Skip to main content
Activities & Pursuits
Demographics
Technology & Media
Expert Bios
Mar 9, 2012Kristen Purcell, Joanna Brenner, Lee Rainie
Even though online Americans are more satisfied than ever with the performance of search engines, strong majorities have negative views of personalized search results and targeted ads
Read More »
More in: Search
Search is the first stop for most internet users, whether their question is related to work, shopping, health, or entertainment.
Benny Evangelista, SFGate
Mar 10, 2012
"Search engines are increasingly important to people in their navigation of information spaces, but users are generally uncomfortable with the idea of their search histories being used to target information to them," said Kristen Purcell, author of t...
Read More
Megan Garber, The Atlantic
Mar 9, 2012
This morning, the Pew Internet and American Life Project released the results of a February survey analyzing Americans' feelings about online privacy. The main takeaway is something of a paradox: The majority of us are uncomfortable with personalized...
Michael Liedtke, Associated Press
Google is almost everyone's favorite search engine, despite misgivings about data-collection and advertising practices that are widely seen as intrusive. A survey of released Friday by the Pew Internet & American Life Project found 83 percent of U...
Danny Sullivan, Search Engine Land
Personalized search? Both Google and Bing will tell you that it provides better results. But two-thirds say they don’t care. They view personalized search as a “bad thing,” a new survey finds. Nearly three-quarters also view gathering data to persona...
Aug 9, 2011Kristen Purcell
Search and email remain the two online activities that are nearly universal among adult internet users.
More in: Search, Email
Apr 5, 2011Jim Jansen
An interview with Senior Fellow Jim Jansen, recorded at the “Buying & Selling EContent” Conference, about paying for online content. (With downloadable audio and transcript)
More in: Search, Shopping
Ylan Q. Mui and Peter Whoriskey, Washington Post
Dec 31, 2010
Google remains a powerful dashboard for the Internet's vast library of information, said Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project. But now that two-thirds of online adults are creating and sharing their own c...
More in: Search, Social Networking
Sep 29, 2010Jim Jansen
58% of Americans have researched a product or service online; 24% have posted comments or reviews online about the things they buy.
More in: Shopping, Search, Decision Making
Teddy Wayne, New York Times
Jun 14, 2010
In response to growing privacy concerns on the Internet, people are increasingly monitoring their online identities. And young Internet users are the most vigilant in restricting access to personal information, ...
More in: Identity, Social Networking, Search
First
Last
Search survey questions about this topic.
» View Questions - Search
Jim JansenBeyond the Book (podcast)
Lee RainieSirsi-Dynix conference and Computers in Libraries Conference
More Recent Presentations
More Infographics
View All Topics
Search the Pew Internet database of questions
Subscribe by RSS
the percentage of adults living with one or more chronic disease who go online, compared with 81% of adults reporting no chronic diseases
Copyright 2012
The Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project is one of seven projects that make up the Pew Research Center. The Center is supported by The Pew Charitable Trust.