Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Figures and tables
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Information needs and user studies
- 3 Human information behaviour studies and models
- 4 Usability study basics
- 5 Usability study participants
- 6 Usability data analysis
- 7 Web usability
- 8 The usability of digital libraries
- 9 The digital divide, digital natives and usability
- 10 Issues and trends in usability research
- Index
3 - Human information behaviour studies and models
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 June 2018
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Figures and tables
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Information needs and user studies
- 3 Human information behaviour studies and models
- 4 Usability study basics
- 5 Usability study participants
- 6 Usability data analysis
- 7 Web usability
- 8 The usability of digital libraries
- 9 The digital divide, digital natives and usability
- 10 Issues and trends in usability research
- Index
Summary
Introduction
Over 10,000 articles have been published on different aspects of human information behaviour (HIB) research and there has been a steady growth since 2000: ‘30 items per year during the early 1970s, 40 during the early 1980s, 50 by the late 1980s, 100 by 1990, and 120 items per year by 2005’ (Case, 2007, 242). Keeping track of such a rapidly growing literature is a challenging task. Fortunately, a representative range of literature has been reviewed in several publications including:
• ‘60 Years of the Best in Information Research on User Studies and Information Needs’ by Wilson (2006b)
• ‘Users, User Studies and Human Information Behaviour: a three decade perspective on Tom Wilson's “On user studies and information needs”’ by Bawden (2006)
• A chapter in Annual Review of Information Science and Technology, ‘Information Behavior’ by Case (2006)
In addition, a number of sources have emerged which deal exclusively or predominantly with information seeking, for example:
• Information Seeking in Context (ISIC) conference series since 1996
• special issues of several journals including Informing Science (3 (2), 2000), Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology (55 (8), 2004), Journal of Documentation (62 (6), 2006, and 63 (1), 2007), Information Processing & Management (‘Designing for Uncertainty’, 2008) and Library & Information Science Research (23 (4), 2001)
• the electronic journal Information Research (http://informationr.net/ir/), edited and published by T. D. Wilson
• a number of recent books including: Looking for Information (Case, 2007), New Directions in Human Information Behaviour (Spink and Cole, 2005), The Turn (Ingwersen and Jarvelin, 2005) and Theories of Information Behaviour (Fisher, Erdelez and McKechnie, 2006).
The chapter begins with the definition of HIB, and information seeking and retrieval. It sets the overall background of HIB study in general, then discusses the concept of information seeking and retrieval, which is a subset of HIB research, and an important aspect of usability of information products and services. Several models in the literature aim to provide a theoretical underpinning of HIB and the information seeking and retrieval process, focusing particularly on human aspects. Therefore, some widely used information seeking behaviour models and some new models derived from recent research work are discussed in this chapter. The new information seeking models will offer some insights of new directions of information behaviour research.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Information Users and Usability in the Digital Age , pp. 55 - 84Publisher: FacetPrint publication year: 2011