Stopping rules and their effect on expected search length

摘要

An information retrieval system is modeled from the point of view of a user linearly scanning the output list for relevant records of citations. Expected search length, a measure of retrieval system performance, is shown to be affected by the stopping rule employed by the user to determine when to terminate the search. Three stopping rules are considered: the satiation rule, the disgust rule, and the combination rule. The effects of these various stopping rules on expected search length are examined and discussed in detail.