Judgment of information quality and cognitive authority in the web

Abstract

This is a preprint of an article published in the Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 53, 145-161. This study examines the problem of the judgment of information quality and cognitive authority by observing people's searching behavior in the Web. Its purpose is to understand the various factors that influence peopleâ s judgment of quality and authority in the Web, and the effects of those judgments on selection behaviors. It was found that the subjects made two distinct kinds of judgment: predictive judgment and evaluative judgment. The factors influencing each judgment of quality and authority were identified in terms of characteristics of information objects, characteristics of sources, knowledge, situation, ranking in search output, and general assumption.