Competency J: Information Seeking Behaviors

“When you mislaid a certain something
Keep your cool and don’t get hot
Calculatus Eliminatus is the best friend that you’ve got
Calculatus Eliminatus always helps an awful lot
The way to find a missing something is to find out where it’s not.”

Calculatus Eliminatus, Allan Sherman (The Cat in the Hat)

Introduction
There is a wealth of detailed information in the ether, both in person and online. Libraries, businesses, and individuals all rely on reliable and accurate sources of information to process plethoras of concepts and produce positive outcomes. Once this information is found, how is one to know whether or not the information is accurate, true, and safe? Where does one even begin to look for information? What techniques should one use to look for information? There are many things to consider when searching for information, and these are among several of the talking points. 

Berrypicking? It’s Cold Outside!
To understand typical information-seeking behavior, we must first understand what information is being sought and why. There are as many ways to find information as there is information. A variety of information-seeking behaviors are typically employed when searching for information. Some of these techniques include berrypicking: a more organic version of information seeking, where users of the technique meander through a set of information, adjusting their technique as the search progresses (Bates, 2007). Much as a meadow dweller would pick blackberries from seemingly random and visually tempting sources, adjusting decision-making processes as they wander through the brush, an information seeker on the internet mirrors this behavior, only with data. Delicious tidbits of data are collected in our metaphorical berry baskets, teaching us what to look for in additional information. 

Everyday Life Information Seeking (ELIS)
Savolainen and Kari (2004), meanwhile, discuss the Everyday Life Information Seeking (ELIS) process, describing the internet as a “big pile” that users must sort through. Deployers of ELIS often only speak with people they know and trust to find information. Healthcare information seekers tend to use this “search the (personal) pile” tactic to find information about personal or familial health conditions. For example, elderly information seekers are known to rely only on their healthcare providers and spouses or romantic partners for credible information (Choi, 2019). To make matters worse, those with disabilities, including the elderly, face many struggles when seeking information, such as the lack of accessibility features on websites (Dobransky and Hargittai, 2006). Though coping mechanisms are typically implemented, finding information when disabled or vulnerable can be tricky. According to Choi (2019), close family members and relatives tend to be tasked with supplying credible and trustworthy information if a healthcare provider is unavailable.

Information Seeking Outcomes
When these vulnerable individuals seek information, it is for the common (usually healthcare-related) issues they encounter in their everyday lives. They are ostensibly not attempting to complete a rocket science-based review on space travel if they’re not a scientist, or figuring out how to bake the next award-winning pie when they historically don’t enjoy cooking. These tasks are not a standard part of the everyday lives of many. According to Kuhlthau (2008), there are specific commonplace subjects most information seekers tend to look for. These include consumer, personal, health, citizenship, decision-making, educational, life issues, and work-related topics. Therefore, knowing many techniques for seeking information is essential to the library and information science profession, and the ability to quickly scan and identify all types of relevant information from common resources is vital. 

Conclusion
Information is constantly increasing; thus, information seekers have more data than ever to cross-reference and glean from. Although there are many different types of information to be sought, the methodologies of information seeking remain the same. New and innovative techniques will eventually have to be learned, and the experience of the average user and library professionals will need to be considered when developing more sophisticated techniques for information retrieval.

Artifacts and Evidence
Artifact 1
Assignment:

Course: INFO 210 Reference and Information Services
Description:
This artifact is one of a series of mini-activities or exercises completed in my INFO 210 Research and Information Services class to teach reference techniques for various databases. In this case, this exercise involves referencing people and bibliographic information, comparing resources (such as Wikipedia) to one another, and rating which sites are best at finding and verifying accurate information. It discusses the myriad ways that one can begin to choose a credible source and authentic resources for accurate information. It was determined that it is indeed difficult to find accurate free and open-source information alone, and even more difficult to reach information that is behind a paywall without the help of a library professional. While there is much debate and speculation about whether a free and open-source internet could ever be possible, it’s obvious after this exercise that finding quality information from Google is no small task. Peer-reviewed academic information, unfortunately, remains largely in the hands of academia. This makes the everyday life information-seeking (ELIS) behaviors of so much of the population completely understandable and even relatable.

Artifact 2
Assignment:

Course: INFO 298 VR and UX in Libraries Internship
Description:
The organization Unite Against Banned Books (UABB) Organization (sponsored by the American Library Association or ALA) decided to create a browser-based Virtual Reality (VR) metaverse space to raise awareness about book bans and collaborated with San Jose State University along with a now-defunct VR company to make this concept a reality. As student interns, we were asked to give our opinions on the beta concept from a user experience perspective and used think-aloud protocols to demonstrate our awareness of the importance of user testing and engagement techniques. Some of our work was presented within this metaverse space, so we were also able to give commentary on whether or not we believed that the content would resonate with the online community or fall flat. I found that the scale was too large and the concept too sweeping to be effective at the time that I reviewed this metaverse space. Since Mozilla Hubs was also shut down, I can’t revisit this space as it was known and understood during this period.

Artifact 3
Assignment:

Course: INFO 210 Reference and Information Services
Description:
In this assignment, I was asked to contact an in-person reference desk (over the phone was acceptable) ask a reference question, and rate the librarian’s helpfulness, friendliness, and adherence to Reference and User Services (RUSA) guidelines when assisting patrons. For this assignment, I contacted the Denver Public Library Main Branch and talked to the reference librarian on duty. My reference question was fairly transparent and she immediately picked up on the fact that I was a library student. We discussed the concept of having to find what the patron is looking for, not merely what they say that they want to find. Because I was unable to come up with a convincing reference question to ask over the phone, most of the conversation was about finding libraries that applied to my unique skill set and interests. Audiovisual libraries have always appealed to me, and so I was looking for local libraries where collections of this type might be larger and more plentiful. While Denver Public Library did house a few collections of this type, the librarian mused that she had only seen robust collections of this type in Los Angeles libraries and archival collections, and was disappointed to say that she couldn’t help me with much local information.

References
Bates, M. J. (2007). The design of browsing and berrypicking techniques for the online search interface. Online Review, 13(5), 407–424

Choi, W. (2019). Older adults’ health information behavior in everyday life settings. Library and Information Science Research, 41(4), Article 100983. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lisr.2019.100983

Dobransky, K., & Hargittai, E. (2006). The disability divide in internet access and use. Information, Communication & Society, 9(3), 313-334. https://doi.org/10.1080/13691180600751298

Kuhlthau, C. C. (2008). From information to meaning: Confronting challenges of the twenty-first century. Libri, 58(2), 66-73. https://doi.org/10.1515/libr.2008.008

Savolainen, R., & Kari, J. (2004). Conceptions of the Internet in everyday life information seeking. Journal of Information Science, 30(3), 219–226. https://doi.org/10.1177/0165551504044667