Personality and Information Behavior in Web Search

In this paper, we describe a quantitative study of personality aspects and their relationship with web search information behavior. We start with introducing personality and give an overview of information behavior research concerning personality aspects. In our study of 30 participants, their personality traits were operationalized by using a version of the Big 5, the B5T, a psychometric questionnaire that maps personality on different dimensions. The participants performed search tasks in a web context and data concerning their information behavior was collected via search logs as well as questionnaires. We show that there are selective correlations of slight and intermediate strength between the variables of information behavior and the personality dimensions. Finally, we discuss possible explanations and implications as well as new impulses for information behavior and retrieval research.