Information Seeking Behavior
(IRLS 587)
Annotated Bibliography
Compiled by:
Bobbi L Newman
Kevin McDowelll
David Burke
Information Needs, Uses and
Context.
The Study and Evaluation
of Information Use and Users
Information Quality, Value
and Impacts
Conceptual Framework
Information Channels
Information Barriers
Information Use by Various
Populations
Encountering Information
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Information Needs, Uses and Context
Cole, Charles. “Operationalizing the Notion of Information as Subjective
a Construct.” Journal of the American Society of Information Science.
45, no 7 (1994):465-476
Cole, a professor in the Library and Information Science program at the
University of Western Ontario, uses several theories to put forth the proposal
that information is subjective. His theory is based primarily on the
writings of Dervin and Nilan that propose the theory that information is a
subjective concept and the steps they outlined. He also looks at Brooke’s
theory that information is that which transforms knowledge structure and
Neisser’s theory that perception is top-down or schemata driven.
Cole shows that information is something that is structured by people.
Cole succeeds in his endeavor to provide a fundamental definition of “subjective
construct”. With his ideas and research Cole attempts to provide schemata
theories. He concludes that we do live in a world of our own making
based on the idea that information at the higher levels of construct can be
adapted.
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The Study and Evaluation of Information Use and Users
Applegate, Rachel. “Models of User Satisfaction: Understanding False
Positives.” RQ, no 4 (1993): 525-559
Applegate, a reference librarian at the University of St. Scholatica in
Duluth looks at false positives in studies on user satisfaction. She
bases her research on three models of user satisfaction; the material satisfaction
model, the emotional satisfaction-simple path model and the emotional satisfaction-multiple
path model. Applegate does a wonderful job of explaining why it is
important to study emotional satisfaction by dividing it into two sections,
evaluation and behavior. Applegate explains why it is important in
research on user satisfaction to move beyond the basic question – is the
user satisfied. The definition of satisfaction should be clearly made.
She defines false positives as a user being satisfied with an inadequate
outcome or answer. She comes to the conclusion that clear definitions
are needed for the term satisfaction are needed before studies are began
and that simple path models will not yield adequate results.
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Information Quality, Value and Impacts
Saracevic, T. and P.b. Kantor. “Studying the Value of Library and
Information Services, part I. Establishing a Theoretical Framework.”
Journal of the American Society for Information Science. 48, no 6. (1197):
527-542.
Savacevic and Kantor, professors of Information Communication and Library
Studies at Rutgers University, present the results of a study designed to
address the problem of designing models and methods for studying the value
and cost of library and information services. This paper is part one
of a two part series and focuses solely on the issue of value. The
paper is divided into sections addressing four definite questions regarding
the value of library and information services. They have developed
several models that serve as basis for future work. Part II of this
paper focuses on the actual study.
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Conceptual Framework
Kirkelas, James. “Information Seeking Behavior: Patterns and Concepts.”
Drexel Library Quarterly 19:2 (1983): 5-20.
Kirkelas defines and develops an overarching theory explaining the information
seeking, gathering and giving process, moving from the recognition of needs
to the search for and assimilation of information. Following Atkins, this
article defines information seeking behavior as search activities driven
by a sense of uncertainty arising from information lacuna - knowledge gaps.
Kirkelas classifies needs by their urgency, suggesting two basic types: immediate
and deferred. Most library science research focuses on the former, with the
aim of revealing basic patterns of information needs satisfaction. But, as
Kirkelas argues, needs are not static; rather they exist on several levels
and in stages of progression, shaped by spatial location, occupation, process
and problem, evolving over time as needs are fulfilled and regenerated under
shifting circumstances. Prompted by uncertainty, constantly renewed
by changing informational needs and conditions, individuals turn to a variety
of sources to redress the lack of knowledge. This involves utilizing internal
and external resources, starting with memory/experience and personal files,
and moving then to external sources. As Kirkelas shows, this usually means
avoiding unknown intermediaries (e.g. librarians) and turning to direct human
communication; that is, colleagues and co-workers, etc. In summing up the
author nicely depicts the main components of the study in a graph representing
the information seeking process, flowing from the initial awareness of uncertainty
to seeking internal and external sources of information.
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Information Channels
Grosser, Kerry. “Human Networks in Organizational Information Processing.”
Annual Review of Information Science and Technology 26 (1991): 349-402.
Although most recent library science and information management literature
focuses on technological advances and implementation in organizations, Grosser
posits that human information networks remain central to effective communication
patterns. This article spans across disciplines in discussing the corpus
of human network literature, examining cognitive psychology studies, management
decision theories, and end-user computing research. Organically developing
informal human networks are inherent in organizations. And, within these
networks, particular individuals take on different informational roles that
researchers group into specific typologies. So that within an organization,
individual experts (gatekeepers/boundary spanners) speed the diffusion of
technological innovation, while others (assassins, etc.) impede or lag behind
the pace of change. Grosser provides a comprehensive overview of research
literature on these typologies; looking at the notion of “invisible colleges,”
(scholarly communication between high-profile academics) and studies on management
techniques and decision-making as they relate to informal human networks.
He also reviews the instruments and methodology for empirically measuring
and analyzing this flow of information. In addition to the typology type
of informal information networks, Grosser reviews the literature on corporate
culture and shows that, here, too, informal human networks, rather than formal,
hierarchical channels, serve as the main means for information diffusion
in organizations. So the “corporate grapevine,” individual job satisfaction,
and management’s ability to perceive and utilize the informal human information
system is integral to the efficacy of organizational communication and a
major factor in shaping corporate culture.
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Information Barriers
Chatman, Elfreda. “The Impoverished Life World of Outsiders.” Journal of
the American Society for Information Science 47:3 (1996): 193-206.
Building on three previous studies on the informational habits of marginalized
groups, Chatman develops a theoretical approach to information poverty and
‘outsider’ perceptions of access, acquisition, and consumption of knowledge.
In three successive studies Chatman applied different theories (gratification
theory, alienation theory, and diffusion theory) to the problems of groups
operating at the fringes of society and beyond the bounds of the dominant/privileged
classes. The sharp socioeconomic divide wherein insider norms are imposed
on the outsider world creates, Chatman found, certain anomalies that did
not conform to theoretical expectations. That is, outsiders, rather than
developing a parallel notion of the ‘insider’ group mirrored on insider information
behavior, tended to exist in an atomistic environment, sheltering behind
protective communication measures. This form of self-reliance, masking information
needs in layers of secrecy and deception, while avoiding risk, meant that
critical knowledge was withheld, subsumed, or twisted. These elements – secrecy,
deception, risk-taking – are at the crux of Chatman’s theory. The main propositions
include the notion that the information poor are unaware of relevant information
sources (or feel that they are cut off from access to information); information
poverty is class-based; information poverty results in concealing needs and
avoiding risks - a form of self-protection. From this Chatman concludes that
while the insider/outsider dichotomy holds true for distinguishing the dominant
from the subordinate in society, the outsider group itself lacks cohesion,
with solitary individuals existing in a sort of information isolation, having
only tenuous ties to other ‘outsiders.’
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Information Use
by Various Populations
Chatman, Elfreda. “Information, Mass Media Use and the Working Poor.” Library
and Information Science Research 7 (1985): 97-113.
Chatman examines conceptions and consumption of mass media among the working
poor. Earlier studies of mass media use of the lower classes showed that,
generally, people shied away from written materials, with an overwhelming
tendency to rely heavily on television as a source of both information and
entertainment. Researchers correlated this pattern of mass media consumption
with socioeconomic factors: low levels of education, restricted forms of
cultural and entertainment activities, and an “emphasis on the concrete and
here and the-here-and-now aspects of life (Chatman, p.98). In this study
of 50 women participating in the CETA program, however, Chatman found that,
rather than turning to television, the subjects relied more on newspapers,
magazines, and books as the their primary form of information acquisition,
regarding print materials as the most useful mass media source. In one respect,
however, the findings from this research reflected previous studies, as the
library was of minor importance to the respondents. Although this particular
group of working poor evinced a tendency toward using newspapers, etc., as
information resources, Chatman notes that these subjects were atypical of
the poor in general, since it was likely that workers accepted into the CETA
program were better educated and more qualified than other members of the
same socioeconomic strata.
Cheuk, Wai-yi Bonnie. “Exploring Literacy in the Workplace: A Qualitative
Study of Engineers Using the Sense-making Approach.” International Forum
on Information and Documentation. V 23 no 2 (1998): 30-38.
Cheuk, a research scholar at the Nanyang Technological University School
of Applied Science, Division of Information Studies, presents the findings
of a study on the question “what kind of Information Seeking and Using (ISU)
process do practioners in the workplace go through to complete their tasks?”
Cheuk adopted Dervins’ Sense-making model for her approach. To answer
her research questions she used comprehensive interviews of eight engineers
located in Singapore. Cheuk makes the interesting and valid point that
people who have advanced computer and technology skills are not necessarily
successful information users or information literate. This well written
paper comes to the conclusion that managers need to look at information seeking
and using behaviors in the workplace as a complicated process that all employees
will approach differently.
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Encountering Information
Duff, Wendy M. and Johnson, Catherine A. “Accidentally Found on Purpose:
Information Seeking Behavior of Historians in Archives” Library Quarterly
72.4 (2002): 472-496
Duff and Johnson, both faculty of Information Studies at the University
of Toronto, discuss their investigation into the information encountering
experiences of historians during archival research. Interviews with
these historians revealed a predilection amongst the subject group for using
informal sources, as they preferred to rely on the expertise of archivists
gleaned in conversation as opposed to performing specific searches.
This behavior in turn appears to have increased the likelihood of the unexpected
discovery of information pertinent to their investigations. Information
encountering enhanced the research experience of these historian , as in many
instances newly discovered sources required the researcher to re-evaluate
the initial focus of her or his investigation and produce new lines of questioning.
Information encountering, as the authors note, may become part of a dialectic
that the researcher enters into when pursuing a research topic, rather than
just an experience of surprise discovery.
Erdelez, Sanda. “Towards Understanding Information Encountering on
the Web” Proceedings
me) a term that embraces those experiences of serendipitous or accidental
discovery discussed by other authors.
In this article Erdelez reprises her earlier (1995) research that concerned
encountering within the context of traditional materials, and transposes
her method now to investigate electronic environments. The article
includes a valuable introduction to information encountering, wherein Erdelez
describes the process as being the accidental discovery of useful information,
most likely in tandem with another search behavior. Her project evaluates
why those most likely to rely on encountering continue to be reluctant to
consider the web a fruitful resource for the encountering experience, and
thus provides some insight into the obstacles that web design poses to some
users.
Twidale, Michael B, Nichols, David M., and Paice, Chris D. “Browsing
is a Collaborative Process” Information Processing & Management
33.6 (1997) 761-783
While this portion of the bibliography concerns information encountering,
this article bears inclusion, and not just because of the dearth of published
research regarding the encountering phenomenon. As Erdelez notes,
encountering is unlikely without the intersection of another seeking activity,
in many instances browsing. The authors, a student of library science
at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana, and two faculty members
from the computer department at Lancaster University, observed the collaborative
aspects of browsing behavior in library users. They observed frequent incidents
of information sharing between researchers, including the sharing of accidentally
discovered information, which, while peripheral to the main search of one
user was quite useful to another, and was then shared. This observation,
as well as the authors’ detailing of user interaction and collaboration
in the search process provide an opportunity to expand our perception of
information encountering as an individual process, or one involving a researcher
in conversation with an information professional, and consider the phenomenon
as one potentially involving several users.
Williamson, Kirsty. “Discovered by Chance: The Role of Incidental
Information Acquisition in an Ecological Model of Information Use” Library
& Information Science Research 20.1 (1998): 23-40
This article addresses the results of an investigation into the information-seeking
behaviors of 202 Australians over the age of 60; it is “ecological”, in
that the researchers strove to view these seeking behaviors in the context
of the subjects’ lives and community. Director of the Telecommunications
Research Group at RMIT University, Williamson employed a combination of
telephone diaries and interviews in her investigation. She notes a
tendency in the group toward traditional print media, radio, and television,
while shying away from more recent technologies. Williamson’s findings
are useful as they identify how these more traditional forms of broadcasting
and exchange provide the opportunity for the subjects to unexpectedly discover
useful information of which they were previously unaware, and in turn sheds
light on the link between information sharing and encountering--the sort
of link between activities that Erdelez requires for the encountering experience
to be valid.
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last updated 11/11/02