The primary aim of XML element retrieval is to return to users XML elements, rather than whole documents. This poster describes a small study, in which we elicited users’ expectations, i.e. their anticipated experience, when interacting with an XML retrieval system, as compared to a traditional ‘flat’ document retrieval system. Categories and Subject Descriptors H.3.3 [Information Search and Retrieval] General Terms Human Factors, Experimentation Keywords User study, XML, element retrieval