INFO 414 Information Behavior

1. INFO 414 Information Behavior Theoretical foundations, frameworks and paradigms

2. Frameworks and paradigms • System or physical paradigm • Social/ psychological view • user oriented paradigm • Cognitive view • Sensemaking • Social constructionism

3. The system or physical paradigm • Objective view of information • Users seen as mechanistic and passive • User behavior predicted according to general variables - age, income • Atomistic - focus on user’s interaction with system; point of contact only • focus on external behaviors; contact with system is indication of need and behavior • individuality regarded as chaotic • quantitative

4. Objective Information • information has constant meaning • a commodity or thing. • can be transported • reflects an absolute correspondence with reality • It will convey the same meaning to all users.

5. Mechanistic Passive Users • Users are regarded as information processing systems • Being informed or benefiting from information is assumed to result directly from document delivery with no intervening user behaviour

6. Transituationality • Users with similar characteristics in similar situations will react in similar ways, use information similarly and make similar decisions. • The information behavior of users is described in ways that apply across situations.

7. Atomistic View of Experience • The focus is on user behaviour at the point of intersection with the information system • The moment of contact and exchange

8. External Behavior • Very concrete • Contact with a system is the basic indicator of information need • Focus on what can be observed as overt behaviour

9. Chaotic Individuality • Focus on individual information behavior will cause too much variation • Systems cannot accommodate individual interpretation • Individuality means chaos and prevents systematic research

10. Sociological and psychological approaches • Sociological approach to information behavior 60’s... • views the individual user of information systems as part of a complex of other systems all of which affect the person’s information behavior

11. Sociological and psychological approaches • factors outside the information system ought to be studied if we are to interpret information behavior accurately • the person’s social situation • the individual’s problems • the use to which the information will be put

12. Sociological and psychological approaches • Psychological approach • reinforces the sociological perspectives • takes account of the user’s internal state as it interacts with the external factors identified by the sociological approach

13. User oriented paradigm • subjective information • constructivist active user • situationality • wholistic views of experience • internal cognitions • systematic individuality • qualitative research

14. Subjective information • Information does not transmit constant meaning • Information users interpret information and create sense or meaning in accordance with their unique model or image of the world

15. Constructivist Active Users • The user constructs need out of situations and is actively involved in information transfer • The user undertakes activities that will induce sensemaking • The user is actively involved from the time the information problem arises to the point of problem resolution

16. Situationality • An individual’s responsiveness to information is governed by a range of variables that are unique to the individual and to the information problem that the individual is engaging • Individuals operate from different centres at different times

17. Wholistic View of Experience • A user’s behavior is studied in terms of those factors that lead to an encounter with an information system and the consequences of such an encounter • A broader view of information behaviour from the time need arises to when it no longer exists

18. Internal Cognitions • Acknowledges the premise that what is going on inside a person’s mind (the individual’s model of the world) will shape the way information is interpreted and used • Interested in what people think as well as what they do when they engage in information behavior

19. Systematic Individuality • The complexity of individuality can be addressed in a way that is consistent with scientific investigation.

20. Problem orientation • A change in perception • away from seeing information as only about something • towards seeing information as having an effect on something • concentrating on problems rather than questions

21. Problem dimensions • A focus on problems • continuum from questions to problems to sensemaking • Problems • the initial state • the goal state • the processes - mental physical or perceptual that move the user from initial state to goal state

22. A problem orientation (Saracevic, 1988) • no such thing as information need in the abstract but rather circumstances that lead to information behavior • there is more to a question than the words expressing it • viewing the problem behind the question rather than the information need is central to the information retrieval interaction

23. A problem orientation (Saracevic, 1988) Internal and cognitive aspects • Problem • Intent • Internal knowledge state • Public knowledge • expectation The problem State or problem Space

24. The cognitive view…(B.C. Brookes) K[s] + i = k[s + s] • Any processing of information - whether perceptual or symbolic - is mediated by a system of categories or concepts, which, for the processing device, are a model of its world (De Mey) Knowledge structure Modified knowledge structure Information

25. The cognitive view (Ingwersen) The world model consists of knowledge structures. These are determined by the individual and social/ collective experiences, education and training etc.

26. Ingwersen (1986) Human Intermediary Conceptual Knowledge Document User Knowledge of documents and representation Perceptions and picture of user need Transformation Interaction

27. Sensemaking Questions answered, ideas formed, resources obtained Discontinuity Condition Gap bridged Situation Uses (Helps) Gap faced Strategies used info values sought

28. Sensemaking moment Situation Each moment is potentially a sensemaking moment Circling the experience Gap Use (Help)

29. Social Constructionism • Essential premise • The primary human reality is about people in conversation • communication and conversation are used to structure and organize social reality • focus on public and social not private and subjective

30. Social contructionism • Emphasizes the negotiation of meaning • attention to reality construction through discourse • there is no versionless reality • rejects monologism and replaces this with dialogism • the most important things take place in interaction, in discursive and bodily practices between people not within the individual cut off from his or her social relationships

31. Social constructionism • Assumes that we construct versions of reality between ourselves • Knowledge is something people do together rather than an individual possession

32. Social constructionism • Social constructionist view • discourse is constructive in itself • not about cognitive states but rather about the situated and occasioned nature of talk • discursive constructions make sense in terms of the social action they are constructed to accomplish

33. Social constructionism • It is possible to study people’s thoughts, ideas and emotions by looking at how they are played out in action • applied to the analysis of information use social constructionism is not about studying the internal and subjective but rather the discursive constructions of information • information is a property of conversation (Taylor) • information as a thing must be reconceptualized in communication terms (Dervin)