Static reformulation: A user study of static hypertext for query-based reformulation

Hypertext allows users to navigate between related materials in digital libraries. The most fundamental automated hypertexts are those constructed on the basis of semantic similarity. Such hypertexts have been evaluated by a variety of means, but seldom by real users given simulated real-world tasks. We claim that while other methods exist, one of the best ways to prove the usefulness of hypertext is to show the benefits for users performing realistic tasks. We compare the reformulation of queries that users perform in keyword searching, to the query reformulation implicit in browsing between documents linked by similarity of content. We find that a static automatically-constructed similarity hypertext provides useful linking between related items, improving the retrieval of targets when used to augment standard keyword search.