The relation between the category of the ‘need’ and the category of the ‘demand’ for information

This paper examines the terminological confusion underlying the study of information use, and reviews the major studies in the field. The conclusion is that confusion in research methods is inextricably linked to a lack of clarity in terminology. Attention is drawn to the significance of different social and cultural contexts in shaping ‘information needs’, and a research scheme is evolved for the study of users of ‘professional information’ in Poland.     

The production of ‘context’ in information seeking research: a metatheoretical view

Context is hot in information science as well as in numerous other disciplines, but what exactly does this mean in and for research? The paper discusses the differences between objectified and interpretative approaches to context. It is argued that in information needs and seeking research (INS), the former approach has thus far been more common. Contextual entities are usually described to provide a background for the study of individuals' or groups' information behavior, not in order to point out how contextual knowledge is. From a metatheoretical viewpoint, context is the site where a phenomenon is constituted as a research object. One way of understanding INS phenomena is to define them as patterns of behavior; another way is to understand them as phenomena mediated by social and cultural meanings and values. A large proportion of current theory and research in INS studies is located within the behaviorist framework which has become so familiar and taken-for-granted that it is rarely seen as a paradigm.     

The ‘lessons’ of Luddism

Hostility towards machinery was more widespread in the early Industrial Revolution than is customarily supposed and machine-breakers themselves were far from the mindless opponents of change they are often portrayed as being. Luddism marked not merely a turning point in the take-up of machinery but also a significant moment in the wider debate between conflicting political economies. It also crystallized a watershed in the attitudes of the State towards industrial protest and industrial regulation.     

‘The tyranny of distance’: Biotechnology networks and clusters in the antipodes

Regional governments around the world hope to become significant players in the world biotechnology industry through their support for local clusters. This article explores whether or not this is a realistic ambition. It does so through network analysis of biotechnology firms located in Melbourne, Australia, the leading biotechnology cluster in the Asia-Pacific. The article finds that the Melbourne cluster is characterized by both intensive regionalism and precocious internationalism, fuelled by ‘the tyranny of distance’ [Blainey, G., 1966. The Tyranny of Distance: How Distance Shaped Australia's History. Sun, Melbourne]. The regional ties are partial; the international ties are precarious. Support from venture capital and deals with big pharma are especially problematic. ‘The tyranny of distance’ is exacerbated by cultural dynamics, favouring ties with the US and UK rather than Japan and Korea, for example. In this context, making the cluster viable is an immense challenge, calling for imaginative and finely-directed public policy measures.     

Defense department payments for ‘company-financed’ R&D

The US Department of Defense funds a significant fraction of the in-house R&D of its defense contractors through its Independent Research and Development (IR&D) program. These IR&D funds, however, are reported as company-financed R&D in statistics compiled by the National Science Foundation. The program is most important in the aircraft industry, where we estimate that IR&D payments were 20% of the R&D reported as company-financed in 1973. Because special regulations govern the IR&D program, it would be more appropriate for most purposes to treat IR&D as part of federally-financed, not company-financed, R&D.     

Characterising and evaluating information seeking behaviour in a digital environment: Spotlight on the ‘bouncer’

The paper delineates and explains an emerging, but significant, form of digital information seeking behaviour among information consumers, which the authors have called ‘bouncing’. The evidence for this behaviour has emerged from five years of deep log analysis studies – an advanced form of transaction log analysis – of a wide range of users of digital information resources. Much of the evidence and discussion provided comes from the scholarly communication field. Two main bouncing metrics were applied in the log studies: site penetration, which is the number of items or pages viewed in a session, and return visits. The evidence shows that (1) a high proportion of people view just a few items or pages during a visit to a site and, (2) a high proportion of visitors either do not come back to the site or they did so infrequently. Typically those who penetrated a site least tended to return the least frequently. These people are termed ‘bouncers’. They bounce into the site and then bounce out again, presumably, to another site, as a high proportion of them do not appear to come back again. Possible explanations – negative and positive, for the form of behaviour are discussed.     

科技信息化建设的项目管理探讨

随着我国的经济高速发展,在信息化建设的道路上取得了明显的成效,其中科技信息化是信息化的重要组成部分,但其建设的整体水平却并不高。在实际的生活中科技工作早已有一个非常迫切的任务,那便是为广大的基层提供一个具有着开放性、便捷性、畅通性、高效性与实用性的科技信息服务平台,使资源得到充分的共享与高效的利用。     

DeLone & McLean models of information system success: Critical meta-review and research directions

Considerable research has focused on information system success (ISS) over the years largely using the models proposed by DeLone and McLean (DM) in 1992 and 2003. Several relationships found in the DM models have been sporadically supported in empirical research although the complete DM models have not been consistently applied. Studies have also interchanged relationships in the 1992 and 2003 models, tested relationships between ISS dimensions unspecified in the DM models, and examined relationships between ISS dimensions and other factors. This study presents a critical meta-review of 53 studies using DM models published between 1992 and 2019, identifies the state of ISS research, and raises several directions for research.     

Predictive models of information systems

The problem of modelling information systems is studied with focus on predictability. Predictability presupposes discovery and knowledge of empirical laws and theories, which are in the domain of information science. Discovery of such laws and theories goes hand in hand with the development of the capability to measure important variables in that domain. The state-of-the-art of predictive modelling is discussed with respect to syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic criteria, emphasizing the need for concentrated effort in further development of the empirical foundation of information science.     

Exploring payment behavior for live courses in social Q&A communities: An information foraging perspective

People are increasingly searching for information in social Q&A communities, especially through a new form of paid knowledge product, namely, live course. Such course provides a way for users to interact synchronously with content creators online. However, how this knowledge product is accepted and why users pay for it deserve attention from researchers. In this study, a research model was developed based on information foraging theory (IFT) and social information foraging (SIF) theory to analyze users’ information processing and evaluation when making payment decisions. Our research model was validated by collecting subjective and objective data from a Chinese social Q&A community that has been successful in offering live course services. We found that perceived quality of free content, perceived credibility of content creators, and perceived quantity of participants positively influence users’ willingness to pay, and thus, positively affects users’ payment behavior. Unexpectedly, social endorsement negatively moderates the relationship between willingness to pay and payment behavior. This study enhances the theoretical understanding of the drivers of users’ payment for live courses in social Q&A communities. For IS practice, our findings provide unique insights for community managers and content creators on how to operate paid knowledge products appropriately and effectively.     

An investigation of the search behaviour associated with Ingwersen’s three types of information needs

We report a naturalistic interactive information retrieval (IIR) study of 18 ordinary users in the age of 20–25 who carry out everyday-life information seeking (ELIS) on the Internet with respect to the three types of information needs identified by Ingwersen (1986): the verificative information need (VIN), the conscious topical information need (CIN), and the muddled topical information need (MIN). The searches took place in the private homes of the users in order to ensure as realistic searching as possible. Ingwersen (1996) associates a given search behaviour to each of the three types of information needs, which are analytically deduced, but not yet empirically tested. Thus the objective of the study is to investigate whether empirical data does, or does not, conform to the predictions derived from the three types of information needs. The main conclusion is that the analytically deduced information search behaviour characteristics by Ingwersen are positively corroborated for this group of test participants who search the Internet as part of ELIS.