Information retrieval techniques have been applied to biomedical research for a variety of purposes, such as textual document retrieval and molecular data retrieval. As biomedical research evolves over time, information retrieval is also constantly facing new challenges, including the growing number of available data, the emerging new data types,…

This phenomenological ethnographic multi-case study's purpose was to gain insight into experiences of rural junior high History Fair participants as they searched for and evaluated online primary sources. Drawing on the theories of Dewey and Kuhlthau, the study examined how the participants searched the Internet, what strategies they used to…

This dissertation studies consumer search behavior in markets where buyers have incomplete information about available goods, such as markets with many sellers or frequently changing prices. In these markets, consumers engage in costly search in order to collect information necessary for making a purchase. Our method of investigation combines…

In recent years, tags have become a standard feature on a diverse range of sites on the Web, accompanying blog posts, photos, videos, and online news stories. Tags are descriptive terms attached to Internet resources. Despite the rapid adoption of tagging, how people use tags during the search process is not well understood. There is little…

This study is about the information-seeking behavior that bilingual users -- specifically, native Chinese speakers whose second language is English -- exhibit when performing an online search. Bilingual online searching occurs when bilingual users submit queries to search for information in two languages. This study seeks to explore the…

Context: This dissertation examines beliefs and uses regarding tagging among current undergraduate students, and examines the ecology of communications practice and implications for formation and maintenance of identity within the population. Currently enrolled undergraduate students at UNC-Chapel Hill formed the population for examination. …

The study of this dissertation provides a solution to a very specific problem instance in the area of data mining, data warehousing, and service-oriented architecture in publishing and newspaper industries. The research question focuses on the integration of data mining and data warehousing. The research problem focuses on the development of…

Internet technology has provided people with unprecedented abilities to filter the information they encounter, leading many scholars to fear that people will be exposed to less diversity of perspectives and fragment into homogeneous interest groups. Exposure to a wide range of topics and perspectives about political information in particular is…

This study explores the web-navigation practices of adult learners in higher education and re-conceptualizes the concept of the organizing circumstance of self-managed learning, originated by Spear and Mocker (1984). The theoretical framework draws on funds of knowledge theory from a cultural historical perspective and elaborates a Vygotskian…

Because research exploring how students with disabilities read and comprehend on the Internet is scarce, a mixed methods study was implemented to determine if Internet Reciprocal Teaching (IRT) is an effective intervention for improving online reading comprehension among seventh grade students with high-incidence disabilities in inclusive…