Fifth Graders' Search for Information in a Textbook

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Abstract
Fifty-nine fifth graders were asked to use an unfamiliar textbook on a familiar topic to locate the answers to three questions, all of which contained terms that could be found in the book's index. Those who were randomly assigned to a condition in which they were asked guiding questions before and during their search were more successful than their counterparts who were simply asked to search. An examination of the information access structures (e.g., index, table of contents) used by students indicated that those who were unsuccessful relied heavily on the table of contents and/or paging through the text despite the very specific nature of the questions. The facilitating effect of the guiding questions appears to have been due to raising the likelihood that students would think of and actually use the index during their search; index use did not guarantee success, but very few students who failed to use the index were successful.