User:Gusandrews/SearchProject/SearcherResourceInteraction

From Studyplace

[edit] 10/15/07, DiMartino and Zoe, 1996

Their dataset was 143 Baruch students who made an appt to use Lexis-Nexus (mind you this was in 1996 when it was a newish thing to them and to librarians both I think)

They were instructed on the basic mechanics of the system (Booleans, proximity searching, refining search, truncation, wildcards, date range, etc)

"The respondents failed to construct searches that would have turned up material abundantly available in the database. Even after being trained and searching the database 4-6 times before, respondent # 19 did not retrieve any documents tier searching 10 different files and changing libraries five times. " (p 141)

"The responses to this survey indicate that fairly sophisticated end-users with prior experience searching other databases and even formal training on the system may experience more difficulties than is commonly realized or acknowledged.... Other end-user studies corroborate these findings-that many of the new generation of end-users are not getting satisfactory results, and they do not even realize it (Nash & Wilson, 1991; LePoer & Mularski, 1989). Not only do users formulate a false impression of the database contents, but they may develop an unrealistic level of confidence regarding their ability to successfully search the system. " (p 142)

So, interesting: even when they're doing it right, the engine developers may be doing it wrong, or the contents may just be completely unmanageable. Does this mean they can't be considered a "domain"? Jeez, probably.

cite "Jacobson and Fusani, who analyzed the impact of prior computer experience on search success. As they suggested 'all computer knowledge does not transfer easily from system to system'" (Jacobson & Fusani, p. 104) May have used booleans in the school library, but do they actually use them?!

[edit] 10/13/07, Case 2002

FIND Baldwin and Rice 1997 concluded that institutional resources have more to do with the use of "source and channels" than individual characteristics (Case p 269) -- good to cite