DDRIG in DRMS: Rational and Heuristic Search

这个项目探讨了当有很多选择时，人们如何决定在搜索有价值的结果（如产品，服务或工作）时去哪里寻找。一个例子是消费者在预订航班时如何访问旅游网站。这个项目有助于解释一个人访问旅游网站的顺序，根据他们期望找到的东西。在一系列的在线实验中，人们被给予了选择，就像他们在网上购物时可能面临的那样，他们关于位置搜索和选择的数据被记录下来。参与者的行为通过描述他们用来做出这些决策的典型决策策略来总结。将这些决策策略与最佳数学和经济模型进行比较，以确定效率低下和错误。描述性行为发现和最佳分析联合收割机一起提出改进在线搜索的建议和创新。这项研究有可能提高公众对网上购物和搜索行为的理解。它可以帮助政府机构，非营利组织和公司改进其网站的设计，以帮助用户找到他们正在寻找的内容。它还可以通过突出显示阻碍有效搜索的常见不良搜索习惯，帮助消费者在线搜索商品。最后，虽然这项研究的重点是消费者搜索，人们搜索许多其他的东西，工作，机会，和服务，研究结果可以应用到这些其他的情况，以及。这个项目探讨了人们如何导航，因为他们顺序搜索最好的结果在一个环境中定义的搜索成本和不同的期望结果在不同的位置。这项研究的目标是了解人们根据搜索成本和他们的期望（即，导航）。研究将观察到的战略与导航的规范经济模型进行了比较。这个建议是独特的，因为它：（A）检查导航行为的上下文中顺序搜索使用控制实验;（B）比较导航行为的预测，一个有影响力的最佳搜索模型（Weitzman，1979）;（C）检查人们在搜索时使用的认知策略;（D）开发一种新的实验方法，允许将导航行为与规范模型的预测进行比较，并确定简化的方法;以及（E）利用基于代理的模型来理解搜索引擎的适应性。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project explores how people decide where to look when searching for valued outcomes (like products, services, or jobs) when many options are available. One example is how consumers visit travel websites when booking flights. This project helps explain the order in which a person would visit travel websites based on what they expect to find. In a series of online experiments, people are given choices like those they might face when shopping online, and their data about location search and choices are recorded. Participants’ behavior is summarized by describing the typical decision strategies that they use to make these decisions. These decision strategies are compared against optimal mathematical and economic models to identify inefficiencies and errors. Together the descriptive behavioral findings and the optimal analysis combine to make recommendations and innovations to improve online search. This research has the potential to enhance public understanding of online shopping and search behaviors. It can help government agencies, non-profit organizations, and corporations improve the design of their websites to help users find what they are looking for. It can also help consumers search for items online by highlighting common bad search habits that hinder effective searching. Finally, while this research focuses on consumer search, people search for many other things, jobs, opportunities, and services and the findings can be applied to these other situations as well.This project explores how people navigate as they search sequentially for the best outcomes in an environment defined by search costs and differing expectations for outcomes at different locations. The goal of this research is to understand the strategies that people use to decide where to look for good outcomes based on search costs and their expectations (i.e., navigation). Studies compare observed strategies to normative economic models of navigation. This proposal is distinctive because it: (A) examines navigation behavior in the context of sequential search using controlled experiments; (B) compares navigation behaviors against the predictions of an influential optimal search model (Weitzman, 1979); (C) examines cognitive strategies used by people as they navigate in search; (D) develops a novel experimental method that allows comparing navigation behaviors to predictions from normative models and to identify simplifying heuristics; and (E) utilizes agent-based models to understand the adaptive nature of search heuristics.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.