Multilingual Information Access: Practices and Perceptions of Bi/multilingual Academic Users

The research reported in this dissertation explored linguistic determinants in online information searching, and examined to what extent bi/multilingual academic users utilize Multilingual Information Access (MLIA) tools and what impact these have on their information searching behavior. The aim of the study was three-pronged: to provide tangible data that can support recommendations for the effective user-centered design of Multilingual Information Retrieval (MLIR) systems; to provide a user-centered evaluation of existing MLIA tools, and to offer the basis of a framework for Library & Information Science (LIS) professionals in teaching information literacy and library skills for bi/multilingual academic users. In the first phase of the study, 250 bi/multilingual students participated in a web survey that investigated their language choices while searching for information on the internet and electronic databases. 31 of these participants took part in the second phase which involved a controlled lab-based user experiment and post experiment questionnaire that investigated their use of MLIA tools on Google and WorldCat and their opinions of these tools. In the third phase, 19 students participated in focus groups discussions and 6 librarians were interviewed to find out their perspectives on multilingual information literacy. Results showed that though machine translation has alleviated some of the linguistic related challenges in online information searching, language barriers do still exist for some users especially at the query formulation stage. Captures from the experiment revealed great diversity in the way MLIA tools were utilized while the focus group discussions and interviews revealed a general lack of awareness by both librarians and students of the tools that could help enhance and promote multilingual information literacy. The study highlights the roles of both IR system designers as well as LIS professionals in enhancing and promoting multilingual information access and literacy: User- centered design, user-modeling were found to be key aspects in the development of more effective multilingual information retrieval (MLIR) systems. The study also highlights the distinction between being multilingually information literate and being multilingual information literate. Suitable models for instruction for bi/multilingual academic users point towards Specialized Information Literacy Instruction (SILI) and Personalized Information Literacy Instruction (PILI)

Mnews: A Study of Multilingual News Search Interfaces

With the global expansion of the Internet and the World Wide Web, users are becoming increasingly diverse, particularly in terms of languages. In fact, the number of polyglot Web users across the globe has increased dramatically. However, even such multilingual users often continue to suffer from unbalanced and fragmented news information, as traditional news access systems seldom allow users to simultaneously search for and/or compare news in different languages, even though prior research results have shown that multilingual users make significant use of each of their languages when searching for information online. Relatively little human-centered research has been conducted to better understand and support multilingual user abilities and preferences. In particular, in the fields of cross-language and multilingual search, the majority of research has focused primarily on improving retrieval and translation accuracy, while paying comparably less attention to multilingual user interaction aspects. The research presented in this thesis provides the first large-scale investigations of multilingual news consumption and querying/search result selection behaviors, as well as a detailed comparative analysis of polyglots’ preferences and behaviors with respect to different multilingual news search interfaces on desktop and mobile platforms. Through a set of 4 phases of user studies, including surveys, interviews, as well as task-based user studies using crowdsourcing and laboratory experiments, this thesis presents the first human-centered studies in multilingual news access, aiming to drive the development of personalized multilingual news access systems to better support each individual user

Proceedings of the 3rd Workshop on Social Information Retrieval for Technology-Enhanced Learning

Learning and teaching resource are available on the Web - both in terms of digital learning content and people resources (e.g. other learners, experts, tutors). They can be used to facilitate teaching and learning tasks. The remaining challenge is to develop, deploy and evaluate Social information retrieval (SIR) methods, techniques and systems that provide learners and teachers with guidance in potentially overwhelming variety of choices. The aim of the SIRTEL’09 workshop is to look onward beyond recent achievements to discuss specific topics, emerging research issues, new trends and endeavors in SIR for TEL. The workshop will bring together researchers and practitioners to present, and more importantly, to discuss the current status of research in SIR and TEL and its implications for science and teaching

Visual knowledge representation of conceptual semantic networks

This article presents methods of using visual analysis to visually represent large amounts of massive, dynamic, ambiguous data allocated in a repository of learning objects. These methods are based on the semantic representation of these resources. We use a graphical model represented as a semantic graph. The formalization of the semantic graph has been intuitively built to solve a real problem which is browsing and searching for lectures in a vast repository of colleges/courses located at Western Kentucky University1. This study combines Formal Concept Analysis (FCA) with Semantic Factoring to decompose complex, vast concepts into their primitives in order to develop knowledge representation for the HyperManyMedia2 platform. Also, we argue that the most important factor in building the semantic representation is defining the hierarchical structure and the relationships among concepts and subconcepts. In addition, we investigate the association between concepts using Concept Analysis to generate a lattice graph. Our domain is considered as a graph, which represents the integrated ontology of the HyperManyMedia platform. This approach has been implemented and used by online students at WKU3

Personalization in cultural heritage: the road travelled and the one ahead

Over the last 20 years, cultural heritage has been a favored domain for personalization research. For years, researchers have experimented with the cutting edge technology of the day; now, with the convergence of internet and wireless technology, and the increasing adoption of the Web as a platform for the publication of information, the visitor is able to exploit cultural heritage material before, during and after the visit, having different goals and requirements in each phase. However, cultural heritage sites have a huge amount of information to present, which must be filtered and personalized in order to enable the individual user to easily access it. Personalization of cultural heritage information requires a system that is able to model the user (e.g., interest, knowledge and other personal characteristics), as well as contextual aspects, select the most appropriate content, and deliver it in the most suitable way. It should be noted that achieving this result is extremely challenging in the case of first-time users, such as tourists who visit a cultural heritage site for the first time (and maybe the only time in their life). In addition, as tourism is a social activity, adapting to the individual is not enough because groups and communities have to be modeled and supported as well, taking into account their mutual interests, previous mutual experience, and requirements. How to model and represent the user(s) and the context of the visit and how to reason with regard to the information that is available are the challenges faced by researchers in personalization of cultural heritage. Notwithstanding the effort invested so far, a definite solution is far from being reached, mainly because new technology and new aspects of personalization are constantly being introduced. This article surveys the research in this area. Starting from the earlier systems, which presented cultural heritage information in kiosks, it summarizes the evolution of personalization techniques in museum web sites, virtual collections and mobile guides, until recent extension of cultural heritage toward the semantic and social web. The paper concludes with current challenges and points out areas where future research is needed

Marketing determinants of consumer behaviour change in the food market

Бакалаврська робота складається з 68 сторінок тексту, 3 розділів, 9 таблиць, 21 рисунок і переліку 42 використаних джерел. Актуальність даного дослідження полягає в необхідності розуміння детермінант споживацької поведінки на сучасному ринку продуктів харчування, зокрема в контексті онлайн-сервісів доставки їжі, і зростаючого визнання музики як потужного інструменту для поліпшення вражень клієнтів, формування поведінки і розроблення ефективних маркетингових стратегій, тим самим надаючи можливість змінювати споживацьку поведінку та збільшувати продажі на зростаючому онлайн-ринку продуктів харчування. Метою цього дослідження є дослідження маркетингових детермінант зміни споживацької поведінки на ринку продуктів харчування, зосереджуючись зокрема на ролі впровадження музики на онлайн-сайтах з продуктами харчування. Завданням цього дослідження є вивчення того, як стратегічне використання музики на онлайн-сайтах з продуктами харчування може поліпшити враження користувача, впливати на процеси прийняття рішень споживачів і сприяти маркетинговим детермінантам зміни споживацької поведінки на ринку продуктів харчування. Об'єктом цього дослідження є дослідження того, як стратегічне використання музики на онлайн-сайтах з продуктами харчування може поліпшити враження користувача, впливати на процеси прийняття рішень споживачів і сприяти маркетинговим детермінантам зміни споживацької поведінки на ринку продуктів харчування. Науковою новизною цього дослідження є дослідження стратегічного використання музики на онлайн-сайтах з продуктами харчування як інструменту для поліпшення вражень користувачів, впливу на процеси прийняття рішень споживачів і сприяння маркетинговим детермінантам зміни споживацької поведінки на ринку продуктів харчування, тим самим надаючи цінні уявлення про раніше недосліджену роль музики в онлайн-шопінгу продуктів харчування та її потенційний вплив на залучення клієнтів, продажі та дохід. Практична значимість цього дослідження полягає у наданні рекомендацій для впровадження ефективних механізмів управління споживацькою поведінкою для онлайн-сайтів з продуктами харчування. Перший розділ сконцентрований на сенсорному маркетингу і ролі фонової музики у впливі на споживацьку поведінку на ринку продуктів харчування. У ньому аналізуються тенденції в онлайн-шопінгу продуктів харчування, занурюючі веб-сайти, музика в електронній комерції, спеціально підібрана фонова музика та аудіо-DNA, а також розглядаються ключові наукові дослідження в цій галузі. Другий розділ сконцентрований на впливі звуку/музики на користувацький досвід веб-сайтів і аналізує переваги та недоліки різних типів музики/звуків у веб-дизайні. Третій розділ сконцентрований на впливі фонової музики на досвід замовлення їжі онлайн, вимірюючи її вплив за допомогою опитування, аналізуючи поведінку користувачів до і після впровадження музики на симульованому веб-сайті та оцінюючи ефективність впровадження музики. Результати свідчать, що фонова музика позитивно впливає на залучення користувачів, генерацію доходів та конверсійні показники, з окупністю витрат на впровадження протягом 31 дня.The bachelor's thesis consists of 68 pages of text, 3 chapters, 9 tables, 21 figures and a list of 42 sources used. The relevance of this study lies in the need to understand the determinants of consumer behavior in the modern food market, particularly in the context of online food delivery services, and the growing recognition of music as a powerful tool to enhance the customer experience, shape behavior, and inform effective marketing strategies, thus presenting an opportunity to drive consumer behavior change and increase sales in the evolving online food market. This research aims to explore the marketing determinants of consumer behavior change in the food market, specifically focusing on the role of music implementation on online food websites. The objective of this research is to investigate how the strategic use of music on online food websites can enhance the user experience, influence consumer decision-making processes, and contribute to marketing determinants for consumer behavior change in the food market. The object of this research is to investigate how the strategic use of music on online food websites can enhance the user experience, influence consumer decision-making processes, and contribute to marketing determinants for consumer behavior change in the food market. The scientific novelty of this study is in investigating the strategic use of music on online food websites as a tool to enhance the user experience, influence consumer decision-making processes, and contribute to marketing determinants for consumer behavior change in the food market, thereby providing valuable insights into the previously underexplored role of music in online food shopping and its potential impact on customer engagement, sales, and revenue. The practical significance of this study lies in the provision of recommendations for the implementation of effective consumer behavior management mechanisms for online food websites. The research results have been confirmed by the act of implementation issued by a prominent online food website. The first section focused on sensory marketing and the role of background music in influencing consumer behavior in the food market, and it analyzed trends in online food shopping, immersive websites, music in e-commerce, custom background music, and audio DNA, as well as reviewed key scientific research papers in the field. The second section focused on the impact of sound/music on website user experience and analyzed the advantages and disadvantages of various music/sound types in web design. The third section focused on the influence of background music on the online food ordering experience, measuring its impact through a survey, analyzing user behavior before and after music implementation on a simulated website, and assessing the cost-effectiveness of implementing music. The results indicated that background music positively contributed to user engagement, revenue generation, and conversion rates, with a break-even point of 31 days for the implementation costs

Amazon-M2: A Multilingual Multi-locale Shopping Session Dataset for Recommendation and Text Generation

Modeling customer shopping intentions is a crucial task for e-commerce, as it directly impacts user experience and engagement. Thus, accurately understanding customer preferences is essential for providing personalized recommendations. Session-based recommendation, which utilizes customer session data to predict their next interaction, has become increasingly popular. However, existing session datasets have limitations in terms of item attributes, user diversity, and dataset scale. As a result, they cannot comprehensively capture the spectrum of user behaviors and preferences. To bridge this gap, we present the Amazon Multilingual Multi-locale Shopping Session Dataset, namely Amazon-M2. It is the first multilingual dataset consisting of millions of user sessions from six different locales, where the major languages of products are English, German, Japanese, French, Italian, and Spanish. Remarkably, the dataset can help us enhance personalization and understanding of user preferences, which can benefit various existing tasks as well as enable new tasks. To test the potential of the dataset, we introduce three tasks in this work: (1) next-product recommendation, (2) next-product recommendation with domain shifts, and (3) next-product title generation. With the above tasks, we benchmark a range of algorithms on our proposed dataset, drawing new insights for further research and practice. In addition, based on the proposed dataset and tasks, we hosted a competition in the KDD CUP 2023 and have attracted thousands of users and submissions. The winning solutions and the associated workshop can be accessed at our website https://kddcup23.github.io/.Comment: Accepted by NeurIPS 2023, Track on Datasets and Benchmarks; Dataset for KDD Cup 2023, https://kddcup23.github.io

Linked education: interlinking educational resources and the web of data

Research on interoperability of technology-enhanced learning (TEL) repositories throughout the last decade has led to a fragmented landscape of competing approaches, such as metadata schemas and interface mechanisms. However, so far Web-scale integration of resources is not facilitated, mainly due to the lack of take-up of shared principles, datasets and schemas. On the other hand, the Linked Data approach has emerged as the de-facto standard for sharing data on the Web and offers a large potential to solve interoperability issues in the field of TEL. In this paper, we describe a general approach to exploit the wealth of already existing TEL data on the Web by allowing its exposure as Linked Data and by taking into account automated enrichment and interlinking techniques to provide rich and well-interlinked data for the educational domain. This approach has been implemented in the context of the mEducator project where data from a number of open TEL data repositories has been integrated, exposed and enriched by following Linked Data principles