U SER -­‐‑ CENTRED   IB  RESEARCH :  TWO  MAIN  PERSPECTIVES  COMPARED

!

2.6.1 User-centred IB research: two main perspectives compared

!

IB can be studied in light of different perspectives (Bates, 2005; Fidel, 2012). However, two key schools of thought within the IB research are often considered. The first, well established, is the cognitive perspective, which entails looking at cognitive and, to some extent, emotional aspects associated, in particular, with information seeking such as the identification of a knowledge gap in one’s knowledge and experiencing doubt, anxiety, and disappointment while searching for information; whereas the second, recently progressing, is the social perspective, which focuses on social aspects that shape people’s information seeking behaviour such as social norms underpinning their actions and in turn influencing their decisions when interacting with information (Pettigrew et al., 2001). These two views often underpin research into people's IB. An analysis of the key characteristics of these two perspectives is shown in table 2.2 below.

Comparative dimension Perspective

The cognitive The social

Background Date Mid-1980s Mid-1990s

Position within the IB literature Major and dominating Minor but is growing

Key authors E.g., Belkin; Dervin; Ellis; Ford; Ingwersen; Kuhlthau E.g., Chatman; Fisher; Savolainen; Mackenzie

Theoretical aspects View to IB Often as a measurable entity but can also be as a cognitive process Often as a process embedded within a social context

Orientation Primarily a psychological lens A social lens

Main purpose/aim of inquiry Prediction but can also involve describing and exploring Understanding which may also involve theorizing Research question/focus Correlation between variables

Modeling information seeking

Identifying social aspects that shape IB

Deriving insights that account for the role of ‘context’

Studied context Study/work context EL context

Studied sample Primarily students Diverse

Methodological aspects

Epistemology Often post-positivist but can also be interpretive Often interpretive Data collection techniques Diverse

Mainly cross-sectional aside from few exceptions that were longitudinal

Mainly interviews, incorporating the critical incident technique (CIT), but can also involve observation

Mainly cross-sectional rather than longitudinal Unit of analysis Can be individuals’ attributes (e.g., demographic) or incidents

described by respondents

Incidents described by respondents and/or observed by the researcher

Form of data analysis Deductive (quantitative or statistical) and inductive (qualitative) Primarily inductive (qualitative)

Critical evaluation Contribution/value Developing models that portray the different stages of the information seeking process and

Highlighting the role of individual differences in information seeking

Developing insights and models that indicate the impact of social factors such as social norms on shaping people’s information seeking

Limitations Focusing, to a great extent, on cognitive aspects Conflicting results

Limited in terms of addressing types of IB other than information seeking

Emphasizing the role of 'context' and yet not clearly indicating what it means in relation to the undertaken study

Limited in terms of addressing types of IB other than information seeking, aside from few examples

As can be seen from table 2.2 each perspective has its distinctive characteristics if these two perspectives are compared to one another in terms of the following:

• Historical background

• Theoretical aspects

• Methodological aspects (presented in chapter three)

• Contribution and limitations These are described as follows.

• Historical background

The cognitive perspective emerged in the mid-1980s advocating a shift towards a user-centered approach to studying people’s information seeking as can be seen in Dervin &

Nilan (1986) call for a focus on people’s views rather than on systems features to better understand their information needs. Since then it has been described as a dominating perspective in the IB research (Fidel, 2012). On the other hand, the social perspective to studying people’s IB emerged in the mid-1990s with Chatman’s (1992; 1999) series of studies pioneering and advocating such perspective. As a relatively emergent view, the social perspective was described as having a humble presence in the area of IB (Fidel, 2012) especially if it is compared with the presence of the cognitive perspective.

• Theoretical aspects

As can be seen from table 2.2, the cognitive and the social perspectives differ in that the former often conceptualizes information seeking as a measurable activity since a psychological lens that aims at prediction usually influences this conceptualization. For example, the exploration of the impact of individual differences (Ford, Eaglestone &

Madden, 2009; Bawden & Robinson, 2011) and whether patterns of information seeking such as the preference of the use of electronic information sources is associated with particular disciplinary subject areas (natural versus social sciences) as in the case of studies conducted for example by Ge (2005) and Gardiner, McMenemy and Chowdhury (2006); or whether information seeking varies among individuals according to attributes such as cognitive style (e.g., Ford, Wood & Walsh, 1994), personality traits (e.g., Heinström, 2003; 2006), and gender (e.g., Ford, Miller & Moss, 2001; Rowlands

& Nicholas, 2008).

However, the cognitive view, as can be seen for example in Dervin’s (1983; 1992;

2005) sense making model and Kuhlthau’s (1993) information seeking process model, also conceptualizes information seeking as a subjective phenomenon constructed by the people involved (Cole, 1994) and therefore emphases exploring and describing information seeking as a cognitive process. This entails bridging the identified knowledge gap in individuals’ understanding about something through information seeking and, to some extent, describing the range of feelings associated with such process (Kuhlthau, 1993).

On the other hand, the social perspective often conceptualizes IB as a process that is embedded in a context since the orientation of this perspective involves analysing people’s IB from a social lens. This entails the identification of social factors such as social norms that shape IB and the role of the social context in which people find themselves in in influencing their IB. For example, a study by Chatman (1986) indicated that competition among her poor women with temporary employment acted as a barrier to sharing, in particular, information about employment opportunities, whereas a study by Pettigrew (1999) highlighted the importance of what she called ‘information grounds’, such as clinics, coffee shops, and restaurants in facilitating information acquisition and sharing.

In addition, table 2.2 indicates that the cognitive perspective often includes studies conducted in the work context with students often being the main group studied (Case, 2012). On the other hand, the focus of the majority of studies that fall under the social perspective is associated with everyday life contexts with describing the information behaviour of varied groups such as pregnant women (Mackenzie, 2003), informal carers (Hepworth, 2004), immigrants (Fisher, Durance & Hinton, 2004), teens (Agosto &

Hughes-Hassell, 2006b), and stay-at-home mothers (Fisher & Landry, 2007).

• Contribution and limitations

Table 2.2 indicates that both the cognitive and social perspectives contributed to the area of information behaviour. The cognitive perspective led to the development of a number of key models that describe the cognitive processes associated with information seeking such ‘Anomalous State of Knowledge’ defined as the state of inadequacy of knowledge with respect to a topic or a goal (Belkin, 2005), the identification and the bridging of a ‘knowledge gap’ in one’s understanding about something (Dervin, 2005),

and verifying (Ellis, 1989), and also to some extent the emotional aspects such as experiencing doubt and disappointment during different stages of information seeking (Kuhlthau, 1993). However, as acknowledged by Ford (2004a), this perspective focuses to a great extent on cognition. While such a focus has added to our understanding of aspects related in particular to the effect of cognitive style (Ford, Wood, Walsh, 1994) and personality traits (Heinström, 2003) on influencing information seeking, it does not consider the role of the social context that people find themselves in, their perception of such and the meaning they attached to their actions. Wilson (2002, p. 204) concluded that “it is necessary to understand the meaning attributed by persons to the activities in which they engage, in order to understand their [information] behaviour”. In addition, the findings from studies within this view are often considered of a conflicting nature, as Bawden & Robinson (2011, p. 10) have stated: “results have often remained suggestive, at times even contradictory, rather than conclusive”. For example, while Ford, Miller and Moss (2001) identified gender as a significant factor in influencing information seeking, Agosto and Hughes-Hassell (2006b) concluded that gender was not a significant factor in predicting information seeking. This makes cross-study comparison challenging, and underlines the need for future studies to further establish a profound understanding of the area.

On the other hand, the social perspective led to developing insights into information behaviour which can be seen for example in Chatman’s (2000) theory of normative behaviour, Savolainen’s (1995) everyday life information seeking model, and Pettigrew’s (1999) ‘information ground’ theory. However, studies that fall under the category of the social perspective are often criticized on the basis that while these studies emphasised the role of context in influencing people’s information behaviour what is meant by ‘context’ tends to be missing in these studies. This can impact on and, specifically, limit the applicability of the findings of these studies to other settings since the meaning of ‘context’ in such studies is not clearly defined. Indeed, Fidel (2012) suggested that the extent to which the findings of studies that emphasised the importance of ‘context’ in understanding information behaviour depends on whether an adequate description of what was meant by ‘context’ was given.

Despite the aforementioned differences between the cognitive and the social perspectives two common characteristics can be noted from table 2.2 as follows.

! Firstly, both perspectives fall into cross-sectional rather than longitudinal studies. One notable exception here is a study by Mick & Buhl (1992) where the data from three respondents were captured via three interviews conducted with each respondent over a four-month period.

! Secondly, because the majority of studies that fall into both the cognitive and the social views focus to a great extent on information seeking they are considered, aside from few examples (e.g., Erdelez, 2005, Savolainen, 2008;

Sairanen & Savolainen, 2010) limited in terms of addressing types of IB other than information seeking.

It is worth noting an important point that can be concluded from table 2.2 which is relatively simple: both the cognitive and the social perspectives have their value and this implies that no one should be considered as better than the other. Nonetheless, researchers, whether explicitly or implicitly, often draw solely or primarily on one rather than another depending on the nature and the objectives of their research. The perceptive taken in relation to this study is considered, as described by Pettigrew et al., (2001), multifaceted, or as called by Bates (2005), socio-cognitive, which was developed as a result of recognition that the cognitive and social perspectives alone may not adequately describe IB (Pettigrew et al., 2001). Reflecting upon the findings of this study, multiple dimensions associated with participants’ IB were identified. For example, avoiding unpleasant emotions, which signals an affective dimension led to a decision to avoid information; while perceiving social responsibility towards family, which highlights a social dimension led to information seeking for the benefit of others.

However, variables associated with the role of individual differences such as age and gender in influencing IB, as analysed in studies that fall under the cognitive perspective are beyond the scope of this study for two reasons. Firstly, and as detailed in section 3.2.3.4 in chapter three, the study adopted an interpretive epistemology which emphasised the importance of understanding participants’ perspectives and the context in which these occur rather than testing or verifying a hypothesis about the role of individual differences in influencing the object of an investigation (Walliman, 2006;

Pickard, 2007). Examining the impact of individual differences in influencing information behaviour would therefore be considered to generally fit within a

post-positivist epistemology. This could be addressed in future studies that adopt such an epistemological approach.

Secondly, the study largely operates within the social approach to studying people’s information behaviour which emphasises the importance of context in understanding information behaviour rather than individual attributes such as their age or gender. The study therefore focuses on women as a distinct group, and is interested in arriving at conclusions that featured collective rather than individualistic experiences. The aim was to tease out variations in participants’ responses to interview questions and their diary reports in order to develop an understanding about their IB as a group of people that is different from other groups studied in previous research. This is illustrated in section 1.3 which gives an overview of the Saudi Arabian cultural context together with the cultural context of Saudi universities. It is argued here that culture has a significant role in creating a unique situation for Saudi female academics which may, in turn, impact upon their information behaviour and may lead to them using alternative ways to obtain information that would fit within their culture. This reflects Hepworth and Walton’s (2009) findings that people’s social environment may act as a barrier which inhibits them from finding information they need.

2.6.2 User-centred IB research: studied areas