BACKGROUND• The Web is a global information resource

• Web users that seek information vary, culturally and ethnically

• Users of different cultural backgrounds may have different cognitive styles and methods of information organization

• However, most search tools simply translate text between languages rather than adjusting the actual interface design and organization of categories to the culture.

So how do users from different cultural backgrounds vary in information seeking behavior?

RELATED RESEARCH• Few studies have explored how culture influences information seeking behavior

• Among others, Kralisch and Berendt (2004) investigated how cultural influences equated to the varying of users’ information seeking behavior by quantitatively analyzing information about search tools used, the number of steps taken and the number of times tools were used

• Fang and Rau (2003) explored the effect of cultural differences in relation to the satisfaction and task performance of using Yahoo!’s search engine and web directories.

METHODSChinese and American participants were each given six information seeking

tasks to accomplish using tools such as search engines and directories

Participants thought aloud while performing tasks

Transcripts collected from participants’ think-aloud and interview sessions were then analyzed and compared

Examples of tasks and interview questions included:

FUTURE RESEARCH• Identify cultural variables that cause the differences in search behavior and tactics

• Guide in the design of more efficient search tools

GOALSIdentify key differences in behavior such as:

• Search tool preference

• Relevance judgment

• Ease or difficulty perception of an information seeking task

• Search tactics

Look for patterns in the reasons and objectives of information seeking

SEARCH TOOL PREFERENCE• Regardless of cultural background, users preferred search engines, especially Google

Faster More results More specific Effective

Easier to use More direct More efficient More simple

• Directories received mixed reviews, mainly negative experiences

• Several Chinese participants mentioned difficulty of understanding what the content of a directory category would include based on labels

• In general, directory use was viewed as time consuming and ineffective to look through all the levels. However, with no time restraint, it was viewed as a good browsing tool option.

FINDINGS REGARDING:

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN PARTICIPANT GROUPS

•Nearly all Chinese participants (but none of the Americans) discussed the use of Bulletin Board Systems (BBS) forums as efficient sources of information

• Chinese participants seemed to interact more with interviewer, conversing about more than the tasks and worrying about wasting interviewer’s time if they encountered difficulty in accomplishing a task

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. EIA-0244131. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.

• Majority of Chinese participants (but only one American) mentioned use of non-online information sources, either alone or combined with online sources

• Use any search tool to find the number of United Nations member states

• Use search directories to find job resources for library science degree graduates

• Which search tool was the easiest to use? Why?

• What do you typically search for?

Yahoo! China

Yahoo!

Google China

Google