Overview

85% of American Internet users have ever used an online search engine to find information on the Web and 29% of Internet users rely on a search engine on a typical day. Only the act of sending or reading email outranks search-engine queries as an online activity – some 52% of Internet users check email on a typical day. About one in four Internet users has typed their own names into a search engine to see what information about them is on the Web. About one in three Internet users has looked up someone else’s name on a search engine. Internet users employ different search strategies for different topics – health, government, and religious information are three topics examined in this report.