Substantial alterations to a system often have little or no effect on particular collections. This may be due to poor separation of relevant and non-relevant documents. The paper presents a procedure for characterizing this separation, which can show whether proposed modifications of the base system are likely to be useful. (8 references)…

Retrieval performance with automatic term classifications for three test collections has been variable. This paper attempts to discover why. The real difference between the collections is in the separation of relevant from non-relevant documents. The separation is so poor that classification cannot be expected to succeed. (14 references)…

A decision theory approach is used to model the information retrieval decision problem of which documents to retrieve from a library collection in response to a specific user query for information. Thorough discussions of decision theory and Bayesian statistics are presented. (19 references) (Author/SJ)

The techniques of search strategy design for substructure searches of the Wiswesser Line Notation (WLN) file are described in detail. The Index Chemicus Registry System'' was used. (13 references) (Author/SM)

The relative retrieval efficiency of the title searching technique and the index term searching technique is so close that the choice of one method or the other must be primarily on economic grounds. (9 references) (Author)

Comments are made on several specific questionable aspects of experimental design in the Second Cranfield project." 8 references. (Author)

Discusses use of associative search techniques and theoretical approaches to document retrieval problems contrasting two different ways of improving system performance: appending associative search techniques to conventional document retrieval systems and designing document retrieval systems based on probabilistic design principles. Four…

Presents an algorithm for use in online information retrieval which will generate a list of bibliographic citations derived from a preselected relevant document and which measures the relatedness of retrieved items to the preselected document. A test of the algorithm in retrieving medical literature is described. Two figures are included. (JL)

Analyzes the formal properties, structural consequences, similarities, and differences of link indicators, brackets, and cohesion separators in the query languages employed in information retrieval. Eleven figures, a 32-item reference list, and appendices on Extended Backus Notation and the formal definition of the Formal Relevance Language are…

Retrieval experiments with the Cranfield collection of 1,400 documents used strategies based on a probabilistic model for an initial search and intermediate search when no relevant documents were known. Results show initial strategy is better than conventional strategies in retrieval effectiveness and number of queries needed to retrieve…

In order to compare effects of input processing on information retrieval in three databases, 25 articles from a specific journal were examined. Tables and Venn diagrams show retrieval results from different manual and computer searches. The relation between document surrogates and subject matter of the documents is discussed. (SW)

Reports the analysis of search logs from a commercial image provider over a one-month period and discusses results in relation to previous findings. Analyzes image searches, image queries composing the search, user search modification strategies, results returned, and user browsing of results. (Author/AEF)

Discussion of relevance feedback in information retrieval focuses on a proposal for the Bayesian Network Retrieval Model. Bases the proposal on the propagation of partial evidences in the Bayesian network, representing new information obtained from the user's relevance judgments to compute the posterior relevance probabilities of the documents…

Discusses results of searches using a variety of query formulations with several Internet search engines which show that strategies intended to give narrower and more precise results may not give improvements in precision even though they result in fewer hits. Describes searches that were performed by students in graduate information retrieval…

Discussion of information retrieval, query optimization techniques, and relevance feedback focuses on genetic algorithms, which are derived from artificial intelligence techniques. Describes an evaluation of different genetic algorithms using a residual collection method and compares results with the Ide dec-hi method (Salton and Buckley, 1990…