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Individual differences and behavioral metrics involved in modeling web navigation

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Abstract

This paper presents an empirical study aiming at investigating individual differences and behavioral metrics involved in modeling web navigation. Factors that have an influence on web navigation behavior were identified with the aid of task analysis, and their relevance in predicting task outcomes (performance, satisfaction, perceived disorientation) was tested with the aid of multiple regression analysis. Several types of navigation metrics were calculated based on web logging data and used as indicators of user characteristics and task outcomes. Results show that spatial-semantic cognitive mechanisms seem to be crucial in adequately performing web navigation tasks. The fact that user characteristics and task outcomes can be estimated with reasonable accuracy based on navigation metrics suggests the possibility of building adaptive navigation support in web applications.

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Acknowledgements

The study presented in this paper was conducted in collaboration with Eelco Herder and Betsy van Dijk from Twente University, The Netherlands. We would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on earlier versions of this paper.

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  1. Center for Content and Knowledge Engineering Institute of Information and Computing Sciences, Utrecht University, Padualaan 14, 3584, Utrecht, CH, The Netherlands

    Ion Juvina & Herre van Oostendorp

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  1. Ion Juvina
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  2. Herre van Oostendorp
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Correspondence to Ion Juvina.

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Juvina, I., Oostendorp, H.v. Individual differences and behavioral metrics involved in modeling web navigation. Univ Access Inf Soc 4, 258–269 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-005-0007-7

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