Consumer Health Information Seeking as Hypothesis Testing

Table 5

Excerpts of Coded Information Seeking Protocol of Participant 17

Seg	Verbalization	Goal-Action-Response Codes	Knowledge Comments
1	P: I would type in “Heart attack symptoms”	G: find description of heart attack, verify symptoms	D: chest pain related to heart attack
	I: Why heart attack?	A: “heart attack symptons” query	S: search box function
	P: Chest pain	R: 0 hits, alt. spelling suggested	L: spelling problem
2	P: I think I spelled it wrong. I'll look under health topics	SG: browse for heart attack symptoms A: hit back button twice	S: browser “back” navigation; alphabetical organization
	P: I'll look under “overview”. Oh, here it says “Act in Time. Heart Attack Signs.”	A: click on health topics A: click on “H”, then “heart attack” SR: heart attack portal page loads SG: find overview A: click “Act in Time” SR: NHLBI page loads	M: overviews are concise and informative
3	P: Chest discomfort, nausea … So she could be having a heart attack	SG: Evaluate information A: Scan, read	D: text is comprehended against the domain knowledge

P = participant; I = interviewer; G = goal; SG = subgoal; A = user action; SR = system's response; D = domain knowledge; S = general search strategies; L = language/literacy; M = metaknowledge.

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