two tasks asked about recent activities of a company in the IT industry and the third task asked about the company’s profile information." (p.885) Marshall, B., McDonald, D., Chen, H., & Chung, W. (2004). EBizPort: Collecting and analyzing business intelligence information. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 55(10), 873-891.
Search task "A search task is a sequence of activities with the goal of finding specified information – the specification may range from narrow and detailed, e.g., a fact, to broad and vague, e.g. “something about memory problems in old age”. The activities may involve the use of IR systems. However, we use the term also for “seeking tasks” involving no use of IR systems. In the real life search tasks are natural, emerging from perceived work tasks of real actors. In research settings, search tasks may be simulated (Martyn and Lancaster 1981; Borlund and Ingwersen 1997; Borlund 2000ab), involving a specified work task scenario, or just assigned search topics, like in typical IR experiments." (p.73) Ingwersen, P., & Jarvelin, K. (2005). The Turn: Integration of Information Seeking and Retrieval. Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer Verlag.
search task not defined Rieh, S. Y., Yang, J. Y., Yakel, E., & Markey, K. (2010). Conceptualizing institutional repositories: using co-discovery to uncover mental models. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 165-174.
search task not defined Ruthven, I., Clews, C., Dali, W. H. M. (2010). First impressions: how search engine results contextualise digital identities. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 311-316.
search task not defined Zhang, X. & Li, Y. (2012). Effects of "Advanced Search" on User Performance and Search Efforts: A Case Study with Three Digital Libraries. In Proceedings of 45th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), 1605 - 1614.
search task not defined Hariri, N. (2011). Relevance ranking on Google: Are top ranked results really considered more relevant by the users? Online Information Review, 35(4), 598 - 610.
search task not defined Mu, X., Lu, K., & Ryu, H. (2010). Search strategies on a new health information retrieval system. Online Information Review, 34(3), 440 - 456.
search task not defined Ageev, M., Guo, Q., Lagun, D., & Agichtein, E. (2011). Find it if you can: a game for modeling different types of web search success using interaction data. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 345-354.
search task not defined Moraveji, N., Russell, D., Bien, J., & Mease, D. (2011). Measuring improvement in user search performance resulting from optimal search tips. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 355-364.
search task not defined A. MacFarlane, A. Al-Wabil, C.R. Marshall, A. Albrair, S.A. Jones, & P. Zaphiris. (2010). The effect of dyslexia on information retrieval: A pilot study. Journal of Documentation, 66(3), 307 - 326.
search task not defined Spink, A., Danby, S., Mallan, K., & Butler, C. (2010). Exploring young children's web searching and technoliteracy. Journal of Documentation, 66(2), 191 - 206.
search task not defined Ruthven, I., Lalmas, M., & van Rijsbergen, K. (2002). Ranking expansion terms using partial and ostensive evidence. In Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Conceptions of Library and Information Science. CoLIS 4, 21-25 July 2002, Seattle, Washington, 1-21.
search task not defined Broussard, R. & Zhang, Y. (2013). Seeking treatment options: Consumers' search behaviors and cognitive activities. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50, 1-10.
search task not defined Allen B. (1998). Designing information systems for user abilities and tasks: An experimental study. Online and CD-ROM review, 22(3), 139-153.
search task not defined Davis, C. H. & Shaw, D. (1989). Comparison of Retrieval System Interfaces Using an Objective Measure of Screen Design Effectiveness. Library and Information Science Research, 11(4), 325-334.
search task not defined Dalrymple, P. W. & Zweizig, D. L. (1992). Users' Experience of Information Retrieval Systems: An Exploration of the Relationship between Search Experience and Affective Measures. Library & Information Science Research, 14(2), 167-181.
search task not defined Li, Y. & Hu, D. (2013). Interactive Retrieval Using Simulated versus Real Work Task Situations: Differences in Sub-facets of Tasks and Interaction Performance. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-10.
search task not defined Crescenzi, A., Capra, R., & Arguello, J. (2013). Time Pressure, User Satisfaction and Task Difficulty. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-4.
search task not defined Sihvonen, A. & Vakkari, P. (2004). Subject knowledge, thesaurus-assisted query expansion and search success. Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Computer-Assisted Information Retrieval (RIAO '04), 393-404.
search task not defined Toms, E. G. & Latter, C. How consumers search for health information. Health Informatics Journal, 13(3): 223-235.
search task not defined Borlund, P. (2000). Experimental components for the evaluation of interactive information retrieval systems. Journal of Documentation, 56(1), 71-90.
search task not defined Zhang, X., Anghelescu, H.G.B. & Yuan, X. (2005). Domain knowledge, search behaviour, and search effectiveness of engineering and science students: an exploratory study. Information Research, 10(2),
Search task Not defined Gonzalez-Ibanez, R., Shah, C., & White, R.W. (2015). Capturing collaboportunities: A method to evaluate collaboration opportunities in information search using pseudocollaboration. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(9), 1897-1912.
Search task definition not provided Villa, R., & Jose, J. M. (2012). A study of awareness in multimedia search. Information Processing & Management,48(1), 32.
search task "locate a text unit in the hypertext with the same content as the fragment." (10) Verheij, J., Soutjesdijk, E., & Beishuizen, J. (1996). Search and study strategies in hypertext. Computers in Human Behaviour, 12(1), 1-15.
Search task student were directed to use the search box to complete the task Holmes, J., Robins, D., Zhang, Y., & Salaba, A. (2008). An exploratory study of school-age children's use of a heterogeneous resource site. Journal of Web Librarianship, 2(2-3), 263-285.
search task definition not provided Tabatabai, D., & Shore, B.M. (2005). How experts and novices search the Web. Library & Information Science Research, 27, 222-248.
search task definition not provided Ylikoski, T. (2005). A sequence analysis of consumers' online searches. Internet Research: Electronic Networking Applications and Policy, 15(2), 181-194.
Search task "The search task can be characterised by its goal, its complexity, and the search strategies used to execute it. Reid (1999) suggests that 'IR tasks' should be the focus of a new paradigm for information retrieval. A search task, in some instances, can be identical to the work task, for example for an intermediary whose work task is to perform a search for a client and submit the result in a printout, a list of references, or other form." Pharo, N. 2004. A new model of information behaviour based on the Search Situation Transition schema. Information Research, 10(1), paper 203.
search task definition not provided Xu, Y.,& Yin, H. (2008). Novelty and topicality in interactive information retrieval. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 59(2), 201-215.
Search task "Each group was assigned a different clinical situation based on an actual patient problem. In each case, a written patient scenario was presented to the students. The students were instructed to search the MEDLINE database and print several abstracts containing relevant information to confirm a point raised or to help make a treatment decision." (544) Pao, M.L., Grefsheim, S.F., Barclay, M.L., Woolliscroft, J.O., McQuillan, M., & Shipman, B.L. (1993). Factors affecting students' use of MEDLINE. Computers and Biomedical Research, 26, 541-555.
search task definition not provided Mackay, J. M., & Elam. J. J. (1992). A comparative study of how experts and novices use a decision aid to solve problems in complex knowledge domains. Information Systems Research. 3(2), 150-172.
Search task - academic related definition not provided Choi, Y. (2010). Effects of contextual factors on image searching on the web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(10), 2011-2028.
Search task - personal activities or interests definition not provided Choi, Y. (2010). Effects of contextual factors on image searching on the web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(10), 2011-2028.
Search task - work related definition not provided Choi, Y. (2010). Effects of contextual factors on image searching on the web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(10), 2011-2028.
Search task, difficult spelling definition not provided Willson, R., & Given, L. M. (2010). The effect of spelling and retrieval system familiarity on search behavior in online public access catalogs: A mixed methods study. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(12), 2461-2476.
Search task, easy spelling definition not provided Willson, R., & Given, L. M. (2010). The effect of spelling and retrieval system familiarity on search behavior in online public access catalogs: A mixed methods study. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(12), 2461-2476.
Search tasks definition not provided Hoeber, O., & Yang, X. D. (2009). HotMap: Supporting visual exploration of web search results. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology,60(1), 90.
Search tasks definition not provided Kinley, K., Tjondronegoro, D., Partridge, H., & Edwards, S. (2012). Human-computer interaction: The impact of users' cognitive styles on query reformulation behaviour during web searching. In Proceedings of the 24th Australian Computer-Human Interaction Conference (299-307). New York, NY: ACM.
Search Tasks Kinley, K., Tjondronegoro, D., & Partridge, H. (2010). Web searching interaction model based on user cognitive styles. In Proceedings of the 22nd Conference of the Computer-Human Interaction Special Interest Group of Australia on computer-human interaction. (340-343). New York, NY: ACM.
Search tasks "we selected tasks that had reasonably unambiguous answers in the top 100 returned pages (a kind of known-item search). The tasks varied in difficulty - 17 had answers in the top 20 items returned (on the first page in the List interface), and 13 had answers between ranks 21 and 100." (p.149) Chen, H., & Dumais, S. (2000). Bringing order to the Web: Automatically categorizing search results. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 145-152.
Search tasks Not defined Dempsey, B.J., Vreeland, R.C., Sumner, R.G., Jr., & Yang, K. (2000). Design and empirical evaluation of search software for legal professionals on the WWW. Information Processing & Management, 36(2), 253-273.
Search tasks "We constructed two sets of nine search tasks based on our experiences from previous studies. Each task required participants to collect links to relevant results pages. The task descriptions contained at least two central concepts, such as 'Find pictures (1) of Mount Pinatubo (2).'" (p.1610) Kaki, M. (2006). fKWIC: Frequency-based keyword-in-context index for filtering web search results. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 57(12), 1606-1615.
Search tasks Not defined Suomela, S., & Kekalainen, J. (2006). User evaluation of ontology as query construction tool. Information Retrieval, 9(4), 455-475.
Search tasks Not defined Freund, L.S. (2008). Exploiting task-document relations in support of information retrieval in the workplace. Ph.D. thesis, University of Toronto.
search tasks not defined Liu, C., Liu, J., Cole, M., Belkin, N. J. & Zhang, X. (2012). Task difficulty and domain knowledge effects on information search behaviors. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49(1): 1-10.
search tasks not defined Lagun, D. & Agichtein, E. (2011). ViewSer: enabling large-scale remote user studies of web search examination and interaction. In Proceedings of the 34th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in Information Retrieval, 365-374.
search tasks not defined Zhang, Y., Wang, P., Heaton, A., & Winkler, H. (2012). Health information searching behavior in MedlinePlus and the impact of tasks. In Proceedings of the 2nd ACM SIGHIT International Health Informatics Symposium, 641-650
search tasks definition not provided Bilal, D., & Bachir, I. (2007). Children's interaction with cross-cultural and multilingual digital libraries: II. Information seeking, success, and affective experience. Information Processing & Management, 43, 65-80.
Search tasks Not defined Zhou, M. (2014). Gender difference in web search perceptions and behavior: Does it vary by task performance? Computers & Education, 78, 174-184.
Search tasks Not defined Bilal, D., & Bachir, I. (2007). Children's interaction with cross-cultural and multilingual digital libraries: II. Information seeking, success, and affective experience. Information Processing & Management, 43, 65-80.
Search tasks Not defined Zhang, Y. (2008). The influence of mental models on undergraduate students' searching behavior on the Web. Information Processing and Management, 44(3), 1330-1345.
search topic not defined Smith, C. (2008). Searcher adaptation: A response to topic difficulty. In Proceedings of the 71rd Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 45(1), 1-10.
search topic not defined Kelly, D., Harper, J., & Landau, B. (2008). Questionnaire mode effects in interactive information retrieval experiments. Information Processing and Management, 44, 122-141.
search topics provided by the participants "The subjects were asked to provide, in a pre-search questionnaire, three search topics on which they would like to conduct searches. They were also asked whether they had previously carried out searches on each topic." (520) Shiri, AS; Revie, C. 2003. The effects of topic complexity and familiarity on cognitive and physical movies in a thesaurus-enhanced search environment. Journal of Information Science 29(6): 517-526.
Search-and-analysis task The "search-and-analysis is complex and open-ended, not a straightforward fact-reporting situation. It has no one set of "right" methods, no predefined starting and stopping points, and no single right solution (Kumpulainen & Jarvelin, 2010)." (p.877) Mirel, B., Tonks, J.S., Song, J., Meng, F., Xuan, W., & Ameziane, R. (2013). Studying PubMed usages in the field for complex problem solving: Implications for tool design. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 64(5), 874-892.
Search-oriented browse Scanning and reviewing information relevant to a fixed task. Carmel, E., Crawford, S., & Chen, H. (1992). Browsing in hypertext: A cognitive study. IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, 22, 865-884
Searching ...one is looking for something in particular (typically by describing it) Bodner, R.C., Chignell, M.H., Charoenkitkarn, N., Golovchinsky, G., & Kopak, R.W. (2001). The impact of text browsing on text retrieval performance. Information Processing & Management, 37(3), 507-520.
Searching ...it required one specific fact as an answer... Rada, R., & Murphy, C. (1992). Searching versus browsing in hypertext. Hypermedia, 4, 1-30.
searching not defined Wu, Z., Ramsden, A., Zhao, D. (1995). The user perspective of the ELINOR electronic library. Aslib Proceedings, 47(1), 13-22.
Searching "Subjects were asked to think of a topic in the entertainment area (and standard suggestions were given as to what constituted ‘‘entertainment’’) , verbalize their topic, and try to locate WWW related homepages." (p.587) Chen, H., Houston, A.L., Sewell, R.R., & Schatz, B.R. (1998). Internet browsing and searching: Use evaluations of category map and concept space techniques. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 49(7), 582-603.
Searching for a collection of documents "the information need can be satisfied by a set of web documents" (p. 3) Craswell, N., Hawking, D., Wilkinson, R., & Wu, M. TREC10 Web and Interactive Tracks at CSIRO. The Tenth Text REtrieval Conference, TREC 2001. (pp. 151-158). Retrieved on November 30, 2010 from http://trec.nist.gov/pubs/trec10/papers/csiro-trec-2001.pdf
Searching for a single document "the information need can be satisfied by a single web document" (p. 3) Craswell, N., Hawking, D., Wilkinson, R., & Wu, M. TREC10 Web and Interactive Tracks at CSIRO. The Tenth Text REtrieval Conference, TREC 2001. (pp. 151-158). Retrieved on November 30, 2010 from http://trec.nist.gov/pubs/trec10/papers/csiro-trec-2001.pdf
Searching for Information "If the question is the foundation of on-line inquiry, then searching is the cornerstone. The whole focus of inquiry is to allow students to pursue questions that interest them. It is impossible for a teaching or researching to anticipate every question that students might ask, so it is equally as impossible to develop on-line learning materials that provide resources for every student. This implies that students need to be allowed to conduct open searches on the web using search engines like The Open Text Index and Lycos." (17) Lyons, D. J., et al. (1997). An investigation of the use of the World Wide Web for online inquiry in a science classroom (Report No.). (ERIC Document No. ED 406158).
Searching for information with a variety of characteristics. require[s] users to search for information that had a variety of characteristics related to content, format (audioclip, videoclip, etc.) and search strategy required. Xie, I., & Cool, C. (2009). Understanding helpseeking within the context of searching digital libraries. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(3), 477-494.
Searching task definition not provided Mason, L., Boldrin, A., & Ariasi, N. (2010). Searching the web to learn about a controversial topic: Are students epistemically active? Instructional Science, 38(6), 607-633.
Searching task "what caused the extinction of dinosaurs?" (p.75) Mason, L., Boldrin, A., & Ariasi, N. (2010). Epistemic metacognition in context: Evaluating and learning online information. Metacognition and Learning, 5(1), 67-90.
Searching task Select images that best match abstract terms such as "happy" and "mysterious". Fidel, R. (1997). The image retrieval task: Implications for the design and evaluation of image databases. New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia, 3, 181-199.
Searching tasks Not defined Olston, C., & Chi, E.H. (2003). ScentTrails: Integrating browsing and searching on the web. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(3), 177-197.
Searching tasks Not defined Shapira, B., Taieb-Maimon, M., & Nemeth, Y. (2005). Subjective and objective evaluation of interactive and automatic query expansion. Online Information Review, 29(4), 374-390.
searching tasks not defined Yuan, X., Zhang, X., & Trofimovsky, A. (2010). Testing visualization on the use of information systems. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 365-370.
Searching, then scanning "A person is in the process of preparing a talk for a conference. S/he recalls some germane comments from a known electronic book but cannot remember the exact contents. S/he needs to find out the exact quotations. S/he recalls that a certain electronic book might be very helpful. But she cannot exactly remember the name of the book." (p.249) Yuan, X., & Belkin, N.J. (2007). Supporting multiple information-seeking strategies in a single system framework. Proceedings of the 30th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 247-254.
See task (Study 3) Not defined Goker, A., & Myrhaug, H. (2008). Evaluation of a mobile information system in context. Information Processing & Management, 44(1), 39-65.
Seeking an answer n/a Wallace, R., & Kupperman, J. (1997, ). On-line search in the science classroom: Benefits and possibilities. Paper presented at the AERA, Chicago, 1997.
Seeking understanding n/a Wallace, R., & Kupperman, J. (1997, ). On-line search in the science classroom: Benefits and possibilities. Paper presented at the AERA, Chicago, 1997.
Select Zhang, Y., & Salaba, A. (2012). What do users tell us about FRBR-based catalogs? Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, 50(5-7), 705-723.
Selected tasks "Tasks for our study were selected from a database collected by a survey of over 2000 WWW users [Morrison, Pirolli, & Card, 2001]. Selected tasks focused on finding some specific information, such as the dates for an upcoming theatre event, or specific items, such as posters of characters that appeared in a recent movie." (p.76) Pirolli, P., Fu, W., Reeder, R., Card, S. (2002). A user-tracing architecture for modeling interaction with the World Wide Web. AVI '02, 75-83.
Self search n/a Hurt, C.D. (1983). Intermediaries, self-searching, and satisfaction. Proceedings of the National Online Meeting, Medford, N.J.: Learned Information, 231-8.
Self-assigned "Participants selected their own search topics and database. Searchers were restricted to searching one database but were not given a search time limit." [p. 447] Trzebiatowski, E. (1984). End User Study on BRS/After Dark. RQ, 23(4), 446-450.
Self-generated The self-generated question is seen as arising out of a person's own life context or circumstances. Gross, M. (1997). Pilot study on prevalence of imposed queries in a school library media center. School Library Media Quarterly, 25 (3), 157-166.
self-generated tasks definition not provided Bilal, D. (2002). Perspectives on children's navigation of the world wide web: Does the type of search task make a difference? Online Information Review, 26(2), 108-117.
Self-imposed The imposed query names the type of question that is given to someone else who is charged with finding its answer. Gross, M. (1997). Pilot study on prevalence of imposed queries in a school library media center. School Library Media Quarterly, 25 (3), 157-166.
Semi Self-Selected Pharo, N., & Nordlie, R. (2012). Examining the effect of task stage and topic knowledge on searcher interaction with a "digital bookstore".In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium (4-11). New York, NY: ACM.
Semi-complex tasks "Complexity was assessed on the basis of the knowledge the shadowees had when beginning each task on the tools/services to be used on the task, the protocol to be used (‘know how’) and on the assumed outcome of the task... If two of these were known, the task was semi-complex" (p.97) Kumpulainen, S., & Jarvelin, K. (2010). Information interaction in molecular medicine: Integrated use of multiple channels. Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context (IIiX '10), 95-104.
Sensemaking task definition not provided Wilson, M. J., & Wilson, M. L. (2013). A comparison of techniques for measuring sensemaking and learning within participant‐generated summaries. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 64(2), 291-306.
Service finding Task - Transactional The service finding task is a task where the goal is to find documents that provide the service described in a user query. Users are interested in the service of a result page. For example, Where can I buy concert tickets? or buy concert tickets is the query of the service search Kang, I., & Kim, G. C. (2004). Integration of multiple evidences based on a query type for web search. Information Processing and Management, 40(3), 459-478
Set task, Closed and Open, Multistage, Implicit Open vs. closed searches: open searches are those for which many answers may be found. Closed searches, by contrast, have a clear 'right' answer (Marchionini 1989). Simple vs. multi-stage searches: as noted in the introduction, according to the evidence of transaction logs, the majority of searches are simple and consist of a query comprising a small number of search terms, with no subsequent modification to the query. To ensure that volunteers occasionally have to engage in more complex search behaviour, some of the set problems require them to carry out searches which need more than one piece of information. To complete such an exercise, a volunteer has to carry out a chain of linked searches, which may entail a combination of open and closed searches. Implicit vs. explicit domain knowledge: one criticism of much search research is that, where queries are imposed (i.e., they emanate from a source other than the searcher (Gross 1999)), there are implicit assumptions made about the searchers’ domain knowledge (Madden et al. 2006). In this study, many of the searches carried out were ones that the volunteers suggested themselves, so no such assumptions are necessary. Those that were imposed were designed to tax the searchers in the event of their chosen searches proving to be simple. All the imposed searches (with one exception) assume only basic knowledge. For the exception, the required knowledge is made explicit by presenting volunteers with the necessary information in a short paragraph (Appendix), from which adequate search terms can be derived." Madden, A. D., Eaglestone, B., Ford, N. J., & Whittle, M. (2007). Search engines: a first step to finding information: preliminary findings from a study of observed searches. Information Research, 12(2).
Set task, Closed, Simple, Implicit See general definition Madden, A. D., Eaglestone, B., Ford, N. J., & Whittle, M. (2007). Search engines: a first step to finding information: preliminary findings from a study of observed searches. Information Research, 12(2).
Set task: Closed, Simple, Explicit Open vs. closed searches: open searches are those for which many answers may be found. Closed searches, by contrast, have a clear 'right' answer (Marchionini 1989). Simple vs. multi-stage searches: as noted in the introduction, according to the evidence of transaction logs, the majority of searches are simple and consist of a query comprising a small number of search terms, with no subsequent modification to the query. To ensure that volunteers occasionally have to engage in more complex search behaviour, some of the set problems require them to carry out searches which need more than one piece of information. To complete such an exercise, a volunteer has to carry out a chain of linked searches, which may entail a combination of open and closed searches. Implicit vs. explicit domain knowledge: one criticism of much search research is that, where queries are imposed (i.e., they emanate from a source other than the searcher (Gross 1999)), there are implicit assumptions made about the searchers’ domain knowledge (Madden et al. 2006). In this study, many of the searches carried out were ones that the volunteers suggested themselves, so no such assumptions are necessary. Those that were imposed were designed to tax the searchers in the event of their chosen searches proving to be simple. All the imposed searches (with one exception) assume only basic knowledge. For the exception, the required knowledge is made explicit by presenting volunteers with the necessary information in a short paragraph (Appendix), from which adequate search terms can be derived." Madden, A. D., Eaglestone, B., Ford, N. J., & Whittle, M. (2007). Search engines: a first step to finding information: preliminary findings from a study of observed searches. Information Research, 12(2).
Sexual health scenarios Not defined Buhi, E.R., Daley, E.M., Fuhrmann, H.J., & Smith, S.A. (2009). An observational study of how young people search for online sexual health information. Journal of American College Health, 58(2), 101-111.
Shopping and Selling definition not provided White, R. W., & Kelly, D. (2006). A study on the effects of personalization and task information on implicit feedback performance. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 297-306). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Short answers (quantity) "Find any N short answers to a question, to which there are multiple answers of the same type." (p.210) Belkin, N.J., Cool, C., Kelly, D., Kim, G., Kim, J., Lee, H., Muresan, G., Tang, M.-C., & Yuan, X.-J. (2003). Query length in interaction information retrieval. Proceedings of the ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 205-212.
Short Search definition not provided Benway, J. P. (1998). Banner Blindness: The Irony of Attention Grabbing on the World Wide Web. Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting Proceedings, 42, 463-467.
Short-answer questions "A test "at the senior medical student level of difficulty... The test questions were designed to have specific answers in the database." (p.166) Hersh, W.R., Elliot, D.L., Hickam, D.H., Wolf, S.L., Molnar, A., & Leichtenstien, C. (1995). Toward new measures of information retrieval evaluation. Proceedings of the ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 164-170.
Side-effects Participants were asked to locate three or more side-effects of a given drug." (p.202) Woodruff, A., Faulring, A., Rosenholtz, R., Morrison, J., and Pirolli, P. (2001). Using thumbnails to search the Web. In Proceedings of the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2001 (Seattle).
Side-effects "participants were asked to locate three or more side-effects of a given drug." (p.177) "Characteristics - Requires semantic information (word proximity and position in layout useful, genre useful)" (p.177, Table 1) Woodruff, A., Rosenholtz, R., Morrison, J. B., Faulring, A., & Pirolli, P. (2002). A comparison of the use of text summaries, plain thumbnails, and enhanced thumbnails for web search tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53(2), 172-185.
Simluated task scenario Not defined; based on Borlund's specifications O'Brien, H. L. (2011). Exploring user engagement in online news interactions. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 48, 1-10.
Simple definition not provided Mead, S.E., Sit, R.A., Rogers, W.A., Jamieson, B.A., & Rousseau, G.K. (2000). Influences of general computer experience and age on library database search performance. Behaviour & Information Technology, 19(2), 107-124.
simple "Simple problems generally dealt with common conditions, required few answers, and were relatively well-defined" (p.13). Sharit, J., Hernandez, M.A., Czaja, S.J., & Pirolli, P. (2008). Investigating the roles of knowledge and cognitive abilities in older adult information seeking on the Web. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 15(1).
simple "simple tasks required the use of only one index and no more than one Boolean operator" (p. 53) Borgman, C.L. (1986). The user's mental model of an information retrieval system: an experiment on a prototype online catalog. International Journal of Man-Machine Studies, 24(l), 47-64.
Simple (fact-finding) "Simple (S), where the information need is satisfied by a single, independent piece of information (by definition, simple task is of the fact finding type)" Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., Liu, J., Xu, T., & Belkin, N. (2010). Analysis and Evaluation of Query Reformulations in Different Task Types. In Proc. the American Society for Information Science and Technology. New York, NY: ACM.
Simple and General "The specificity was defined on the basis of the hierarchical level of the search request and the complexity on the basis ofthe llumbers of concepts in the search request." (102) Iivonen, M. (1995) Factors lowering the consistency in online searching. In Raitt, D.I., & Jeapes, B. (Eds.), Online information 95: Proceedings of 19th international online information meeting (pp. 101-107). Oxford: Learned Information Ltd.
Simple and General " According to Saracevic et al. (1987, p. 14), the specificity of search request means “the hierarchical level in the meaning of terms and ultimately the whole request,”and the complexity of search requests means “the number of search concepts, their modifiers and/or constraints in a request.” Iivonen, M. (1995). Consistency in the selection of search concepts and search terms. Information Processing & Management, 31, 173-190.
Simple and Specific "The specificity was defined on the basis of the hierarchical level of the search request and the complexity on the basis ofthe llumbers of concepts in the search request." (102) Iivonen, M. (1995) Factors lowering the consistency in online searching. In Raitt, D.I., & Jeapes, B. (Eds.), Online information 95: Proceedings of 19th international online information meeting (pp. 101-107). Oxford: Learned Information Ltd.
Simple and Specific Simple=not more than 3 concepts " According to Saracevic et al. (1987, p. 14), the specificity of search request means “the hierarchical level in the meaning of terms and ultimately the whole request,”and the complexity of search requests means “the number of search concepts, their modifiers and/or constraints in a request.” Iivonen, M. (1995). Consistency in the selection of search concepts and search terms. Information Processing & Management, 31, 173-190.
simple author searches definition not provided Dimitroff, A., & Wolfram, Z. (1995). Searcher response in a hypertext-based bibliographic information retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 46, 22-36.
simple browsing tasks Simple browsing tasks were "those in which the task phrasing contained match words to the bookshelf or Dewey topic headings". (p.732) Hirsh, S.G. (1997). How do children find information on different types of tasks? Children's use of the Science Library Catalog. Library Trends, 45(4), 725-745.
Simple Browsing, Complex Keyword “Simple-Browsing tasks were those in which the task phrasing contained match words to the bookshelf or Dewey topic headings.” (p.87) “The size of the Keyword search results sets served as the basis for the keyword task complexity measure in this study. Searches that yielded lengthy results sets (i.e., greater than 10 headings) were considered complex-keyword topics and search which yielded 10 or fewer headings were considered simple-keyword topics.” (p.90) Hirsh, S.G. (1996). The effect of domain knowledge on elementary school children, information retrieval behavior on an automated library catalog. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Department ofLibrary and Information Science, University of California, Los Angeles.
Simple Browsing, Simple Keyword “Simple-Browsing tasks were those in which the task phrasing contained match words to the bookshelf or Dewey topic headings.” (p.87) “The size of the Keyword search results sets served as the basis for the keyword task complexity measure in this study. Searches that yielded lengthy results sets (i.e., greater than 10 headings) were considered complex-keyword topics and search which yielded 10 or fewer headings were considered simple-keyword topics.” (p.90) Hirsh, S.G. (1996). The effect of domain knowledge on elementary school children, information retrieval behavior on an automated library catalog. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Department ofLibrary and Information Science, University of California, Los Angeles.
Simple close ended "The fuzzier the description, the more complex the task" (p.1035). Simple tasks had three exact clues. "Close-ended tasks ask users to find one specific item based on some specific information, such as author, title, or publisher, and there is only one absolutely correct answer" (p.1035). Niu, X., & Hemminger, B. (2015). Analyzing the interaction patterns in a faceted search interface. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(5), 1030-1047.
Simple fact finding task "The goal of a fact-finding task is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value, a date)." (p.2454) "Simple , where the information need is satisfied by a single piece of information." (p.2455) Gwizdka, J., & Lopatovska, I. (2009). The role of subjective factors in the information search process. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60, 2452-2464.
Simple fact finding task (known item search) FF task: "the goal... is to find one or more specific pieces of information (e.g., name of a person or an organization, product information, a numerical value; a date)"; Simple: "the information need is satisfied by a single, independent piece of information (by definition, simple task is of the fact finding type)" (p.2173) Gwizdka, J. (2010). Distribution of cognitive load in web search. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 61(11), 2167-2187.
simple fact questions locate factual answers to the questions Marchionini, G., Lin, X., & Dwiggins, S. (1990). Effects of search and subject expertise on information seeking in a hypertext environment. In Proceedings of the 53rd Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science (pp.129-137). Toronto, Canada.
simple factual retrieval "searching with only one word for names, dates, or lists of information; or use of the index to identify the correct form of the search keyword" [p.258] Edyburn, D.L. (1988). Examining the successful retrieval of information by students using online databases. School Library Media Quarterly, 16, 256-259.
Simple individual academic tasks "looking for definitions of concepts, looking for books, looking for articles, and looking for answers to a specific question" (p.621) He, D., Wu, D., Yue, Z., Fu, A., & Vo, K.T.. (2012). Undergraduate students' interaction with online information resources in their academic tasks. Aslib Proceedings: New Information Perspectives, 64(6), 615-640.
simple keyword tasks "Searches that yielded ten or fewer headings were considered simple keyword topics." (p.733) Hirsh, S.G. (1997). How do children find information on different types of tasks? Children's use of the Science Library Catalog. Library Trends, 45(4), 725-745.
Simple look-up task not defined Fagan, J.C. (2010). Usability studies of faceted browsing: A literature review. Information Technology and Libraries, 29(2), 58-66.
Simple Lookup Task (single facet) "In general, a lookup task involves finding a specific fact or an answer to a precisely defined question .... In our study, lookup tasks were further divided into two groups based on complexity. The complexity of lookup tasks was determined by three contributing factors: 1) the number of facets to be combined to get the target page, 2) the extent to which a higher level thinking (rather than simple recognition) such as comparing pages in the result set is required, 3) the navigation path to a target BLS web page." (p.445) Capra, R., Marchionini, G., Oh, J. S., Stutzman, F., & Zhang, Y. (2007). Effects of structure and interaction style on distinct search tasks. Paper presented at the JCDL 2007: Proceedings of the 7th ACM/IEEE Joint Conference on Digital Libraries, Vancouver, B.C.
Simple open ended "The fuzzier the description, the more complex the task" (p.1035). Simple tasks had three exact clues. "For the open-ended tasks, users find three items on a particular topic. There might be more than three correct items" (p.1035). Niu, X., & Hemminger, B. (2015). Analyzing the interaction patterns in a faceted search interface. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(5), 1030-1047.
Simple popular interest medical queries "The simplest queries contained a single concept. An example of a single-concept query is, 'You recently heard a lecture about bibliotherapy, the use of reading as a therapeutic technique. You found the lecture interesting and would like to find out what the medical literature has to say about this topic.'" (p.366) Williams, M.E., Kinnucan, M., Smith, L.C., Lannom, L., & Cho, D. (1986). Comparative analysis of online retrieval interfaces. Proceedings of the 49th ASIS Annual Meeting, 365-370.
Simple queries "Queries required for the first category were the simplest, consisting of the use of the conjunctive AND operator between two single search terms." (p.393) Topi, H., & Lucas, W. (2005). Searching the Web: Operator assistance required. Information Processing & Management, 41(2), 383-403.
simple queries "Each query, if correctly answered by subjects in either the print or the CD-ROM group, led to one section of one article in the encyclopedia. These questions differed in the number of embedded search terms from one word to four words." (502) Large, A., Beheshti, J., Breuleux, A., & Renaud, A. (1994). A comparison of information retrieval from print and CD-ROM versions of an encyclopedia by elementary school children. Information Processing & Management, 30(4), 499-513.
Simple retrieval "Simple retrieval tasks required finding a leaf node in the tree." (p.30) Pirolli, P., Card, S., Van Der Wege, M. (2001). The effects of information scent on visual search in the hyperbolic tree browser. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(1), 20-53.
Simple retrieval "Simple retrieval tasks required finding a leaf node in the tree" of the data structure. (p.30) Pirolli, P., Card, S.K., & van der Wege, M.M. (2003). The effects of information scent on visual search in the Hyperbolic Tree Browser. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 10(1), 20-53.
Simple search (S) where the information need is satisfied by a single, independent piece of information (by definition, simple task is of the fact finding type) Liu, C., Gwizdka, J., & Liu, J. (2010). Helping identify when users find useful documents: examination of query reformulation intervals. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 215-224). New York, NY: ACM.
Simple search task open-ended or one step questions (p.177) Foss, E., Druin, A., Yip, J., Ford, W., Golub, E., & Hutchinson, H. (2013). Adolescent search roles. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 64(1), 173-189.
Simple search task One that does not require "advanced query formation techniques" (p. 560). Foss, E., Druin, A., Brewer, R., Lo, P., Sanchez, L., Golub, E., & Hutchinson, H. (2012). Children's search roles at home: Implications for designers, researchers, educators, and parents.Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63(3), 558-573.
Simple search task "Users enter queries... and receive ranked lists of search results... Basic types of search tasks that can be solved with a simple query–result pairing. These search tasks happen in the context of question-answering and fact-finding." (p.347) Singer, G., Norbisrath, U., & Lewandowski, D. (2013). Ordinary search engine users carrying out complex search tasks. Journal of Information Science, 39(3), 346-358.
Simple search tasks Tasks using a simple search form Kim, J. (2005). Finding documents in a digital institutional repository: DSpace and Eprints. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 42, n.p.
Simple Task "A simple task is a well-defined question where it is clear what information is required. The answer to a simple task is located on one page, and little cognitive effort is required to solve the task" (p.109). Zhang, Y. (2012). The impact of task complexity on people's mental models of MedlinePlus. Information Processing & Management, 48(1), 107.
Simple task Low difficulty; A factual task with simple well-defined information needs: using search engines (e.g., Baidu and Google) to get hypertext information shown in Chinese language by preliminary search strategies (e.g., inputting short keywords). This type of task has easy information browse and evaluation steps, with two to four total search paths. (p.363) Ding, R., & Ma, F. (2013). Assessment of university student web searching competency by a task-based online test: A case study at Wuhan University, China. The Electronic Library, 31(3), 359-375.
Simple task Can be completed without the "advanced search" function. Zhimin, X. & Fan, L. (2014). Experimental study on mobile OPAC search and public computer's OPAC basic search as contrast. Geomatics and Information Science of Wuhan University, Information Acquisition and Seeking, 39(Spec.) 35-38.
simple tasks "Simple tasks are those in which the task phrasing contains match words to the bookshelf topic headings." (p.49) Hirsh, S.G. (1996). Complexity of Search Tasks and Children's Information Retrieval. ASIS '96 Proceedings, 47-51.
Simple tasks "Simple tasks are characterized by asking the users to find simple facts. The needed information is contained in one document (web site) and can retrieved with one single query." (p.112) Singer, G., Norbisrath, U., & Lewandowski, D. (2012). Ordinary search engine users assessing difficulty, effort, and outcome for simple and complex search tasks. Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context (IIiX) Symposium, 110-119.
Simple, typical, tasks Tasks were collected from real users through a survey: "Please try to recall a recent instance in which you found important information on the World Wide Web, information that led to a significant action or decision. Please describe that incident in enough detail so that we can visualize the situation." (p.499) Card, S., Pirolli, P., Van Der Wege, M., Morrison, J., Reeder, R., Schraedley, P., Boshart, J. (2001). Information scent as a driver of Web Behavior Graphs: Results of a protocol analysis method for web usability. CHI '01, 498-505.
Simulated Domain and Work-Task Scenario "An evaluation methodology with simulated contexts that include description of domains and work-tasks. The method is an extension of the notion of simulated work-tasks... The goal of the method is to give the experimental query a context closer to a real-life information-seeking situation. In this way, the SDWS would allow the user a) a broader understanding of the situation, and b) a subjective interpretation of the relevance." (p.385) Karlgren, J., & Hansen, P. (2002). SICS at iCLEF 2002: Cross-language relevance assessment and task context. In Peters, C., Braschler, M., Gonzalo, J., & Kluck, M. (eds.), Advances in Cross-Language Information Retrieval (Third Workshop of the Cross-Language Evaluation Forum, CLEF 2002, Rome, Italy, September 19-20, 2002, Revised Papers). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 2785, 383-391. Springer.
Simulated search definition not provided Ramirez, G., & de Vries, A. (2006). Relevant contextual features in XML retrieval. Proceedings of Information Interaction in Context (IIiX) 2006, 56-65.
Simulated search "The structural framework of simulated need situations were used to present search tasks." (p. 136) Moshfeghi, Y. & Jose, J. M. (2013). An effective implicit relevance feedback technique using affective, physiological and behavioural features. In Proceedings of the 36th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 133-142.
Simulated search task N/A Petrelli, D. (2008). On the role of user-centered evaluation in the advancement of interactive information retrieval. Information Processing & Management 44(1): 22-38
Simulated search task No definition was provided Otterbacher, J., Hemphill, L., & Dekker, E. (2011). Helpful to you is useful to me: The use and interpretation of social voting. ASIST Proceedings, n.p.
Simulated search task N/A Li, Y., Chen, Y., Liu, J., Cheng, Y., Wang, X., Chen, P., & Wang, Q. (2011). Measuring task complexity in informaiton search from user's perspective. ASIST Proceedings, n.p.
simulated search tasks "Based on the process model developed in the expert study above, complex search tasks were broken down into sub-tasks corresponding to individual steps of the process, such as search term selection or query revision. The resulting sub-tasks allowed for a focussed investigation of the direct effects that different types of expertise have on individual steps of the model." (341) Hoelscher, C., & Strube, G. (2000). Web search behavior of Internet experts and newbies. In Proceedings of the Ninth International World Wide Web Conference (pp. 337-346).
simulated search tasks "Based on the process model developed in the expert study above, complex search tasks were broken down into sub-tasks corresponding to individual steps of the process, such as search term selection or query revision. The resulting sub-tasks allowed for a focussed investigation of the direct effects that different types of expertise have on individual steps of the model." (341) Holscher, C., & Strube, G. (2000).Web search behavior of Internet experts and newbies. Computer Networks, 33, 337-346.
Simulated search tasks Not defined Suomela, S., & Kekalainen, J. (2005). Ontology as a search-tool: A study of real users' query formulation with and without conceptual support. In Losada, D.E., & Fernandez-Luna, J.M. (eds.), Advances in Information Retrieval (27th European Conference on IR Research, ECIR 2005, Santiago de Compostela, Spain, March 21-23, 2005. Proceedings). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3408, 315-329. Springer.
Simulated shopping task A list of products to locate in the shopping environment. Titus, P. A., & Everett, P. B. (1996). Consumer wayfinding tasks, strategies, and errors: An exploratory field study. Psychology & Marketing (1986-1998), 13(3), 265. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/230397494?accountid=14244
Simulated situation "A simulated work task situation is a short 'cover story' that describes a situation that leads to an individual requiring to use an IR system. The 'cover-story' is, semantically, a rather open description of the context/scenario of a given work task situation." Borlund, P. (2003). The IIR evaluation model: A framework for evaluation of interactive information retrieval systems. Information Research, 8(3), paper no. 152. http://informationr.net/ir/8-3/paper152.html
Simulated work task ...short 'cover story' that describes a realistic information requiring situation that motivates the study participant to search the IR system. A simulated work task situation serves two main functions:

1) it causes a ‘simulated information need’ by allowing for user interpretations of the simulated work task situation, leading to cognitively individual information need interpretations as in real life; and
2) it is the platform against which situational relevance is judged by the study participant.

More specifically it helps to describe to the study participant:
• The source of the information need;
• The environment of the situation;
• The problem which has to be solved; and also
• Serves to make the study participant understand the objective of the search
Borlund, P., and Schneider, J. W. (2010). Reconsideration of the Simulated Work Task Situation: A Context Instrument for Evaluation of Information Retrieval Interaction. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Research design and methods (pp. 155-164). New York, NY: ACM.
simulated work task not defined Cole, M. J., Gwizdka, J., Liu, C., Belkin, N. J., & Zhang, X. Inferring user knowledge level from eye movement patterns. Information Processing & Management, 49(5): 1075-1091.
simulated work task not defined Bando, L. L., Scholer, F., & Turpin, A. (2010). Constructing query-biased summaries: a comparison of human and system generated snippets. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 195-204.
Simulated work task situation definition not provided Blomgren, L., Vallo, H., & Bystrom, K. (2004). Evaluation of an information system in an information seeking process. In Heery, R., & Lyon, L. (eds.), Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries (8th European Conference, ECDL 2004, Bath, UK, September 12-17, 2004, Proceedings), 57-68.
Simulated work task situation only "The simulated work task situation helps to describe to the test person: the source of the information need; the environment of the situation; the problem which has to be solved; and serves to make the test person understand the objective of the search... The exclusion of the indicative request (and definition) makes the sim-2 version more semantically open. Borlund, P., & Ingwersen, P. (1999). The application of work tasks in connection with the evaluation of interactive information retrieval systems: Empirical results. Mira '99: Evaluating Interactive Information Retrieval (Glasgow, UK, April 14-16, 1999), 1-18. www.bcs.org/upload/pdf/ewic_mi99_paper1.pdf‎.
Simulated work task situation plus indicative request "The simulated work task situation helps to describe to the test person: the source of the information need; the environment of the situation; the problem which has to be solved; and serves to make the test person understand the objective of the search... The indicative request is a suggestion to the test person about what to search for." (p.2) Borlund, P., & Ingwersen, P. (1999). The application of work tasks in connection with the evaluation of interactive information retrieval systems: Empirical results. Mira '99: Evaluating Interactive Information Retrieval (Glasgow, UK, April 14-16, 1999), 1-18. www.bcs.org/upload/pdf/ewic_mi99_paper1.pdf‎.
Simulated work task situations Not defined Borlund, P., Dreier, S., & Bystrom, K. (2012). What does time spent on searching indicate? Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context (IIiX), 184-193.
Simulated work task situations Not defined Szlavik, Z., Tombros, A., & Lalmas, M. (2007). Feature- and query-based table of contents generation for XML documents. In Amati, G., Carpineto, C., & Romano, G. (eds.), Advances in Information Retrieval (29th European Conference on IR Research, ECIR 2007, Rome, Italy, April 2-5, 2007. Proceedings). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4425, 456-467. Springer.
simulated work task situations "The background scenario, contextual situations, and the event calendar, as described in section 4.1, was explained and handed out to participants. They were asked to rate the usefulness of the four different leisure time events in relation to the 18 different situations. In preparation for the task, users were introduced to usefulness as situational relevance." (82) Bierig, R; Groker, A. 2006. Time, location and interest: An empirical and user-centered study. Information Interaction in Context, Proceedings: 134-147. edited by Ruthven, I; Borlund, P; Ingwersen, P; Belkin, NJ; Tombors, A; Vakkari, P. presented at 1st International Symposium on Information Interaction in Context (IIiX 2006) in Copenhagen, Denmark, Oct 18-20, 2006.
Simulated work-task situations "First, they are aimed at promoting a simulated information need in a subject. That is, the simulated situation should engage the subjects in the search by the identification of the subject with the situation. Second, the simulated situations position the search within a realistic context. This allows the experimental subject to provide his or her own interpretation of what information is required and allows the subject to develop the information need naturally." p. 3 Ruthven, I., Lalmas, M., & van Rijsbergen, C. J. (2003). Incorporating user search behavior into relevance feedback. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 54(6), 529-549.
simulated work/situation task "that were related to typical tasks to reflect similar participants’ needs and were therefore representative of some of the most commonly submitted queries." (p. 147) Clark, M., Ruthven, I., O'Brian Holt, P., & Song, D. (2012). Looking for genre: the use of structural features during search tasks with Wikipedia. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 145-154
simulative work task situations "a cognitive state, which creates an information need that has to be satisfied so that the user is able to deal with the situation and move on. The realism by using the situation comes from the involvement of the tests person who, based on the work task assigned, develops his/her own individual and subjective information need. The participants then dynamically assessed relevance of the retrieved objects, in relation to their own interpretation of the simulated work task, as in real life" (p. 125) Papaeconomou, C.; Zijlema, A.; Ingwersen, P. (2008). Searchers' relevance judgments and criteria in evaluating web pages in a learning style perspective. ACM International Conference Proceeding Series; Vol. 348 archive. Proceedings of the second international symposium on Information interaction in context table of contents. London, United Kingdom. 2008
Situated work tasks "A situated work task has two parts: a work task situation, and an indicative request. The work task situation describes a task scenario for the user, including the larger work context in which the search is taking place. The indicative request defines example requests for the task." (p.494) Villa, R., Gildea, N., & Jose, J.M. (2008). FacetBrowser: A user interface for complex search tasks. Proceedings of the 16th ACM International Conference on Multimedia, 489-498.
six known-item retrieval type tasks definition not provided White, R. W., & Marchionini, G. (2006). A study of real-time query expansion effectiveness. In Proceedings of the 29th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval (pp. 715-716). Seattle, Washington, USA: ACM.
six open-ended, exploratory type tasks definition not provided White, R. W., & Marchionini, G. (2006). A study of real-time query expansion effectiveness. In Proceedings of the 29th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval (pp. 715-716). Seattle, Washington, USA: ACM.
Somewhat difficult searches "In order to make every search somewhat difficult, independent of system performance, we designed the statements to require disambiguation during query formulation." (p.51 of Smith dissertation, 2010) Smith, C.L, and Kantor, P.B. (2008). User adaptation: Good results from poor systems. Proceedings of the 31st annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 147-154.
Sorting task Given a set number of images, the subject are asked to sort the images into groups based on their own personal criteria. Fidel, R. (1997). The image retrieval task: Implications for the design and evaluation of image databases. New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia, 3, 181-199.
special features definition not provided Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
special items definition not provided Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
specific "Specific tasks involved looking for a specific function, representing the case where a designer knows a piece of functionality exists but doesn't know where to find it." [p. 56] Henninger, S. (1994) Using iterative refinement to find reusable software. IEEE Software, 11 (5), 48-59.
Specific Undefined Lee, E., Whalen, T., McEwen, S., & Latremouille, S. (1984). Optimizing the design of menu pages for information retrieval. Ergonomics, 27, 1051-1069.
Specific (known) entities definition not provided Hert, C.A. (1996). User goals on an online public access catalog. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 47(7), 504-518.
Specific fact finding Not defined Reiterer, H., Mussler, G., Mann, T.M., & Handschuh, S. (2000). INSYDER - An information assistant for business intelligence. Proceedings of the 23rd Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 112-119.
Specific fact-finding Not defined here; adopting definition from Shneiderman (1997) Pansanato, L.T.E., & Fortes, R.P.M. (2007). System description: An orienteering strategy to browse semantically-enhanced educational wiki pages. In Franconi,E., Kifer, M., & May, W. (eds.), The Semantic Web: Research and Applications (4th European Semantic Web Conference, ESWC 2007, Innsbruck, Austria, June 3-7, 2007. Proceedings). Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4519, 809-818. Springer.
specific fact-finding definition not provided Navarro-Prieto, R., Scaife, M., & Rogers, Y. (1999). Cognitive strategies in web searching. Proceedings of the 5th Conference on Human Factors and the Web, 43-56. http://zing.ncsl.nist.gov/hfweb/proceedings/navarro-prieto/index.html.
Specific fact-finding (known item search) definition not provided Shneiderman, B. (1997). Designing information-abundant web sites: Issues and recommendations. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 47(1), 5-29.
Specific facts Yields "a specific answer that could be located in the database" (p.44) Marchionini, G., Dwiggins, S., Katz, A., & Lin, X. (1993) Information seeking in full-text end-user-oriented search systems: The roles of domain and search expertise. Library and Information Science Research, 15(1), 35-69.
Specific image search task not defined Wang, X. & Erdelez, S. (2013). Medical image users' search tactics across different search tasks. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 50(1), 1-4.
specific information search not defined Huang, C., Joo, S. & Xie, I. (2012). Effects of learning styles on the application of search tactics: A preliminary result. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
Specific information search Not defined Xie, I., & Joo, S. (2010). Tales from the field: Search strategies applied in web searching. Future Internet, 2(3), 259-281.
Specific information searching Not defined Xie, I., & Joo, S. (2012). Factors affecting the selection of search tactics: Tasks, knowledge, process, and systems. Information Processing and Management, 48(2), 254-270.
Specific information task The specific information task required users to search for specific information. Xie, I., & Cool, C. (2009). Understanding helpseeking within the context of searching digital libraries. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 60(3), 477-494.
Specific keyword search Not specified Dimitroff, A., Wolfram, D., & Volz, A. (1996). Affective response and retrieval performance: Analysis of contributing factors. Library & Information Science Research, 18(2), 121-132.
Specific keyword search Not defined Wolfram, D., Volz, A., & Dimitroff, A. (1996). The effect of linkage structure on retrieval performance in a hypertext-based bibliographic retrieval system. Information Processing & Management, 32(5), 529-541.
Specific object (known) Specific: "things that can be identified and named... they require a greater amount of knowledge" (p.2454); Object not defined; Known: participant rated knowledge as high(1 or 2) on pre-topic questionnaire Smith, G., Brien, C., & Ashman, H. (2012). Evaluating implicit judgments from image search clickthrough data. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(12), 2451-2462.
Specific object (unknown) Specific: "things that can be identified and named... they require a greater amount of knowledge" (p.2454); Object not defined; Unknown: participant rated knowledge as low (4 or 5) on pre-topic questionnaire Smith, G., Brien, C., & Ashman, H. (2012). Evaluating implicit judgments from image search clickthrough data. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(12), 2451-2462.
Specific questions "Two questions requested the student to locate one piece of information" Rouet, J.-F. (2003). What was I looking for? The influence of task specificity and prior knowledge on students' search strategies in hypertext. Interacting with Computers, 15(3), 409-428.
Specific questions "questions [that] requested the student to locate one piece of information" (p.415) Rouet, J. (2003). What was I looking for? The influence of task specificity and prior knowledge on students' search strategies in hypertext. Interacting with Computers, 15(3), 409-428.
Specific scene (known) Specific: "things that can be identified and named... they require a greater amount of knowledge" (p.2454); Scene not defined; Known: participant rated knowledge as high(1 or 2) on pre-topic questionnaire Smith, G., Brien, C., & Ashman, H. (2012). Evaluating implicit judgments from image search clickthrough data. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(12), 2451-2462.
Specific scene (unknown) Specific: "things that can be identified and named... they require a greater amount of knowledge" (p.2454); Scene not defined; Unknown: participant rated knowledge as low (4 or 5) on pre-topic questionnaire Smith, G., Brien, C., & Ashman, H. (2012). Evaluating implicit judgments from image search clickthrough data. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 63(12), 2451-2462.
specific search "...search for certain, particular items of information..." pp.175 Chen, B., Wang, H., Proctor, R. W., & Salvendy, G. (1997). A human-centered approach for improving WorldWide Web Browsers. Behavior Research Methods, Vol.29(2), pp. 172-179.
Specific search "Finding images of individually named person, group, thing, event, location, or action." (p. 335) Hung, T.-Y. (2005). Search moves and tactics for image retrieval in the field of journalism: A pilot study. Journal of Education Media & Library Sciences, 42(30), 329-346.
Specific search task "find answers to specific questions about hypertext systems" [p. 6] Qiu, L. (1993). Analytical searching vs. browsing in hypertext information retrieval systems. Canadian Journal of Library & Information Science, 18, 1-13.
Specific search task Conduct a search to find answers to specific questions such as “What size should a node be?” and “What type of links should there be?” Qiu, L. (1994). Frequency distributions of hypertext path patterns: A pragmatic approach. Information Processing & Management, 30(1), 131-140.
Specific search task "find answers to a specific question about hypertext systems" (p.418) Qiu, L. (1993). Markov models of search state patterns in a hypertext information retrieval system. JASIS, 44(7), 413-427.
Specific subject search Not defined Wolfram, D., Volz, A., & Dimitroff, A. (1996). The effect of linkage structure on retrieval performance in a hypertext-based bibliographic retrieval system. Information Processing & Management, 32(5), 529-541.
Specific task "a task having a solution requiring knowledge of a specific domain." (p. 323) Satio H., & Miwa K. (2002). A cognitive study of information seeking processes in the WWW: The effects of searcher's knowledge and experience. In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Web Information Systems Engineering, 1, 321-327.
specific task to find a piece of specific information Kim, K.-S. (2008). Effects of emotion control and task on Web searching behavior. Information Processing & Management, 44(1), 373-385.
Specific Task "Two tasks were chosen to represent a continuum from specific information needs such as those that may be expressed using keywords in a precise search statement, to subjective information needs that may be difficult to express verbally and are dependent on characteristics of a scene as interpreted by an individual. The two tasks were adapted from existing user queries to the CNN database for environmental images, and were modified somewhat to correspond to the image content present in the test collection." (177) Goodrum, A.A. (2001). Multidimensional scaling of video surrogates. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 52(2), 174-182.
Specific tasks "[T]he information required to answer these questions was clear and easy to recognize; the answers were located on one page; and little high-level information processing was required to complete the tasks." (p.57) Zhang, Y. (2014), Searching for specific health-related information in MedlinePlus: Behavioral patterns and user experience. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 65: 53-68. doi: 10.1002/asi.22957
Specific tasks (Study 1) "The S[pecific] tasks were to test a specific feature such as the pop-up of a content item when the participant is within an information zone determined by a tag." (p.50-51) Goker, A., & Myrhaug, H. (2008). Evaluation of a mobile information system in context. Information Processing & Management, 44(1), 39-65.
string search definition not provided Woelfl, N. (1984). Individual differences in online search behavior: The effect of learning styles and cognitive abilities on process and outcome. Unpblished doctoral dissertation, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH.
structural questions "that asked about purpose, methodology, findings and conclusions" Allen, B. (1990). Knowledge Organization in an Information Retrieval Task. Information Processing & Management, 26(4), 535-542.
Structural search "Participants searched for and explored widiin metatools, such as encyclopedias, Wikipedia, and the table of contents in books. This type of search was used to build a conceptual understanding of the topic." (p. 132) Bowler, L. (2009). Genres of search: A concept for understanding successive search behavior. Canadian Journal of Information Science, 33(3), 119-140.
structured comparison Compare related images in order to write an essay Yee, K.-P., Swearingen, K., Li, K., & Hearst, M. (2003). Faceted metadata for image search and browsing. In SIGCHI Proceedings, (pp.401-408).
structured gathering of materials Gather materials for an art history essay on a given topic. Complete 4 subtasks, ranging from very specific to more open ended Yee, K.-P., Swearingen, K., Li, K., & Hearst, M. (2003). Faceted metadata for image search and browsing. In SIGCHI Proceedings, (pp.401-408).
Structured tasks definition not provided Uddin, M.N., & Janecek, P. (2007). Performance and usability testing of multidimensional taxonomy in web site search and navigation. Performance Measurement and Metrics, 8(1), 18-33.
Subject (graphic based) search definition not provided Hsieh-Yee, I. (1998). Search tactics of Web users in searching for texts, graphics, known items and subjects: A search simulation study. In H. Iyer (Ed.), Electronic Resources: Use and User Behavior (pp. 61-83). New York: Haworth Press.
Subject (text based) search definition not provided Hsieh-Yee, I. (1998). Search tactics of Web users in searching for texts, graphics, known items and subjects: A search simulation study. In H. Iyer (Ed.), Electronic Resources: Use and User Behavior (pp. 61-83). New York: Haworth Press.
subject driven medium- complexity tasks not defined Jozsa, E., Koles, M., Komlodi, A., Hercegfi, K., & Chu, P. (2012). Evaluation of search quality differences and the impact of personality styles in native and foreign language searching tasks. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 310-313
subject driven medium-complexity tasks not defined Chu, P., Jozsa, E., Komlodi, A., & Hercegfi, K. (2012). An exploratory study on search behavior in different languages. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium, 318-321.
Subject search n/a Wallace, P.M. (1993). How do patrons search the online catalog when no one's looking? Transaction log analysis and implications for bibliographic instruction and system design. RQ, 33, 239-252.
Subject Search definition not provided Turner, N. B. (2011). Librarians do it differently: Comparative usability testing with students and library staff. Journal of Web Librarianship, 5(4), 286-298.
Subject Search N/A Tagliacozzo, R., & Kochen, M. (1970). Information seeking behavior of catalog users. Information Storage and Retrieval, 6(5), 363-381.
Subject search Not defined Xie, I., & Joo, S. (2010). Tales from the field: Search strategies applied in web searching. Future Internet, 2(3), 259-281.
Subject Search - Comprehensive "In two searches the participants were asked to find material with similar subject coverage as the item described in an abstract. This kind of search task imitates a student’s request for a book “like” a faculty-recommended book that is unavailable. The remaining four search tasks evolved from patron reference queries. The queries came from patrons’ questions in two departmental libraries at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The queries were in final negotiated form: i.e., the queries were in the form that the reference librarian searched after interviewing the patron. ... One was comprehensive: Participants were requested to find everything published during the last 5 years that was related to the topic." (p 508) Connell, T. H. (1995). Subject searching in online catalogs: Metaknowledge used by experienced searchers. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 46(7), 506-518.
Subject Search - Selective "In two searches the participants were asked to find material with similar subject coverage as the item described in an abstract. This kind of search task imitates a student’s request for a book “like” a faculty-recommended book that is unavailable. The remaining four search tasks evolved from patron reference queries. The queries came from patrons’ questions in two departmental libraries at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The queries were in final negotiated form: i.e., the queries were in the form that the reference librarian searched after interviewing the patron. Five of the search tasks were selective: Participants were asked to find one or two good items that could help the patron answer the question asked." (p 508) Connell, T. H. (1995). Subject searching in online catalogs: Metaknowledge used by experienced searchers. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 46(7), 506-518.
Subject searches "Subjects were given four search tasks for which they were asked to ®nd relevant records using the assigned system. Assigned search tasks appear in Appendix A. The ®rst task, representing a practice question, entailed that participants ®nd a known item document by author. Participants were then asked to conduct three subject searches: one in which there was a small number of relevant records in the database (Qsmall), one with a mid-sized number of relevant records (Qmedium) and one with a large number of relevant records (Qlarge), as determined by the investigators. Searchers were unaware of the total number of relevant items for each search task when they were assigned. The subject-based search tasks required the use of more than one descriptor for optimal results. In addition, to successfully locate all relevant records for Qlarge, non-sequential exploration of records was necessary in the hypertext system." (p.672) Wolfram, D., & Dimitroff, A. (1998). Hypertext vs. boolean-based searching in a bibliographic database environment: A direct comparison of searcher performance. Information Processing & Management, 34(6), 669-680.
Subject searches Not defined Carpineto, C., & Romano, G. (1996). Information retrieval through hybrid navigation of lattice representations. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 45(5), 553-578.
Subject searches Not defined Dalrymple, P.W. (1990). Retrieval by reformulation in two library catalogs: Toward a cognitive model of searching behavior. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 41(4), 272-281.
Subject searches not defined Akeroyd, J. (1990). Information Seeking in Online Catalogues. Journal of Documentation, 46(1), 33-52.
subject-based search definition not provided Wolfram, D., & Dimitroff, A. (1997). Preliminary findings on searcher performance and perceptions of performance in a hypertext bibliographic retrieval system. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 48(12), 1142-1145.
subject-generated search task "The second type of search in each session, tasks three and four, involved locating the answers to student-generated questions." [p. 258] Edyburn, D.L. (1988). Examining the successful retrieval of information by students using online databases. School Library Media Quarterly, 16, 256-259.
Subject-oriented searching Not defined Xie, I., & Joo, S. (2012). Factors affecting the selection of search tactics: Tasks, knowledge, process, and systems. Information Processing and Management, 48(2), 254-270.
Subjetive search "Finding images of having emotional or abstract concepts." (p. 335) Hung, T.-Y. (2005). Search moves and tactics for image retrieval in the field of journalism: A pilot study. Journal of Education Media & Library Sciences, 42(30), 329-346.
Summarization task Participants were... asked to write a short coherent summary (max. 300 words) addressing one or two global questions or aspects concerning the topic domain... Participants were instructed to browse/search for the requested information and were restricted to include only information they found in their browsing. (p.630) Kammerer, Y., Nairn, R., Pirolli, P., & Chi, E.H. (2009). Signpost from the masses: Learning effects in an exploratory social tag search browser. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 625-634.
Task Not defined Bierig, R. (2008). Event and map content personalisation in a mobile and context-aware environment. PhD. thesis, Robert Gordon University.
task not defined Marchionini, G. & Mu, X. (2003). User studies informing E-table interfaces. Information Processing & Management, 39(4), 561-579.
task not defined Kelly, D., Kantor, P., Morse, E., Scholtz, J., & Sun, Y. (2006). User-centered evaluation of interactive question answering systems. Proceedings of the Interactive Question Answering (IQA) workshop at HLT-NAACL 2006, 49-56.
Task 1 definition not provided Morehead, D. R., & Rouse, W. B. (1983). Human-computer interaction in information seeking tasks. Information Processing and Management, 19(4), 243-253.
Task 2 definition not provided Morehead, D. R., & Rouse, W. B. (1983). Human-computer interaction in information seeking tasks. Information Processing and Management, 19(4), 243-253.
Task complexity (1): the presence of multiple paths to a solution definition not provided Villa, R., Cantador, I., Joho, H., and Jose, J. M. (2009). An aspectual interface for supporting complex search tasks. Proceedings of the 32nd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Boston, MA, USA.
Task complexity (2): the presence of multiple desired outcomes definition not provided Villa, R., Cantador, I., Joho, H., and Jose, J. M. (2009). An aspectual interface for supporting complex search tasks. Proceedings of the 32nd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Boston, MA, USA.
Task complexity (3): the presence of conflicting interdependences among the paths to the solution(s) definition not provided Villa, R., Cantador, I., Joho, H., and Jose, J. M. (2009). An aspectual interface for supporting complex search tasks. Proceedings of the 32nd international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Boston, MA, USA.
Tasks Not defined Hook, K. (1997). Evaluating the utility and usability of an adaptive hypermedia system. Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Intelligent User Interfaces, 179-186.
Tasks "These tasks were chosen because they required some browsing within the site. We did not want users to be able to complete the tasks by searching the news front-page." (p.12) Lambros, S. (2005). Investigating the applicability of information foraging theory to mobile web browsing. Blacksburg: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
Tasks "The participants were asked to perform eight tasks in two domains: four tasks related to healthcare, and four tasks related to online shopping. The task order was randomized within each domain, as was the order between the domains. Participants were told to perform the tasks, as they would normally do for themselves." (p.610) Bhavnani, S.K. (2002). Domain-specific search strategies for the effective retrieval of healthcare and shopping information. CHI EA '02, 610-611.
tasks specified by the Track definition not provided Toms, EG., O'Brien, HL., Kopak, R., & Freund, L. 2005. Searching for relevance in the relevance of search. In Crestini, F., & Ruthven, I. (Eds.) Context: Nature, Impact, and Role, Proceedings 3507: 59-78. Presented at 5th International Conference on Conceptions of Library and Information Sciences (CoLIS 2005). Glasgow, Scotland.
Taxonomy definition not provided Hert, C.A., & Marchionini, G. (1998). Information seeking behavior on statistical websites: Theoretical and design implications. Proceedings of the 61st ASIS Annual Meeting, 303-314.
teacher-initiated research This study reports the preliminary results of one of the teacher-initiated research questions Bilal, D. (1998). Children's search processes in using World Wide Web search engines: An exploratory study. Proceedings of the 61st ASIS Annual Meeting, Pittsburgh, PA.
Teaching definition not provided White, R. W., & Kelly, D. (2006). A study on the effects of personalization and task information on implicit feedback performance. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 297-306). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Term Paper Task A few minutes ago you read an article on a topic. Now. assume that you are working a term paper assignment for one of your classes, which requires you to complete a lO-page paper on this topic. To do this, you want to find additional information about the topic. You will be searching an experimental information retrieval system to find a few good articles about the topic that you can include in your term paper. Allen, B.L., & Kim, K.-S. (2001). Person and context in information seeking: Interactions between cognitive and task variables. New Review of Information Behaviour Research, 2, 1-16.
Terse Not defined; a brief version of the CLEF topics Hansen, P., & Karlgren, J. (2005). Effects of foreign language and task scenario on relevance assessment. Journal of Documentation, 61(5), 623-639.
Test tasks "Tasks were developed based on users’ typical work on the software as discerned in the menu development phase of this project" (p.1106) Ju, B., & Gluck, M. (2005). User-process model approach to improve user interface usability. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 56(10), 1098-1112.
Text The question "included words taken from the text in the neighborhood of the target information" (p.40) Egan, D.E., Remde, J.R., Gomez, L.M., Landauer, T.K., Eberhardt, J., & Lochbaum, C.C. (1989). Formative design-evaluation of SuperBook. ACM Transactions on Information Systems, 7(1),30-57.
Text and heading The question includes "one or more words from the topic heading immediately preceding the target information" and "words taken from the text in the neighborhood of the target information" (p.40) Egan, D.E., Remde, J.R., Gomez, L.M., Landauer, T.K., Eberhardt, J., & Lochbaum, C.C. (1989). Formative design-evaluation of SuperBook. ACM Transactions on Information Systems, 7(1),30-57.
text search not defined Kim, Y. (2010). Social tags in text and image search. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 353-358.
Text-based search and locate tasks Not defined Cockburn, A., & McKenzie, B. (2000). An evaluation of cone trees. In People and Computers IV - Usability of Else! Proceedings of HCI 2000, 425-436. Retrieved June 21, 2013, from http://ir.canterbury.ac.nz/bitstream/10092/522/1/45293_conesBCSHCI.pdf.
Tool-neutral questions Questions for which the visualization tool might not have much impact Heo, M., & Hirtle, S.C. (2001). An empirical comparison of visualization tools to assist information retrieval on the Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 52(8), 666-675.
Tool-strong questions Questions for which the visualization tool would be useful; includes both questions requiring users' understandability of the Web space and questions requiring comparisons on the Web pages Heo, M., & Hirtle, S.C. (2001). An empirical comparison of visualization tools to assist information retrieval on the Web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 52(8), 666-675.
topic comprehension task "A person starts with a rough idea of the topic, and gradually gains knowledge about the topic through an exploratory search process. This process involves intensive information seeking activities and often involves the creation of external representations to support the accomplishment of future tasks, such as writing a paper or giving a talk." (540) Qu, Y., & Furnas, G.W. 2008. Model-driven formative evaluation of exploratory search: A study under a sensemaking framework. Information Processing & Management 44(2): 534-555.
Topic distillation task "This task asked participants to find a list of key resources for a topic. The definition of key resources was based on the instruction of the Web Track of TREC. The main criteria for being a key resource was that the Website was principally devoted to the topic." [p. 230] Joho, H., & Jose, J. M. (2008). Effectiveness of additional representations for the search result presentation on the web. Information Processing and Management, 44, 226-241.
Topic distillation task "This task asked participants to find a list of key resources for a topic. The definition of key resources was based on the instruction of the Web Track of TREC. The main criteria for being a key resource was that the website was principally devoted to the topic. In our experiment, participants were asked to find the key resources for designer handbags." (p.306) Joho, H., & Jose, J.M. (2006). A comparative study of the effectiveness of search result presentation on the Web. Advances in Information Retrieval. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 3936, 302-313.
Topic Relevance Task - Informational The topic relevance task is a traditional ad hoc retrieval task where documents (web pages) are ranked by decreasing likelihood of meeting the information need provided in a user query (Hawking & Craswell, 2001). Users are interested in finding as much information as possible, in the topic relevance task. For example, What is a prime factor? or prime factor is the query of the topic relevance task. The goal of this query is finding the meaning of prime factor. Kang, I., & Kim, G. C. (2004). Integration of multiple evidences based on a query type for web search. Information Processing and Management, 40(3), 459-478
topical information search task "In the topical information search task, the participants were told to make bookmarks of more than one Web page that they found relevant to the topic given." Kim, K.-S. (2000). Users, tasks and the Web: Their impact on the information- seeking behavior. Proceedings of the 21st National Online Meeting, USA.
topical information search task "a task of this type requires the searcher to find more than one piece of information related to the topic given and regarded useful to the searcher" (p.6). "In the topical information search task,the participants were told to make bookmarks of more than one Web page that they found relevant to the topic given." (p.6) Allen, B.L., & Kim, K.-S. (2001). Person and context in information seeking: Interactions between cognitive and task variables. New Review of Information Behaviour Research, 2, 1-16.
topical information search task (TOPIC) "a task requiring the participant to find pieces of information related to a given subject and regarded as useful to understanding the subject" (45) Kim, K.-S. (1998). Information-seeking behavior on the World Wide Web: Effects of cognitive style, online database search experience and task types on search performance. (Doctoral dissertation). University of Texas at Austin.
Training Tasks definition not provided Hertzum, M., & Frokjaer, E. (1996). Browsing and querying in online documentation: A study of user interfaces and the interaction process. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 3(2), 136-161.
Transactional The intent is to perform some web-mediated activity. (p.5) Broder, A. (2002). A taxonomy of web search. SIGIR Forum, 36(2), 3-10.
Transactional task ...based on the intent to perform some web-mediated activity. Terai, H., Saito, H., Egusa, Y., Takatu, M., Miwi, M., and Kando, N. (2008). Differences between informational and transactional tasks in information seeking on the web. Proceedings of the second international symposium on Information interaction in context, pp. 152-159
Transactions "performing online services such as registering for a conference or making an online purchase" (p.1190) MacKay, B., & Watters, C. (2012). An examination of multisession web tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63(6), 1183-1197.
Transactions Transactions are defined as tasks in which you are performing an online action. Often, a username/password is associated with the transaction. Examples include Web-based e-mail, banking, or posting to a message board. Kellar, M., Watters, C., & Shepherd, M. (2007). A field study characterizing web-based information-seeking tasks. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(7), 999-1018. doi:10.1002/asi.20590
Transmuting successive search task "Transmuting successive searches depict situations where the searchers learn about and gradually refine their information problems during the course of information search." (p.1260) "The factors in the MISE [Multiple Information Seeking Episodes] model depict transmuting successive searches as follows: with continuous cognitive involvement with information attainment, despite the constrains from the information systems and search contexts, searchers’ clarity about the problematic situation, level of subject knowledge and definition of information problems will improve over the process which in turn would be manifested in searchers’ cognitive abilities in the information-seeking process." (p.1266) Lin, S., & Xie, I. (2013). Behavioral changes in transmuting multisession successive searches over the web. Journal of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 64(6), 1259-1283.
Travel definition not provided White, R. W., & Kelly, D. (2006). A study on the effects of personalization and task information on implicit feedback performance. In Proceedings of the 15th ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (pp. 297-306). Arlington, Virginia, USA: ACM.
Treatment n/a Lopes, C., & Ribeiro, C. (2010). Context Effect on Query Formulation and Subjective Relevance in Health Searches. In Proceeding of the third symposium on Information interaction in context: Querying and relevance behavior (pp. 205-214). New York, NY: ACM.
TREC interactive track topic Not further defined Veerasamy, A., & Belkin, N.J. (1996). Evaluation of a tool for visualization of information retrieval results. Proceedings of the 20th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 85-92.
Trec Topic "The task for this study was a query construction task, i.e. subjects had to develop a final routing query for a given information problem, or topic, that could be run repeatedly against changing document collections. Specifically, we asked subjects to devise a single final query that retrieved at least 30 documents from the current collection, of which as many documents as possible in the top 30 were relevant to the provided topic." (208) Koenemann, J., & Belkin, N. J. (1996). A case for interaction: A study of interactive information retrieval behavior and effectiveness. Paper presented at the Human Factors in Computing Systems, Common Ground: CHI '96 Conference Proceedings, Vancouver.
TREC topics "The participants had 15 minutes on each system to find as many relevant documents as possible." (1489) Jansen, BJ., & McNeese, MD. 2005. Evaluating the effectiveness of and patterns of interactions with automated searching assistance. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 56(14): 1480-1503.
TREC topics Not defined Veerasamy, A., & Heikes, R. (1997). Effectiveness of a graphical display of retrieval results. Proceedings of the 20th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 236-245.
TREC topics Zhang, X., Liu, J., Cole, M., & Belkin, N. (2015). Predicting users domain knowledge in information retrieval using multiple regression analysis of search behaviors. Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, 66(5), 980-1000.
two searches (librarian and clinician) using text words only definition not provided Hersh, W.R., & Hickam, D.H. (1994). The use of a multi-application computer workstation in a clinical setting. Bulletin of the Medical Librarian Association, 82, 382-389.
two searches (librarian and clinician) using the full MEDLINE feature set (MeSH terms and text words) definition not provided Hersh, W.R., & Hickam, D.H. (1994). The use of a multi-application computer workstation in a clinical setting. Bulletin of the Medical Librarian Association, 82, 382-389.
Type 2 questions "The Type 2 questions are of the form <>... For the Type 2 questions, two facts are usually needed to make the comparison, plus supporting documents." (p.378) Wu, M., Fuller, M., & Wilkinson, R. (2001). Searcher performance in question answering. Proceedings of the 24th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 375-381.
Type I questions "The Type 1 questions are of the form <>... For the Type 1 questions, a complete answer consists of n answer components, plus a list of supporting documents." (p.378) Wu, M., Fuller, M., & Wilkinson, R. (2001). Searcher performance in question answering. Proceedings of the 24th Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 375-381.
unclearly specified search, I tasks in which some of the query preview attributes are relevant to the task Tanin, E., Lotem, A., Haddadin, I., Shneiderman, B., Plaisant, C., & Slaughter, L. (2000). Facilitating data exploration with query previews: a study of user performance and preference. Behaviour & Information Technology, 19(6), 393-403.
unclearly specified search, II tasks in which all of the query preview attributes are relevant to the task Tanin, E., Lotem, A., Haddadin, I., Shneiderman, B., Plaisant, C., & Slaughter, L. (2000). Facilitating data exploration with query previews: a study of user performance and preference. Behaviour & Information Technology, 19(6), 393-403.
Understand "Constructing meaning from oral, written, and graphic messages through interpreting, exemplifying, classifying, summarizing, inferring, comparing, and explaining." (p.255) Wu, W., Kelly, D., Edwards, A., & Arguello, J. (2012). Grannies, tanning beds, tattoos and NASCAR: Evaluation of search tasks with varying levels of cognitive complexity. In Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context Symposium (254-257). New York, NY: ACM.
Understand "Constructing meaning from oral, written, and graphic messages through interpreting, exemplifying, classifying, summarizing, inferring, comparing, and explaining" (p.439) Arguello, J., Wu, W., Kelly, D., & Edwards, A. (2012). Task complexity, vertical display and user interaction in aggregated search. In Proceedings of the 35th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 435-444.
Understanding Constructing meaning from oral, written, and graphic messages through interpreting, exemplifying, classifying, summarizing, inferring, comparing, and explaining (Table 2); Scenario must have participant translate, construe, interpret, or extrapolate information (Table 3) Jansen, B.J., Booth, D., & Smith, B. (2009). Using the taxonomy of cognitive learning to model online searching. Information Processing & Management, 45(6), 643-663.
undirected search "I want to learn anything/every thing about my topic." (p. 1699) Kim, J. & Can, A. (2012). Characterizing Queries in Different Search Tasks. In Proceedings of 45th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), 1697 - 1706.
Undirected viewing "The individual is exposed to information with no specific informational need in mind. The overall purpose is to scan broadly in order to detect signals of change early. Many and varied sources of information are used, and large amounts of information are screened. The granularity of the information is coarse, but large chunks of information are quickly dropped from attention. The goal of broad scanning implies the use of a large number of different sources and different types of sources." (p.6) Choo, C. W., Detlor, B., & Turnbull, D. (2000). Information seeking on the Web - an integrated model of browsing and searching. First Monday, 5(2). http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/729/638.
Unknown entities definition not provided Hert, C.A. (1996). User goals on an online public access catalog. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 47(7), 504-518.
Unspecified definition not provided Reid, J. (2000). A task-oriented non-interactive evaluation methodology for information retrieval systems. Information Retrieval, 2(1), 115-129.
Unspecified "a list of 10 possible psychological research topics to be the object of bibliographic searches" (p.257) Tang, R., Shaw, W.M., Jr., & Vevea, J.L. (1999). Towards the identification of the optimal number of relevance categories. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50(3), 254-264.
unspecified definition not provided Saracevic, T., & Kantor, P. (1988). A study of information seeking and retrieving. II. Users, questions, and effectiveness. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 39(3), 177-196.
unspecified "To assess PDQ's usability, a set of test questions appropriate for PDQ was developed." [p. 30] Shaw, D. J., & Czaja, R. F. (1992). User interactions with the PDQ cancer information system. Bulletin of the Medical Library Association, 80(1), 29-35.
unstructured search Search for images of interest Yee, K.-P., Swearingen, K., Li, K., & Hearst, M. (2003). Faceted metadata for image search and browsing. In SIGCHI Proceedings, (pp.401-408).
unstructured search Search for images of interest Yee, K.-P., Swearingen, K., Li, K., & Hearst, M. (2003). Faceted metadata for image search and browsing. In SIGCHI Proceedings, (pp.401-408).
Usability test scenarios Tang, R., Quigley, E., Guillette, J., & Erdmann, C. (2013). Shared discovery using a library tool on an interactive tabletop: Team composition, collaboration style and process. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology, 50, 1-15.
use information read/view/listen, save to disk (download), display for others, duplicate, and print Byrne, M.D., John, B.E., Wehrle, N.S., & Crow, D.C. (1999). The tangled Web we wove: A taskonomy of WWW use. CHI Proceedings, 544-551.
User-generated "tasks derived from a task database collected by survey from WWW users" (p.5) Pirolli, P., Fu, W. (2003). SNIF-ACT: A model of information foraging on the World Wide Web. UM 9th International Conference, Johnstown, PA, USA.
user-initiated search definition not provided Lancaster, F. W. (1972). Evaluation of on-line searching in MEDLARS (AIM-TWX) by biomedical practitioners (No. Occasional Papers No. 101). Urbana, IL: Univ. of Illinois, Graduate School of Library Science.
using text words only definition not provided Hersh, W.R., & Hickam, D.H. (1994). The use of a multi-application computer workstation in a clinical setting. Bulletin of the Medical Librarian Association, 82, 382-389.
Vacation planning task Paul, S.A., & Morris, M.R. (2011). Sensemaking in collaborative web search. Human-Computer Interaction, 26(1-2), 27-122.
Vanilla CLEF Not defined; CLEF topics were administered without change Hansen, P., & Karlgren, J. (2005). Effects of foreign language and task scenario on relevance assessment. Journal of Documentation, 61(5), 623-639.
Verificative information need "You would like to check a specific piece of information" (p.497) Borlund, P., & Dreier, S. (2014). An investigation of the search behaviour associated with Ingwersen's three types of information needs. Information Processing & Management, 50(4), 493-507.
Verificative information need "You would like to check a specific piece of information" (p.187) Borlund, P., Dreier, S., & Bystrom, K. (2012). What does time spent on searching indicate? Proceedings of the 4th Information Interaction in Context (IIiX), 184-193.
Very difficult tasks "The [task difficulty] levels were controlled by assigning topics with the appropriate number of relevant documents within the corpus (more than 100, less than 20, one or zero), therefore improving or decreasing the chance of one finding relevant documents accordingly." (p.396) Arapakis, I., Jose, J.M., & Gray, P.D. (2008). Affective feedback: An investigation into the role of emotions in the information seeking process. Proceedings of the 31st ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development of Information Retrieval, 395-402.
video search not defined Wildemuth, B. M., Oh, J. S., & Marchionini, G. (2010). Tactics used when searching for digital video. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 255-264.
Visual cues n/a Westman, S., Lustila, A., and Oittinen, P. (2008). Search strategies in multimodal image retrieval. Proceedings of the second international symposium on Information interaction in context (London, United Kingdom), 13-20.
Web information search task not defined Chen, J. A. (2012). An Individual's Problem Space and Web Information Searching: A Proposed Study on Mental Organization of Keyword Importance and Efficiency in Everyday Web Information Searching. In Proceedings of 45th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), 4583 - 4592.
Web search "given an information need, the user needs to issue queries and then identify answer documents that contain information relevant to the information need." pp. 14 Turpin, A. and Scholer, F. (2006). User performance versus precision measures for simple search tasks. Proceedings of the 29th annual international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval table of contents. Seattle, Washington, USA.
Web search not defined Balatsoukas, P. & Ruthven, I. (2010). What eyes can tell about the use of relevance criteria during predictive relevance judgment? In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 389-394.
Web search tasks not defined Guo, Q., Jin, H., Lagun, D., Yuan, S., & Agichtein, E. (2013). Mining touch interaction data on mobile devices to predict web search result relevance. In Proceedings of the 36th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 153-162.
Web search tasks not defined Liu, C., Belkin, N. J., & Cole, M. J. (2012). Personalization of search results using interaction behaviors in search sessions. In Proceedings of the 35th international ACM SIGIR conference on Research and development in information retrieval, 205-214.
Web search tasks not defined Liu, J., Liu, C., Zhang, J., Bierig, R., & Cole, M. J. (2010). Identifying queries in the wild, wild web. In Proceedings of the third symposium on Information interaction in context, 317-322.
Web search tasks not defined Phillips, A.H., Yang, R., & Djamasbi, S. (2013). Do ads matter? An exploration of web search behavior, visual hierarchy, and search engine results pages. In Proceedings of 46th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), 1563 - 1568.
Web search tasks Not defined Capra, R.G., III, & Perez-Quinones, M.A. (2005). Using Web search engines to find and refind information. IEEE Computer, 38(10), 36-42.
Web search, matching phrasing "A matching phrasing was a task whose wording matched the text of the target page" (p.1987). Barsky, E., & Bar‐Ilan, J. (2012). The impact of task phrasing on the choice of search keywords and on the search process and success. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63(10), 1987-2005.
Web search, nonmatching phrasing "A nonmatching phrasing was synonymous with the matching phrasing, but had no match with the target page" (p.1987). Barsky, E., & Bar‐Ilan, J. (2012). The impact of task phrasing on the choice of search keywords and on the search process and success. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 63(10), 1987-2005.
Web Surfing Web-surfers were users with no specific information goals for a Web-viewing session Li, H. and Bukovac, J. L. (1999). Cognitive impact of banner ad characteristics: An experimental study. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, Vol. 76(2), 341-353.
web-based search tasks definition not provided Hoelscher, C., & Strube, G. (2000). Web search behavior of Internet experts and newbies. In Proceedings of the Ninth International World Wide Web Conference (pp. 337-346).
web-based search tasks definition not provided Holscher, C., & Strube, G. (2000).Web search behavior of Internet experts and newbies. Computer Networks, 33, 337-346.
Website "Find any N websites that meet the need specified in the task statement." (p.210) Belkin, N.J., Cool, C., Kelly, D., Kim, G., Kim, J., Lee, H., Muresan, G., Tang, M.-C., & Yuan, X.-J. (2003). Query length in interaction information retrieval. Proceedings of the ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, 205-212.
well-defined finding task "The well-defined finding task had the requirements of a clearly defined goal end state. This focused the searcher’s attention on what to look for and also helped the searcher realize when he or she had found the solution. The information necessary to solve the well-defined finding task stuwas specified precisely in the statement of the task (Bystrom & Jarvelin, 1995; Chi & Glaser, 1985; Howard,1983; Simon, 1973; Wood, 1983)." (p.843) Schacter, J., Chung, G.K.W.K., & Dorr, A. (1998). Children's Internet searching on complex problems: Performance and process analyses. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 49(9), 840-849.
Well-defined topical information need Not defined Skov, M. (2009). The Reinvented Museum: Exploring Information Seeking Behaviour in a Digital Museum Context. PhD thesis, Royal School of Library and Information Science, Denmark. pure.iva.dk/ws/files/30768221/MetteSkovThesis.pdf
well-structured, low-complexity task definition not provided Browne, G. J., Pitts, M. G., & Wetherbe, J. C. (2007). Cognitive stopping rules for terminating information search in online tasks. MIS Quarterly, 31(1), 89-104.
well-structured, medium-complexity task definition not provided Browne, G. J., Pitts, M. G., & Wetherbe, J. C. (2007). Cognitive stopping rules for terminating information search in online tasks. MIS Quarterly, 31(1), 89-104.
What to be aware of knowing about safety/cultural issues (local taboos, safety of the surroundings, etc.) Chang, S. L. (2009). Information research in leisure: Implications from an empirical study of backpackers. Library Trends, 57(4), 711-728.
What to budget Controlling expenses, learning about local currency Chang, S. L. (2009). Information research in leisure: Implications from an empirical study of backpackers. Library Trends, 57(4), 711-728.
When to do what Arranging schedules/itineraries Chang, S. L. (2009). Information research in leisure: Implications from an empirical study of backpackers. Library Trends, 57(4), 711-728.
Where to go Selecting destinations/sightseeing locations Chang, S. L. (2009). Information research in leisure: Implications from an empirical study of backpackers. Library Trends, 57(4), 711-728.
Where to stay Finding accommodations, such as hostels and/or motels Chang, S. L. (2009). Information research in leisure: Implications from an empirical study of backpackers. Library Trends, 57(4), 711-728.
word counting definition not provided Tenopir, C., & Shu, M. E. (1989). Magazines in full text: Uses and search strategies. Online Review, 13(2), 107-118.
Work task Work tasks are separable parts of a person's duties towards his/her employer. This means that although the work tasks may not be explicitly defined, both they and their performance are always to some degree outlined by the work organization. Bystrom, K. and Hansen, P. (2002). Work tasks as units for analysis in information seeking and retrieval studies. In: Emerging Frameworks and Methods: Fourth International Conference on Conceptions of Library and Information Science (CoLIS4) , 21-25 July 2002, Seattle, Washington, USA.
Work task Not defined; Borlund dissertation referenced Larsen, B. (2002). Exploiting citation overlaps for information retrieval: Generating a boomerang effect from the network of scientific papers. Scientometrics, 54(2), 155-178.
work task "work tasks at hand that involves information use and require certain types of outcomes other than finding information" (p. 1) Liu, J. & Belkin, N. J. (2012). Searching vs. writing: Factors affecting information use task performance. In Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49(1): 1-10.
work task not defined Lopes, T. C. & Ribeiro, C. (2011). Comparative evaluation of web search engines in health information retrieval. Online Information Review, 35(6), 869 - 892.
work task questionnaire definition not provided Kallehauge, J. 2010. Stage-driven information seeking process: Value and uncertainty of work tasks from initiation to resolution. Journal of Information Science 36 (2): 242-262.
[search] Questions derived from medical test questions ...traditional examination-style questions from the Medical Knowledge Self-Assessment Program (MKSAP, American College of Physicians, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) after converting them from multiple-choice to yes/no form. Hersh, W. (2002). TREC 2002 Interactive Track Report, pp. 283-293.
[search] Questions from clinical practice ...generated by practicing clinicians, and these questions were known to have answers that could be found by searching MEDLINE. Hersh, W. (2002). TREC 2002 Interactive Track Report, pp. 283-293.
“known-item” search "Known-item search tasks required the searcher to obtain a piece of information that was known to exist and provide a specific answer to the question." (p. 2) Saparova, D. (2012). Information needs and search characteristics of first-year medical students. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.
“subject” search "Subject search tasks required the searcher to find different pieces of information that were related to the subject and considered useful in answering the question." (p. 2) Saparova, D. (2012). Information needs and search characteristics of first-year medical students. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 49, 1-4.