NOTE: Part of response to readings for week 3, Sep 10th 2004, LIS 501 (1 of 2 required courses) last fall.
Kuhlthau’s model of the information search process is the key idea that I want to focus on. As to the article at large, I think it a wonderful piece that puts research that has had a deep impact on user-centered services into a context of how it can be helpful to designers of information retrieval (IR) systems. This type of research into how users actually search should be critical to good IR design; my concern is that systems designers rarely think from this perspective. Maybe with the growing interdisciplinarity that Wilson mentions we will begin to see systems designers who can think from the user-centered perspective.
I enjoyed this article because it had me engaged, thinking, making notes,and responding to it. I am quite leery of models in all "sciences" but this one speaks to me in many ways. It may not be universalizable, but it makes a serious contribution to the process of information searching. Not all information needs require such a complex model; the stages can in fact be collapsed or missing entirely for simple information "searches," which she clearly acknowledges (packet 2).
I fully understand and quite frequently feel "the dip" in my own information search process (ISP). For me, lifelong-learning is one big ISP. There are so many connections; and the more I learn, the more I learn and know that there is still to more learn, and that I will never be done. The uncertainty never goes away; it just shifts around the question domains. The "dip" in all of its’ affective glory is how I seem to live much of my life–"…increasingly uncertain until a focus is formed to provide a path for seeking meaning and criteria for judging relevance" (packet 2). In coming to GSLIS I have changed jobs, educational focus, physically moved, and left my friends and family. All of this has led to much confusion and uncertainty as I try to seek the information and meaning that will allow me to put my life in context, while looking for the relevant criteria by which I can judge my own unfolding life, or ISP. As an aside, I must say that I love the "Uncertainty Principle." It is so Douglas Adams and reminds me of the Infinite Improbability Drive that powers the starship Heart of Gold.
"Please do not be alarmed," it said, "by anything you see or hear around you…We are now cruising at a level of two to the power of two hundred and seventy-six thousand to one against and falling, and we will be restoring normality just as soon as we are sure what is normal anyway. Thank you…" (Adams, 1979).
In class we were asked, in regards to limitations of the ISP model,
if searching is really a linear process. It most certainly is not! But,
I believe that Kuhlthau has not ruled that out, at least not in this
piece we read. "Searching is a process over time rather than a single
event. Searching is a holistic experience rather than just an
intellectual activity" (packet 3). If we merge this idea with Leckie’s
"view of research as a non-sequential, non-linear process with a large
degree of ambiguity and serendipity" we get a fuller model of the
research-oriented ISP (202). I find nothing in Kuhlthau that suggests
her ISP model is uni-linear. Maybe some singular threads within the
process are linear, but as a holistic whole the process is not. As one
of our authors said (sorry, can’t find the reference–will keep
looking), the question constantly keeps shifting during the search
process. I find this to be the case in all of my research. One idea
always leads to others. These may generate new questions, or change the
current question.
I also like Kuhlthau’s idea of "zones of intervention" (packet 4). I just recently read Vygotsky’s Mind in Society
for a reading/discussion group and came across his idea of the zone of
proximal development. This is a very important concept in understanding
learning and has critical applications in education. It certainly
deserves attention in any theory of (mediated) information searching. I
am looking forward to being able to devote some time to reading
Kuhlthau’s Seeking Meaning in the hopefully near future.
One limitation of Kuhlthau’s ISP model is that it applies to
active searching; but there are other non-active forms of information
seeking to which it probably does not apply. I have no problem with
this state of affairs as I do not believe in overarching "theories of
everything." They are rarely applicable to any real world situations,
especially human situations. To be so overarching they must incorporate
a large amount of ceteris paribus clauses. In human affairs,
"all things being equal" is never the case. I believe that Kuhlthau’s
ISP model, particularly with a Leckiean description of the research
process, provides an excellent model of the research oriented ISP. How
broadly it can be applied to non-research processes of information
searching is an empirical question; but no matter, there may well be
better models for other active, non-research oriented ISPs. That is one
of the strengths of social epistemology; we can agree to be pluralistic
in our search for "truth."
Citations
Adams, Douglas. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. New York: Harmony, 1979. Found at: Technovelgy LLC. "Technovelgy.com: where science meets fiction." Technovelgy LLC. 2004 <http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/content.asp?Bnum=134>.
Kuhlthau, Carol Collier. 1999 "Accommodating the User’s Information Search Process: Challenges for Information Retrieval System Designers." Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science 25 (3): 12-16.
Leckie, Gloria J. 1996 "Desperately Seeking Citations: Uncovering Faculty Assumptions About the Undergraduate Research Process." Journal of Academic Librarianship 22 (3): 201-208.
Vygotsky, L.S. Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1978.
Wilson, T.D. 2000 "Human Information Behavior." Informing Science 3 (2)
