A HYPERCARD PROGRAM TO TRACK INFORMATION-SEARCH STRATEGIES

In many decision-making studies, subjects are given a body of material to review and then their search strategies are assessed Research para digms in such studies exhibit varying degrees of artificiality and obt rusiveness, and data collection is often cumbersome. The present paper describes a Macintosh application using the Hyper-Card program that t racks subjects' search strategies in a less obtrusive and artificial m anner than those used in previous studies. The program records the ord er in which the material is reviewed as well as the duration of subjec ts' access to each part of the material. Data collection is also great ly simplified by the program. An experiment using the program is descr ibed, and suggestions for other uses of the program are discussed.