Are there studies on how the back button is used?

I'm wondering if there is some research on how the back button is used in browsers and what their expectations are.

Personally I've noticed that I don't use the back button that much.

In some situations I tend to open links in new tabs instead of using the back button (Amazon, Reddit, Google, etc). So I open and close tabs instead of navigating back.

In other situations where I don't open new tabs, I do not use the back button that much. For example when using Gmail, if I want to go back to the inbox I tend to click the inbox button. The same happens in Twitter and other apps.

The situation where I use the back button more often is on Android, where the back navigation is part of using the OS itself.

Of course these are my personal experiences, but I've been wondering how common these patterns are.