When links change: how additions and deletions of single navigation links affect user performance
Lauren Fruh VanSickle Scharff, Philip T. Kortum · Journal of Usability Studies archive · 2009
This study examined user performance for Web sites in which a critical navigation link may have changed over the course of two visits. These second visits occurred either immediately after the first visit, one week later, or three weeks later. A shortcut link to the information was either consistently present, consistently absent, or varied between user visits. Results indicated when a pertinent navigation link was removed users searched through more pages and were less accurate in finding target information. When a link was added after the first visit, only about half of the users used it; however, even users who didn't use the added link still showed a performance improvement in their subsequent visit, suggesting that completing a single previous search on a site will lead to relatively long-term memories that can influence subsequent searches.