info seeking through student eyes

8/8/2019 Info Seeking Through Student Eyes

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51 6 College & Research Libraries

simultaneously. Graduate students wereinvolved in longer-term research effortswith deadlines in the far future. Conse-quently, thenature of the undergraduates'tasks was less complex. Undergraduates'tasks were frequently satisfied with in-formation that was quickly available or"good enough." Graduate students typi-

cally couldn't settle for "good enough"information and had to search further anddeeper for reliable information.

Afethods Used o Accomplish TasksInterviewers recorded the methods used

by students for each information-seekinggoal and task. Students used a variety ofcreative methods to perform their tasksand accomplish their goals. Often theyemployed more than one method tocomplete a task, either due to multistepprocesses or unsatisfactory results. Aspart of the analysis, interviewers notedwhich methods were used to begin each

task. As a result, a number of dominant

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first-choice methods emerged indicatingmethod preferences.

Of the methods analyzed, 32 percentinvolved a library-provided resource orservice. Graduate students

averaged 1.90methods per task, while undergraduatesaveraged 1.78 methods per task.

Table 5 shows the top methods usedto accomplish a task in the study andthe number of times that method wasused first.

The students relied on Web-based toolssuch as Google (Search, Print, Images, orScholar),Amazon, and Wilipedia for manyof their information needs. Thirty-nineper-cent of all tasks in the study involved one ormore of these methods. Students also reliedon a valued network of colleagues that in-duded peers, other students, lab cohorts, aswell as faculty. Eighteen percent of all tasksincluded a consultation with a person in thestudent's personal network.

Table 6 highlights the most frequently

used method of each of the four top tasks.

TABLE 5

Methods Used to Accomplish TasksMethod Category Total # of Times Used

Occurrences First on a Task

Search Google 78 50

Go directly to a known URL not otherwise specified 60 38Use the library catalogto browse or search 30 17Search licensed citation databases 26 8Use course web sites 23 14Review notes/handouts takenin class/lab 17 9Search e-resources finding tool 16 11Read textbook 13 3Consult otherstudents 13 7

Consult with guest lecturer/faculty 12 8Search GoogleScholar 12 5


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Information Seeking through Students' Eyes 51 7

Task Method No. ofOccurrences

Find facts or do a quick lookup Search Google25

Search for a partially-known item Search Google 18

Search for informationon a topic Search a citation database 17

Search for a known item Search the library catalog 16

Searching Google was the most fre-quently used method for finding facts

and searching for a partially known

item. Searching the NMIT Libraries' catalogwas the most frequently used methodfor known-item searching. For findinginformation on an unknown topic, search-ing citation databases narrowly edgedout Google as the most frequently usedmethod, though searching Google was the

method most frequently used first. Uponfurther analysis, the data showed that

when Google wasused as a first method,

it was necessary 58 percent of the timeto use at least one additional method tosatisfy the requirements of the task.

Success, Efficiency, and Trusted SourcesFor each task, the study team recordedthree additional sets of metrics: 1) howsuccessful the student judged him/herself

to be at completing the task; 2) how efficientthe interviewer(s) felt the student had beenat accomplishing the task; and 3) if the stu-dent used a "trusted resource." We defined

a trusted resource as a person, source, ortool that the student had used previouslyor thathad been recommended to them by

someone they trusted.For the first metric,there were several occasions in the studyin which the student felt that s/he had beensuccessful at a task,but the interviewers didnot agree with that assessment.Arating of"efficient" did not take into account wheth-er the interviewer felt that the student hadfound an excellent source of information.In a few cases the students were successfuland efficient, but the piece of informationthey found was less than optimal. Such anoutcome is one limitationof this measure-ment. The trusted resource metric wasdeveloped once the interviewers realizedhow often students relied on particularresources or persons to the exclusion ofothers, even when they did not necessarilyhave confidence that the resource wouldyielda successful outcome.In one example

of theuse of a trusted resource, the studentused PubMed as a starting point for find-ing articles not related to medical topics,

TABLE 6Maenft Pro uentlv UITed Methods for the Ton Four Tasks

TABLE 7

Assessment of Success, Efficiency and Use of Trusted Sources inInformation-seeking Tasks

Graduate UndergraduateStudents Students

Yes Yes


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simply because she had previously hadsuccess with it when performing researchin a different subject area. We gleaned akey fact from each of the three metrics werecorded: students considered themselvesto be overwhelmingly successful; inter-

viewers found the students to be relativelyefficient; and students often chose to use atrusted resource.

Table 7 summarizes the overall resultsfor these metrics.

The success, efficiency, and trustedresource metrics were applied to the topfour task categories as demonstrated intable 8.

Overall, the graduate students weremore likely than the undergraduate stu-dents to use a trusted resource in accom-plishing their information-related tasks,though both relied heavily on trustedresources. It is possible that the differencearose because of differences in the natureof the work done by the two groups.Many graduate students work in a lab orresearch group and thus had colleagues

working on the same or similar researchareas with whom they could consult. Un-d d

had recommended them. Trust in onlineresources is built from frequent use asdocumented in a recent OCLC study,"-Word-of-mouth influences on service se-lection and trust is also a well-documentedphenomenon in the social sciences.3

For tasks like topical searching orsearching for partially known items,graduate students were, by their ownadmission, less successful and, by ouranalysis, less efficient. However, thegraduate students were consistently in-volved in more complex research wherediscovering much-needed data may bedifficult or nearly impossible. For under-graduate students searching for infor-mation on a topic, there were a notablysmaller percentage of tasks for which theyrelied on trusted resources, and yet theyremained quite efficient in their pursuits.It is possible that this result is due to theless complex nature of their inquiries ascompared to the graduate students.

With respect to products and servicesprovided by the MNT Libraries, students

mentioned a variety of resources. Thestudents frequently recalled how and

TABLE 8Top Four Task Categories And Success/Efficiency/Trusted Source Metrics

Sorted By Student StatusGraduate students Undergraduate students

Task Category Successful Efficient Used Successful Efficient UsedTrusted TrustedSource Source

Search for a known item 86% 86% 76% 84% 84% 64%

Search for information 80% 40% 90% 82% 64% 57%on a topic

Search for a partially- 62% 69% 92% 95% 75% 80%known item

Find facts or do a quick 100% 100% 86% 96% 86% 86%lookup

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Information Seeking through Students' Eyes 519

browsing physical collections, or talkingto a librarian.

Next Steps Based on Findings of MITPhoto Diary StudyHearing the students' narratives wasinstrumental in forming ideas about pri-orities and plans for improving the MITLibraries' online systems for search anddiscovery of information resources. Thefindings of the study confirmed trendsabout which we had suspicions, but thefindings also surprised us into thinkingin new ways about how students find

information sources.The study promptedthe identificationof four broad categoriesfor action:

@ Make discovery and search easierand more effective

o Incorporate trusted resources infinding tools

& Continue to put links to the MITLibraries where the users are

eImplications for otherMIT Librariesservices

Make Discovery and Search Easier andMore EffectiveWhile the students engaged in known-item searching and topical searchingin roughly equal proportions, topicalsearching was more difficult and time-consuming for students than known-itemsearching. The graduate students typi-cally sought significant detail on a topic,whereas the undergraduates looked forgeneral overviews. When confronted bythe vast array of tools available to them,the students often exhibited uncertaintyabout what to do next and frequentlyreverted to tools with which they werefamiliar instead of digging deeper to

understand how new tools could bemoreeffective. The students instinctivelyused

i f di t l il bl

1. Reduce the number of starting pointsfor discovery; allow users to search manytools at once. Because no single tool willallow for searching all library resourcesat once, the MIT Libraries are planning toreduce the number of places a user mustgo to in a search for information. Oneinterface could search the metadata andcontent that is owned by the MIT Librar-ies via a metadata aggregator tool, suchas those offered commercially by Endecaor Siderean, to combine the catalog, theinstitutional repository, the MIT Libraries'Web pages, a visual images database,etc.

The second interface could be a carefuldeployment of a federated search tool toallow for search of a limited number oflicensed resources by broadcast searchmethods.

2. Provide more guidance in the selectionoftools to use or discovery.The MIT Librar-ies' current e-resources finding tool, Vera(http://libraries.mit.edu/vera) provides

onlya subject-categorized, alphabetical

list of resources with descriptions. Inthe study, the students found this levelof information about the resources in-adequate for making informed decisionsabout whichdatabases to try, so they oftendidn't try any of them and relied on toolswith which they were familiar (such asPubMed for finding article citations notmedically related). With the implementa-tion of a federated search tool,more cluesto aid in evaluating resources will becrucial. Pregrouping of core resources forcross-databasesearching is one expectedadvance in this area.

3. Provide user-friendly access to meta-data n results setsfor urther searchstrategyrefinement and discovery. Students in thestudy favored tools that provided smart

links to related information and nar-rowing categories. There is extensivemetadata that is hidden away in full


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Incorporate Trusted Resources in FindingToolsA surprising finding of the study wasthe extent to which the students reliedon the opinions of others when choosingtools and information to use. Whetherthey sought input from others, either inperson or online, the students used others'opinions to make decisions about whatresources to use. The team knew thatstudents relied on familiar tools, but thepervasiveness of this preference movedthis issue to the forefront of our thinkingin a way that it hadn't been before. It isimportant for libraries to incorporatethis essential social phenomenon intoour tools and systems. Incorporation oftrusted resource data into library toolsmay happen in several ways:

1. Add links within library ools.Studentswould find tools useful that createdlinks among library resources such asthe online catalog, citation databases,

and trusted nonlibrary sources such asAmazon, book review sites, and GooglePrint. By including these links, theMITLibraries can facilitate students' easy andefficient movement into and out of libraryresources, greatly reducing the duplicatesearches they must perform now to getfrom one resource to another.

2. hicorporate ocialnetworking, ezoiewing,and shnilar user input capabilities nto librarytools. Several students wished they couldhave access to the opinions of their peersand faculty about which resources aregood to use. User tagging of resources andallowing for local review and commentingabout resources within the MvIT Librarieswould be of value in the education of MITstudents. Student feedback indicated thatit would not be necessary to have a par-

ticular faculty or student name attachedto a comment, knowing their role would

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understand how important a resourceis within the topic searched. The utilityof the results would be increased in a

tool such as a metadata aggregator, if itwere possible to offer sorting of resultsbased on use, or to incorporate use datainto relevancy/ranking algorithms. Usedata to be incorporated could includecirculation data for items in the catalog,journal use data from electronic resourcemanagement tools or publishers, anddownload metrics from other local digitaltools. Circulation data could also powera "people who borrowed this book alsoborrowed..." feature that would helpexpose the "long tail"1 of resources thatis a particular strength of libraries.

4. Incorporate relevancy rankings intoresults lists of library tools. Students inthe study expected results to be rankedby relevancy in general, and they alsoexpected the relevancy algorithms to beexcellent at identifying the most appropri-

ate resources first. Based on these results,the MIT Libraries will have relevancy-ranked results in the tools we implementin the future.

Continue to Put Links to the A1IT LibrariesWhere the Users areWhile students began only 23 percentof all tasks in the study by using libraryresources, they ended up consulting a re-source from the MIT Libraries in about 36percent of their tasks. Since students often

started their information seeking outsidethe MIT Libraries' Web space, it wouldmake sense to continue to find ways toembed links, tools, and MIT Libraries'metadata into widely popular Web sites,search engines, and databases to lead ourcommunity back to resources available

to them in the MIIT Libraries. There are avariety of ways to continue this work:


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Information Seeking through Students' Eyes 521

2. Take advantage of browser extensionsand toolbars that enable integration of librarylinks on sites often used by students. Forexample, Firefox plug-ins enable direct

links from a title on Amazon to a titlein

our catalog. Extensions like these make it

possible to incorporate and integrate our

services and links without needing thecooperation of the outside Web site. Theseare becoming more popular as users in the

outside world are finding useful ways tolink libraries, bookstores, and other Websites and services. For example, the MNT

Libraries now offer the LibX toolbar anda Greasemonkey script that automateslookup in the MIT Libraries catalog.

3. Support the development of tools likebrowser extensions and toolbars within theMIT community. In a technology-orientedstudent community like MIT, we need toinvite our students to modify and improvelibrary tools. In the study, we learned thata small but significant number of students

were interested in manipulating librarydata themselves, and many knew a fel-low student who they believed wouldbe interested in doing this. It would takeonly a few students contributing theirown ideas to begin to create novel and

productive tools. The MIT Libraries havebegun to welcome such contributions by

creating an "MIT Libraries Betas" page(http://libraries.mit.edu/betas/) where weare placing tools that aren't quite readyfor full-production mode or those thathave been contributed by others. The firststudent-contributed beta was a course-picking application written by computer

science students and based on MIT Li-braries' "Simile" research into integratingheterogeneous metadata. The betas site

has been highlighted periodically on the

MIT Libraries' homepage.4. Migrate traditional ibrary inding ools,

within them. We would like our platformsto enable easy sharing of data with otherapplications by third parties who see newuses for it. For instance, if all MIT Librar-ies' metadata for owned content contained

within existing systems were available ina metadata aggregator tool that had Webservices enabled, we could allow others tocreate applications using that data.

Implications or Other MIT LibrariesServicesWhile the photo diary study provided a

significant amount of information to sup-

port decision-making for the evolutionof online tools, it inevitably also offereddirect support for other types of actionsand services that would enhance the in-formation-seeking experiences of the MITstudents. As in the case of the Rochesterstudy, these insights were an unexpectedbenefit of the qualitative method we hadused, and the study team agreed that it

was important to share these findingswithin the library system. Most notably:1. Raise awareness: The Photo Diary

Study echoed the results from the 2005MIT Libraries Survey in that it showedthat students are often unaware of the vastarray of relevant and helpful informationand tools available to them from the MIT

Libraries.2. Reduce barriers to services: Because

ease and speed of access are highly val-ued by MIT students, we recommended a

review of services to identify and addressthe barriers students experience in theiruse of libraries services.

3. Focus on custoiner ervice:MIT studentsprefer to discover things on their own andnot to ask for help, except from trustedpeers. It is critical that every interaction

with the MIT Libraries be positive in orderto overcome this barrier as well as to allowh MIT Lib i b t of th


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efforts should be directed to assisting cur-rent graduate students with getting up tospeed, as well as preparing undergradu-ates for future academic careers.

5. Assist with personal iqformation man-agement: The number of tasks and theamount of time the graduate studentsdevoted to information managementwere significant. Continued promotionand instruction on bibliographic manage-ment tools like Endnote, RefWorks, andZotero will help students increase theirproductivity and provide an opportunityfor the MIT Libraries to partner with thestudents in additional ways.

ConclusionSince the completion of the Photo DiaryStudy, the MIT Libraries have moved for-ward on several of the recommendationsoutlined here. Project SimpLR (http://lib-staff.mit.edu/simpl) has charged two taskforces: one to implement a metasearch tool

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and the other to investigate acquiring orbuilding a metadata aggregator tool, suchas WorldCat Local. The MIT Libraries'Betas page was implemented in the sum-

mer of 2006.The MIT Libraries are one institutionamong many that are working to rapidlydevelop systems-based solutions that willradically improve information discoveryfor their users. From North CarolinaState's innovative catalog interface usingEndeca software, to University of Roches-ter's eXtensible catalog effort, and manyothers, big changes are underway. TheMIT Libraries hope both to contribute tothis progress and to take advantage ofinnovations begun by others. We believestrongly that by staying focused on theneeds and information-seeking practicesof our students, we -will be able to createa sustained level of improvement in oursystems that will contribute to their ulti-mate success in their academic lives.

Notes

1. Anna M. Van Scoyoc and Caroline Cason, "The ElectronicAcademicLibrary: Undergradu-ate Research Behavior in a Library without Books," portal:Librariesand theiAcadeiy6 (2006):47-59;Lesley M.Moyo, "ElectronicLibraries and the Emergence of New ServiceParadigms," ElectronicLibraq!22 (2004): 220-30.

2. Van Scoyoc and Cason, "The Electronic Academic Library"; Christen Thompson,"In-formation Illiterate or Lazy: How College Students Use the Web for Research," portal: Librariesand the Academy 3 (2003): 259-68; Joan K. Lippincott, "Next Generation Students and Libraries,"EDUCAUSEReview (2005), available online at http:/flibrary.case.edulksl/admin/slc/workingdocu-ments/net__generation_students.pdf[Accessed 30 October 2007].

3. StudyingStudents: The Undergraduate esearch Projectat the UniversityofRochester,ed. NancyFried Foster and Susan Gibbons (Chicago: Association of College and Research Libraries,2007);Lippincott, "Next Generation Students and Libraries."

4. Van Scoyoc and Cason, "The Electronic Academic Library"; Moyo, "Electronic Librariesand the Emergence of New Service Paradigms."

5. Foster and Gibbons, StudyingStudents.6. Van Scoyoc and Cason, "The Electronic Academic Library"; Foster and Gibbons, Stud4ing

Students; Thompson, "Information Illiterate or Lazy."7. Marilee Jones, "New Kids on the Block: Observations on the Newest Generation of MIT

Students," MIT FacultyNeusletter14 (2001): 12-15.8. Institutional Research, Office of the Provost, MIUE CSEQReport.C. RobertPace and George

D. Kuh, CollegeStudent ExperiencesQuestionnaireResearch Programn (Indiana University Center forPostsecondary Research and Planning 5th ed 2001)


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TITLE: Information Seeking through Students Eyes: The MITPhoto Diary Study

SOURCE: Coll Res Libr 69 no6 N 2008

The magazine publisher is the copyright holder of this article and itis reproduced with permission. Further reproduction of this article inviolation of the copyright is prohibited. To contact he publisher:http://www.ala.org/

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