A hierarchical search history for Web searching

A hierarchical search history for Web searching was developed based on user-centered design principles and was proposed to assist users in controlling; a Web search process. Two experimental search engines and browsers were developed. One was based on currently available search engines and the other was based on the user-centered search history design. An experiment was conducted to test the effectiveness of the search history. The dependent variables were the number of relevant Web sites identified during a l-hr test period and satisfaction. The independent variables were type of search engine and task complexity. The experimental results suggested that with a high complexity task, search history improved users' search performance by 124% and satisfaction of use by 42.5% as compared to the current search engine.