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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the long-term development of online research skills among lower secondary school students and how various factors such as teaching interventions and students’ self-efficacy, attitudes, information and communication technology (ICT) activity and gender are associated with development.

Two intervention courses were implemented to improve online research skills among 7th-grade students. In the follow-up test in the 8th grade, students’ skills were measured in Web searching, critical evaluation of sources and argumentative use of Web information. Students’ self-efficacy beliefs in online research, their attitudes toward learning, behavioral intentions in online research and ICT activity were surveyed by questionnaires.

The main finding was that the effect observed immediately after the intervention in 7th grade did not last until the following year. A cluster analysis revealed six skill profiles characterizing strengths and weaknesses in students’ performance in the subtasks of online research and indicated that many students suffer from poor evaluation skills. Self-efficacy beliefs stood out as a student-related factor associated with the development of online research skills.

This study contributed to the pedagogy of online research skills. It indicates that small-scale interventions are not enough to enhance 7th-graders’ online research skills. Students need continuous practice in different contexts during their school years. It is important to support students’ self-efficacy to motivate them to develop their skills in all the subtasks of online research. This study also demonstrated the importance of follow-up studies in online research skills, as they have been rare thus far.

The internet and search engines dominate within people’s information acquisition, especially among the younger generations. Given this trend, this study aims to explore if information and communication technology (ICT) practices, internet reliance and views of knowledge and knowing, i.e. epistemic beliefs, interact with each other. Everyday practices and conceptions among beginning undergraduate students are studied as a challenge for higher education.

The study builds upon survey-based quantitative data operationalising students’ epistemic beliefs, their internet reliance and their ICT practices. The survey items were used to compute subscales describing these traits, and the connections were explored using correlations analysis.

The results suggest that the more beginning undergraduate students rely on internet-based information, the more they are inclined to epistemic beliefs where knowledge is regarded as certain, unchanging, unambiguous and as being handed down by some authority.

The approach used in the study applies to the sample used, and further research is required to test the applicability of the approach on larger samples.

The study highlights the risk of everyday information practices being transferred into the educational context.

Ignorance of these changes may pose a risk for knowledge building on different educational levels and in a longer perspective, a threat to democracy.

While there is some research on epistemic beliefs in relation to internet-based information, studies approaching the problem over a possible connection between epistemic beliefs and internet reliance are scarce. In addition, this study implies a conceptual bridge between epistemic beliefs and internet reliance over the concept of algorithmic authority.

The aim of this study is to assess the impact of personality traits and sense of coherence (SOC) on concealing information needs out of shame. The study also investigates the link between concealed information needs and the use of experiential information for psychological wellbeing.

A Partial Least Square ‐ Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) approach is used to assess and analyse the proposed conceptual model, which is based on the responses of 412 upper secondary school students.

The findings reveal that personality traits not only have direct significant effects on concealing information needs but that their effects are also mediated by SOC. The positive relationship between concealed information needs and the use of experiential information is confirmed in the study.

This study is the first to show that personality and SOC influence concealing information needs. Two pathways are found. Firstly, negative emotionality and a low SOC lead to a heightened sense of shame. Secondly, introversion induces a more guarded behaviour. The study, moreover, quantitatively demonstrates a link between concealed information needs and the use of experiential information for psychological wellbeing.

The total costs of online searching in four hosts — Data‐Star, Dialog, ESA‐IRS, and STN International — were evaluated in a study conducted at the Information Service of the Technical Research Centre of Finland. To make the comparison as comprehensive as possible, six databases were used, all of which are available in the four hosts. The databases were BIOSIS, Chemical Abstracts, COMPENDEX, FSTA, INSPEC, and NTIS. The costs were analysed separately for the searching phase and for the output phase. For the searching phase, the costs were calculated as a function of the connect time. For the output phase, the cost per displayed record were estimated. The estimates were based on measured output time. The telecommunication costs were included, but their share is shown separately. The effect of transmission rate on the connect time and telecommunication costs was also studied by using two different speeds, 1200 baud and 2400 baud. The results of the study are presented in graphs and in tables. The graphs show the conducted values of the various cost components (connect time, output, telecommunication) for the four hosts and six databases. The comparisons of total costs for various types of online searches are presented in tables. At 1200 baud, the most economic searches are usually made in ESA‐IRS. Data‐Star, Dialog and STN are competitive only in very short searches, and at rather high levels of output. At 2400 baud, the competitiveness of Data‐Star, Dialog and STN is much better, especially if a medium‐length format is used for output. Data‐Star and STN which do not have a data network of their own suffer from higher telecommunication costs.

This study explored how the expression of search facets and relevance feedback (RF) by users was related to search success in interactive and automatic query expansion in the course of the search process. Search success was measured both in the number of relevant documents retrieved, whether identified by users or not. Research design consisted of 26 users searching for four TREC topics in Okapi IR system, half of the searchers using interactive and half automatic query expansion based on RF. The search logs were recorded, and the users filled in questionnaires for each topic concerning various features of searching. The results showed that the exhaustivity of the query was the most significant predictor of search success. Interactive expansion led to better search success than automatic expansion if all retrieved relevant items were counted, but there was no difference between the methods if only those items recognised relevant by users were observed. The analysis showed that the difference was facilitated by the liberal relevance criterion used in TREC not favouring highly relevant documents in evaluation.

At the beginning of 1989, the information retrieval service of European Space Agency (ESA) introduced a new pricing structure whereby the connect time costs less than before and the printouts cost more. The change is naturally pleasing to those who want to take their time to refine their search strategy and to try various alternatives.

The increasing flood of documentary information through the Internet and other information sources challenges the developers of information retrieval systems. It is not enough that an IR system is able to make a distinction between relevant and non‐relevant documents. The reduction of information overload requires that IR systems provide the capability of screening the most valuable documents out of the mass of potentially or marginally relevant documents. This paper introduces a new concept‐based method to analyse the text characteristics of documents at varying relevance levels. The results of the document analysis were applied in an experiment on query expansion (QE) in a probabilistic IR system. Statistical differences in textual characteristics of highly relevant and less relevant documents were investigated by applying a facet analysis technique. In highly relevant documents a larger number of aspects of the request were discussed, searchable expressions for the aspects were distributed over a larger set of text paragraphs, and a larger set of unique expressions were used per aspect than in marginally relevant documents. A query expansion experiment verified that the findings of the text analysis can be exploited in formulating more effective queries for best match retrieval in the search for highly relevant documents. The results revealed that expanded queries with concept‐based structures performed better than unexpanded queries or Ñnatural languageÒ queries. Further, it was shown that highly relevant documents benefit essentially more from the concept‐based QE in ranking than marginally relevant documents.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of personality (intellectual curiosity, conscientiousness and negative emotionality) and approach to studying (deep, strategic and surface) on students’ learning-related information behaviour in inquiry tasks.

Data were collected from 219 senior high school students with the use of three questionnaires.

The findings showed that students’ individual traits influenced different aspects of their learning-related information behaviour from information need to information use.

The results were based on survey data. Reliability issues with the scales are discussed. In future research qualitative data would enrich the understanding of the phenomena.

The results are informative for teachers and librarians who guide students in inquiry tasks.

The study spanned learning-related information behaviour across the whole inquiry process: from task construction through task performance to task completion. The findings showed that individual traits were particularly influential at the task completion stage, that is on information use.

Purpose – This chapter will discuss empirical results on how attitudes toward group work and the prospect of publishing in wikis influence students’ work in collaborative knowledge construction. It will also explore how writing for an audience can be used in information literacy education.

Methodology – Data were collected by pre- and post-questionnaires and group interviews from two 8-week courses in an upper secondary school. In total, 58 students were involved. The quantitative data was analyzed by frequency and correlation analysis. Content analysis was applied to transcribed interviews.

Findings – Group work experiences carried over from one context to another. Ways to undertake group work influenced the learning experience. Cooperation – sharing tasks to be undertaken individually – tended to be a negative experience while working closely together enhanced learning. Wikis were mainly used as platforms for combining texts written individually by the students. The prospect of publishing on public Wikipedia had a considerably stronger influence on students’ motivation than publishing a text for fellow classmates on the school wiki.

Practical implications – Wiki-publishing enables an emphasis on information use as part of information literacy instruction, where students learn to adapt their texts toward their audiences. Careful instruction is, however, needed for the use of social media tools and collaborative processes, in order for them to serve their purpose.

Originality – The study showed how group work attitude in general influence future group work experiences. It also demonstrated the influence of publishing texts on wikis or Wikipedia on students’ motivation.

This paper aims to give a critical review of the empirical information seeking and retrieval (IS&R) literature focusing on learning related information behavior. It also aims to propose the task‐based approach to link research on learning and information behavior in learning tasks and to organize and interpret the literature.

This paper takes the form of a critical literature review.

Researchers have identified patterns of information behavior and variations in the conceptions of seeking and using information for learning tasks. The results are fragmented and a framework should be developed to guide further research. Learners' information behavior in learning tasks may be attributable to various explanatory factors, which have not been taken into account in any single study. The concept of focus formulation appears to link information seeking and learning. The role of the writing process in learners' information behavior and the characteristics of the resulting documents have received least attention in the research field.

The review emphasizes task‐based IS&R literature. Learning research may shed more light on specific questions.

The paper may help teachers in designing learning tasks.

The paper provides a synthesis of recent studies on information behavior in learning tasks and identifies new paths for further research.