Link Depth: Analysis of Browsing Behavior on the Web

We conducted a user study of Web information-seeking behaviors by comparing users performing different tasks. The participants were 11 undergraduate and 5 graduate students. They were given two tasks: A ”Report Task,” in which they had to gather information to write a report on world history, and a ”Trip Task,” in which they had to gather information to plan for a trip. We defined ”Link Depth” as an index for indicating the extent to which a user has moved deeper into the Web following links from search engine result pages. Link Depth analysis revealed the characteristic browsing patterns of each user group. 1. は じ め に