Pausal behavior of end-users in online searching

This research used an information processing approach to analyze the pausal behavior of end-users. It is based on viewing the search as a series of actions and pauses (rests). The end-users are 41 students and 3 faculty. After instructions, subjects searched through the semester, doing 79 searches. This study identified reasons for pausing, location of pauses, hesitation rate and pausal behavior changes over time. This study confirms that the searchers pauses less frequently and for shorter periods as they progressed through searches with more experience and practice, searchers moved more smoothly online, and the hesitation rate decreased over time. Over a series of searches or cycles within long searches, searchers gradually began to chunk more information between pauses. However, the duration of pauses do not vary significantly over time. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.