Laypersons Searching for medical information on the Web: The Role of Metacognition

Today, the WWW is a very prominent resource of healthrelated information, both, for medical experts and laypersons (e.g. Fox, 2003). The latter often retrieve these information to make an informed decision. However, one cannot expect laypersons to deal with these information effectively offhand. We rather assume that to succeed, laypersons need to actively guide their search process on a metacognitive level, since metacognitive strategies are known to play an important role in the comprehension of complex documents (e.g. Hill & Hannafin, 1997). However, it is yet unclear whether laypersons spontaneously guide their web search on a metacognitive level and in case they do so whether the use of metacognitive strategies is related to search success.