Searching for Engagement: Child Engagement and Search Engine Result Pages

Benjamin Bettencourt, Arif Ahmed, Nic Way, Casey Kennington, Katherine Landau Wright, Jerry Alan Fails

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

2 Scopus citations

Abstract

In this paper, we explore how children engage with search engine result pages (SERP) generated by a popular search API in response to their online inquiries. We do so to further understand children navigation behaviour. To accomplish this goal, we examine search logs produced as a result of children (ages 6 to 12), using metrics commonly used to operationalize engagement, including: position of clicks, time spent hovering, and the sequence of navigation on a SERP. We also investigate the potential connection between the text complexity of SERP snippets and engagement. Our findings verify that children engage more frequently with SERP results in higher ranking positions, but that engagement does not decrease linearly as children navigate to lower ranking positions. They also reveal that children generally spend more time hovering on snippets with more complex readability levels (i.e., harder to read) than snippets on the lower end of the readability spectrum.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationProceedings of Interaction Design and Children, IDC 2022
Pages479-484
Number of pages6
ISBN (Electronic)9781450391979
DOIs
StatePublished - 27 Jun 2022
Event21st ACM Interaction Design and Children Conference, IDC 2022 - Virtual, Online, Portugal
Duration: 27 Jun 202230 Jun 2022

Publication series

NameProceedings of Interaction Design and Children, IDC 2022

Conference

Conference21st ACM Interaction Design and Children Conference, IDC 2022
Country/TerritoryPortugal
CityVirtual, Online
Period27/06/2230/06/22

Keywords

  • Children
  • Engagement
  • Search Engine Result Pages
  • Web Search

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