Mette Skov

Inter and intra-document contexts applied in polyrepresentation for best match IR

The principle of polyrepresentation offers a theoretical framework for handling multiple contexts in information retrieval (IR). This paper presents an empirical laboratory study of polyrepresentation in restricted mode of the information space with focus on inter and intra-document features. The Cystic Fibrosis test collection indexed in the best match system InQuery constitutes the experimental setting. Overlaps between five functionally and/or cognitively different document representations are identified. Supporting the principle of polyrepresentation, results show that in general overlaps generated by three or four representations of different nature have higher precision than those generated from two representations or the single fields. This result pertains to both structured and unstructured query mode in best match retrieval, however, with the latter query mode demonstrating higher performance. The retrieval overlaps containing search keys from the bibliographic references provide the best retrieval performance and minor MeSH terms the worst. It is concluded that a highly structured query language is necessary when implementing the principle of polyrepresentation in a best match IR system because the principle is inherently Boolean. Finally a re-ranking test shows promising results when search results are re-ranked according to precision obtained in the overlaps whilst re-ranking by citations seems less useful when integrated into polyrepresentative applications.

Overview of the CLEF 2015 Social Book Search Lab

The Social Book Search SBS Lab investigates book search in scenarios where users search with more than just a query, and look for more than objective metadata. Real-world information needs are generally complex, yet almost all research focuses instead on either relatively simple search based on queries or recommendation based on profiles. The goal is to research and develop techniques to support users in complex book search tasks. The SBS Lab has two tracks. The aim of the Suggestion Track is to develop test collections for evaluating ranking effectiveness of book retrieval and recommender systems. The aim of the Interactive Track is to develop user interfaces that support users through each stage during complex search tasks and to investigate how users exploit professional metadata and user-generated content.

Inter and intra-document contexts applied in polyrepresentation

The principle of polyrepresentation offers a theoretical framework for handling multiple contexts in Information Retrieval (IR). This paper presents an empirical study of polyrepresentation of the information space with focus on inter and intra-document features. The Cystic Fibrosis test collection indexed in a best match system constitutes the experimental setting. Overlaps between four functionally and/or cognitively different representations are identified. Supporting the principle of polyrepresentation, results show that in general overlaps generated by three or four representations have higher precision than those generated from one or two overlaps both in structured and unstructured search mode. It is concluded that a highly structured query language is necessary when implementing the principle of polyrepresentation in a best match IR system because the principle is inherently Boolean. Finally a re-ranking test shows promising results when search results are re-ranked according to precision obtained in the overlaps.

Supporting Complex Search Tasks

There is broad consensus in the field of IR that search is complex in many use cases and applications, both on the Web and in domain specific collections, and both professionally and in our daily life. Yet our understanding of complex search tasks, in comparison to simple look up tasks, is fragmented at best. The workshop addressed the many open research questions: What are the obvious use cases and applications of complex search? What are essential features of work tasks and search tasks to take into account? And how do these evolve over time? With a multitude of information, varying from introductory to specialized, and from authoritative to speculative or opinionated, when to show what sources of information? How does the information seeking process evolve and what are relevant differences between different stages? With complex task and search process management, blending searching, browsing, and recommendations, and supporting exploratory search to sensemaking and analytics, UI and UX design pose an overconstrained challenge. How do we know that our approach is any good? Supporting complex search task requires new collaborations across the whole field of IR, and the proposed workshop will bring together a diverse group of researchers to work together on one of the greatest challenges of our field.

Workshop on Barriers to Interactive IR Resources Re-use

The goal of this workshop is to serve as a starting point for a community-driven effort to design and implement a platform for the collection, organization, maintenance, and sharing of resources for IIR experimentation. As in all scientific endeavors, progress in IIR research is contingent on the ability to build on previous ideas, approaches, and resources. However, we believe there to be a number of barriers to reproducibility and re-use of resources in IIR research: the fragmentary nature of how the community»s resources are organized, the lack of awareness of their existence, documentation and organization of the resources, the nature of the typical research publication cycle, and the effort required to make such resources available. We believe that an online platform dedicated to the collection and organization of IIR resources could be a promising way of overcoming these barriers. The workshop therefore aims to serve both as a brainstorming opportunity about the shape this iRepository should take, as well as a way of building support in the community for its implementation.

Supporting Complex Search Tasks ECIR 2015 Workshop

There is broad consensus in the field of IR that search is complex in many use cases and applications, both on the Web and in domain specific collections, and both professionally and in our daily life. Yet our understanding of complex search tasks, in comparison to simple look up tasks, is fragmented at best. The workshop addressed the many open research questions: What are the obvious use cases and applications of complex search? What are essential features of work tasks and search tasks to take into account? And how do these evolve over time? With a multitude of information, varying from introductory to specialized, and from authoritative to speculative or opinionated, when to show what sources of information? How does the information seeking process evolve and what are relevant differences between different stages? With complex task and search process management, blending searching, browsing, and recommendations, and supporting exploratory search to sensemaking and analytics, UI and UX design pose an overconstrained challenge. How do we know that our approach is any good? Supporting complex search task requires new collaborations across the whole field of IR, and the proposed workshop will bring together a diverse group of researchers to work together on one of the greatest challenges of our field.

Applying an expectancy-value model to study motivators for work-task based information seeking

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to operationalise and verify a cognitive motivation model that has been adapted to information seeking. The original model was presented within the field of psychology. Design/methodology/approach – An operationalisation of the model is presented based on the theory of expectancy-value and on the operationalisation used when the model was first developed. Data for the analysis were collected from a sample of seven informants working as consultants in Danish municipalities. Each participant filled out a questionnaire, kept a log book for a week and participated in a subsequent interview to elicit data regarding their information source behaviour and task motivation. Findings – Motivation affected source use when the informants search for information as part of their professional life. This meant that the number of sources used and the preference for interpersonal and internal sources increased when the task had high-value motivation or low-expectancy motivation or bot...

Report on the Workshop on Barriers to Interactive IR Resources Re-use (BIIRRR 2018)

The goal of the BIIRRR 2018 workshop [2] was to serve as a starting point for a communitydriven effort to design and implement a platform for the collection, organization, maintenance, and sharing of resources for interactive information retrieval (IIR) experimentation. As in all scientific endeavors, progress in IIR research is contingent on the ability to build on previous ideas, approaches, and resources. Current trends towards open science and funding mandates to preserve and share research data lend support and even urgency to the notion of establishing a shared disciplinary repository of research tools and data for IIR. The need for an IIR (evaluation) framework was further highlighted by Pia Borlund in her 2016 CHIIR keynote [3]. Components from IIR experiments that could be valuable to archive for re-use include: the systems or platforms used for experimentation, the content or resources of the experimental platform (data collections), the search tasks or work situation, the experimental context and other important aspects of the test design, experimental protocols, questionnaire designs, etc., the gathered user and system interaction data, the tools used for analysis as well as the results and measures. We believe there to be a number of barriers to reproducibility and re-use of resources in IIR research: the fragmentary nature of how the community’s resources are organized, the lack of awareness of their existence, insufficient documentation and organization of the resources, the nature of the typical research publication cycle, and the effort required to make such resources available. The TREC initiative highlights the value of such a repository, as it provides a single access

What was this Movie About this Chick

In recent decades, information retrieval research has slowly expanded its focus to address the wealth of complex search requests present in our work and leisure environments. A better understanding of such complex needs could aid in the design of more effective, domain-specific search engines. In this paper we take a first step towards such domain-specific understanding. We present an analysis of a random sample of 1000+ complex book and movie search requests posted in the LibraryThing and Internet Movie Database forums. A coding scheme was developed that captures the 29 different relevance aspects expressed in these requests. We find that while the identified relevance aspects are remarkably similar for complex book and movie requests, their relative occurrence does vary considerably from domain to domain.

Analyzing the Influence of Language Proficiency on Interactive Book Search Behavior

English content still dominates in many online domains and information systems, despite native English speakers being a minority of its users. However, we know little about how language proficiency influences search behavior in these systems. In this paper, we describe preliminary results from an interactive IR experiment with book search behavior and examine how language skills affect this behavior. A total of 97 users from 21 different countries participated in this experiment, resulting in a rich data set including usage data as well as questionnaire feedback. Although participants reported feeling language constraints, a preliminary analysis of native and non-native English speakers indicate little to no meaningful differences in their search behavior.