CITATION AND COPYRIGHT INFORMATION:
Cite as: Cheuk, W-Y, B. (1999). A qualitative study in information seeking and use in the professional workplace context: Using the Sense-Making approach. Doctoral dissertation, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Advisor, Schubert Foo.
© Wai-Yi Bonnie Cheuk (1999).
An electronic copy of this work can be obtained by contacting the author at the email address above.

ADVISOR:
Schubert Foo

ABSTRACT:
Although many researchers agree to the importance of adopting a “situational” approach to study information seeking and use, what they mean by “situational” differs. Most user studies define “workplace domain” as a “situation,” and expect to find constancies of information needs, information seeking and use behaviors for people belonging to the same workplace domain across time. This study aims to adopt an alternative “situational” perspective, by studying individual’s information seeking and use behaviors as embedded in time, and examine how these behaviors change as situations change.

The research addresses the research question: What information seeking and use behaviors do professionals at work exhibit at different time-space moments, and why do they behave in such ways?

Dervin’s Sense-Making Approach was chosen to guide this study. It is a user-centered approach that directs the researcher to pay attention to real-life information seeking and use experience as defined in the respondents’ own terms as embedded in time.

The respondents in the research included auditors, engineers and architects working in Singapore who altogether provided 626 instances that they had to seek and use information at work. The data were collected from personal interviews utilizing the Sense-Making’s micro-moment time-line interviewing technique. Based on the respondents’ answers, ten “information seeking situation” types were identified, namely Task Initiating, Focus Forming, Ideas Assuming, Ideas Rejecting, Ideas Confirming, Ideas Finalizing, Ideas Sharing, Approval Granting, Design Generating, and Approval Seeking Situations. Respondents from the three professional groups reported seven common “information seeking situation” types. These ten “information seeking situation” types explain why professionals have different needs for information at different times.

The second part of the study examines professionals’ information seeking and use behaviors in terms of the number and types of information sources and strategies they employed under different “information seeking situation” types. The findings show that each professional group exhibits distinctive information seeking and use behaviors in general (i.e., on average across time). An interesting finding, which is different from previous research, is that professionals (even belonging to the same workplace) exhibit different information seeking at different times. An even more interesting outcome is that regardless of the workplace contexts, there are similarities in professionals’ information seeking and use behaviors when they see themselves in the same “information seeking situation” type.

It is suggested that these findings have an implication for information seeking and use theory, information systems design, provision of library services and information literacy education.

OTHER MATERIALS BY THIS AUTHOR ON THIS WEBSITE:
See: http://communication.sbs.ohio-state.edu/sense-making/AAauthors/authorlistcheuk.html