=Paper=
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|title=Role of Emotion in Information Retrieval for Entertainment
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-836/paper4.pdf
|volume=Vol-836
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==Role of Emotion in Information Retrieval for Entertainment==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-836/paper4.pdf
Role of Emotion in Information Retrieval for Entertainment
(Position Paper)
Yashar Moshfeghi Joemon M. Jose
School of Computing Science School of Computing Science
University of Glasgow University of Glasgow
Glasgow, UK Glasgow, UK
yashar@dcs.gla.ac.uk Joemon.Jose@glasgow.ac.uk
In this paper, we argue that standard and dominant view
doesn’t sufficiently consider all the possible aspects of search-
ers’ needs. Information Science (IS) researchers have argued
ABSTRACT about the existence of needs other than IN, and discussed
The main objective of Information Retrieval (IR) systems their roles in the cognitive aspects of human beings and in
is to satisfy searchers’ needs. A great deal of research has IR&S behaviour. Examples include Wilson’s interrelation
been conducted in the past to attempt to achieve a better between physiological, affective and information needs in
insight into searchers’ needs and the factors that can poten- IR&S behaviour [6], Kuhlthau’s uncertainty principle [3];
tially influence the success of an Information Retrieval and these studies have investigated the role of affective and cog-
Seeking (IR&S) process. One of the factors which has been nitive experience of a searcher in an information seeking pro-
considered is searchers’ emotion. It has been shown in pre- cess model.
vious research that emotion plays an important role in the Although these views better capture the searchers’ mind
success of an IR&S process which has the purpose of satisfy- compared to the traditional view, their accounting for the
ing an information need. However, these previous studies do role of emotion is limited to its relation with cognition in
not give a sufficiently prominent position to emotion in IR, the process of satisfying an IN in an IR&S behaviour, e.g.,
since they limit the role of emotion to a secondary factor, Kuhlthau’s [3] model. Therefore, emotion plays a marginal
by assuming that a lack of knowledge (the need for informa- role in these views in their modelling of needs. For example,
tion) is the primary factor (the motivation of the search). in an IR&S scenario, where searchers’ task is to find docu-
In this paper, we propose to treat emotion as the principal ments that are topically relevant to a given query (e.g., Iraq
factor in entertainment-based IR&S process, and therefore War), the emotion that they experience during the comple-
one that ought to be considered by the retrieval algorithms. tion of this task influences their performance and satisfac-
tion. Other examples are those of Arapakis et al. [1] and
Categories and Subject Descriptors: H.3.3 Information Lopatovska [4] that investigated the use of facial expressions
Storage and Retrieval - Information Search and Retrieval - and peripheral physiological signals as implicit indicators of
Information Filtering topical relevance.
General Terms: Theory Others, e.g., Wilson [6], consider a more autonomous role
Keywords: Entertainment, Search, Information Retrieval, for affect and define affective need as an independent need
Information Science, Emotion which can motivate an IR&S behaviour. For example, gath-
ering information to satisfy affective needs, such as the need
for security, for achievement, or for dominance [6]. However,
1. INTRODUCTION there is no operationalisation of this affective need suitable
The idea that IR systems help searchers to overcome their for use in real IR systems.
information need (IN) is a leitmotif since the early days of In general, the current landscape of the role of emotion
IR: the main task is to locate documents containing infor- in IR&S behaviour is incomplete. Moshfeghi [5] argued that
mation relevant to such needs. Within this view, a searcher people use computers for individual as well as social pur-
is considered as an agent that interacts with an IR system poses, such as entertainment, dating, getting to know peo-
with the intention of seeking information [3]. The informa- ple, finding ‘friends’, gaming, etc., which strongly indicates
tion can be defined as facts, propositions, and concepts, as that users try to satisfy needs other than information ones.
well as evaluative judgements such as opinion [6]. The study conducted by Elsweiler et al. [2] also supported
this claim. The current views of emotion in IR/IS do not
sufficiently explain these types of activities accurately, even
though it is clear that users search for emotionally-rich doc-
uments from the Internet to satisfy these needs.
The pervasiveness of emotionally-rich content on the web,
such as movies, music, images, news, blogs, customer re-
view, Facebook comments and Twitter, highlights the de-
Presented at Searching4Fun workshop at ECIR2012. Copyright c 2012 for
the individual papers by the papers’ authors. Copying permitted only for mand for such contents, and, indirectly, their role in satis-
private and academic purposes. This volume is published and copyrighted fying searchers’ needs. Therefore, it is important to under-
by its editors.
stand the IR&S behaviour backed up by an entertainment this point of view, not only is emotion a factor that exists
aspect. The position of this paper is that emotion is a pri- throughout an IR&S process which aims to meet an IN, but
mary motivation (either directly or indirectly) behind an also it can be considered as a need: the need to change
entertainment-based IR&S behaviour. negative feelings caused by uncertainty during the initiation
The rest of the paper is organised as follows: Section 2 phase (e.g. feelings of doubt, anxiety and frustration) to
discusses Kuhlthau’s [3] model, followed by our approach in feelings of satisfaction and comfort.
Section 3 and discussion and conclusion in Section 4. When the emotion need of the searcher is to diminish the
negative feelings associated with a lack of knowledge (i.e.,
2. EMOTION IN IR/IS an IN), the emotion need would be satisfied if the IN associ-
There are many theories and models that attempt to ex- ated with it is resolved. However, in an entertainment-based
plain the information seeking behaviour. Kuhlthau’s infor- IR&S process, the emotion need of the searcher is not asso-
mation seeking process model is one of the first and most ciated with a particular IN, and is an autonomous need by
popular models to investigate the affective along with cog- itself. An example of such needs are the scenarios where the
nitive and physical aspects of a searcher in an informa- searchers are stressed and look at some clips that could help
tion seeking process. She proposes that people’s feelings, to relieve their stress, e.g., when searchers are seeking for
thoughts and actions interact within their information seek- funny clips in YouTube. Of course, one way of finding these
ing process. Kuhlthau’s information seeking process model clips is by looking at the popular (most viewed/highly rec-
describes the searchers’ common patterns of seeking mean- ommended) videos. In such scenario there is no particular
ing from information, to extend their knowledge state on a information need to be resolved, but only an emotion need.
complex problem or topic which has a discrete beginning and From the above, we can now argue that emotion in an
ending [3]. The fundamental principle behind Kuhlthau’s entertainment-based IR&S process acts as a primary factor,
information seeking process is the uncertainty principle [3]. i.e. as an autonomous and important need.
This refers to the existence of a cognitive state which causes
feelings of anxiety and lack of confidence. Feelings of doubt,
4. CONCLUSIONS
anxiety and frustration are in association with vague and In this paper, we explained the role of emotion in entertain-
unclear thoughts. The model shows that during a typical ment-based IR&S behaviour. We explained that in the nor-
information seeking process, the thoughts of a searcher be- mative view of IR/IS, the focus is on the satisfaction of
come clear and consequently their confidence increases and searchers’ IN. Although the role of emotion is acknowledged
their feeling of doubt, anxiety and frustration decrease. as a factor influencing the whole IR&S behaviour, its role
Although this model is an important step towards under- was limited to the study of its influence on the process of
standing the role of emotion in IR/IS, it does not encom- satisfying an IN. However, emotion can be a source of mo-
pass many important aspects of emotion in IR. Kuhlthau tivation on its own for a searcher to engage in an IR&S
considers emotion/affect as a factor influencing the informa- process. Such scenarios have not been considered in the
tion seeking process, rather than a need in itself. Moreover, IR/IS community, and this motivated the definition of the
Kuhlthau’s model is limited by making uncertainty central, emotion need concept. We argued that there are emotion
i.e., as driving the seeking process while we argue that pos- needs that can motivate searchers to engage in IR&S be-
itive or negative emotion states, high or low arousal level, haviour which strictly speaking does not have an IN. The
such as stress or boredom respectively, could also motivate pervasiveness of the use of IR applications for the purpose
users to engage in an information seeking behaviour. There- of entertainment and the existence of emotionally-rich data
fore, a key limitation lies in the fact that the affective side on the web provides evidence that some information seeking
of searchers is interpreted as only being a secondary moti- behaviour can be categorised under other strategies than in-
vational source for information need. In this paper, we con- formation need that can lead to better satisfaction of the
sider emotion as a separate need. This is explored further searchers’ needs. Given all these evidences, the conclusion
in next section. of this paper is that emotion act as a primary factor behind
entertainment-based IR&S behaviours. Finally, there is not
3. APPROACH much research about entertainment-based IR&S processes.
This is due to the limitations associated with it, such as lack
The goal of this section is to argue that emotion should
of datasets, evaluation methodology, metrics and procedure.
be considered as the primary factor in entertainment-based
An attempt to solve such limitations is a possible direction
IR&S behaviour: emotion can be considered as an individ-
for future work.
ual need which can motivate searchers to engage in an IR&S
process. The secondary factor of emotion refers to the fact 5. REFERENCES
that emotion (in relation to cognition) influences every as- [1] I. Arapakis, Y. Moshfeghi, H. Joho, R. Ren, D. Hannah, and
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casual-leisure information needs: a diary study in the context of
As discussed in Section 2, the secondary nature of emotion television viewing. In IIiX ’10, pages 25–34, 2010.
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