Putting information behaviour on the cognitive map: exploring information seeking behaviours of academic researchers
Creators: name: Fu, Yaming
name: Lomas, Elizabeth
name: Inskip, Charles
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2020
Subjects: Cognitive mapping
Information behaviour
LIS method

description: This session for Interaction and Engagement is aimed at exploring academic researchers’ information seeking behaviour by a visual method, cognitive mapping, which is a drawing activity to express personal thinking and reflect problem solving. In particular, this SIE is focused on how academic researchers from different cultural backgrounds will draw their information seeking behaviour on paper and whether any cultural diversity can be spotted from visual representations. The value of using cognitive mapping in information studies will be discussed as well to extend its value in further studies. <strong>Description:</strong> Purpose and Intended Audience Visual research methods have been providing unique insights into how people express themselves by visual forms. “We live in a visually structured culture” (Spencer, 2011, p. 11), and visual forms has the great potential in revealing the sense-making process and meanings culturally and socially. It is found to be a useful source in anthropology, sociology, ethnography, and social geography studies. Library and information studies (LIS) find clues about attitudes, social beliefs, conventions, context and other aspects of social life from visual representations as a complement to other forms of data (Greyson, O’Brien, &amp; Shoveller, 2017; Hicks &amp; Lloyd, 2018). It is treated as an elicitation tool that facilitates the explanation that is hardly expressed by words (Given, O’Brien, Absar, &amp; Greyson, 2013). Cognitive mapping that is derived from geography and psychology field, is a way to get visual representations of how people utilise or think about a particular resource or place (Kitchin &amp; Freundschuh, 2000). It is developed to represent personal perspectives or thinking on particular topic or objects. By drawing pictures of understanding on certain physical or digital objects, this method helps people better comprehend, deal with and describe the ‘information’ they encounter, no matter this information is a place, symbol or any form of knowledge (Graham-Cagney, 2014). In the LIS field, cognitive mapping has been adopted as a way to learn about users' information behaviour in the way they interact with the resources and services provided by physical or digital library (Asher &amp; Miller, 2013; Duke &amp; Asher, 2013; Horan, 1999; Lanclos, 2013). Usually, post discussion or interview is conducted with cognitive mapping activities to let participants explain their drawing and discuss the topic further. Thus, cognitive mapping, like other visual methods, is a way to expand and guide the further study on objects. In the past practice, its application is focused on mapping how users make use of and find their ways in the library context to provide clues for librarians to improve the library environment. However, it has not been explored to reflect the diversity of information seeking behaviour in particular with academic researchers. Academic researchers are worthy to be studied in LIS field because they are one of the main user groups of LIS facilities and they represent the professional information seekers towards academic resources. Multiple techniques have been explored to learn about their information seeking behaviour, ranging from surveys (Hemminger, Lu, Vaughan, &amp; Adams, 2007) to interviews (Ellis, Cox, &amp; Hall, 1993), with a focus on comparing social and scientific researchers’ seeking behaviour or evaluating the transition of information seeking behaviour on a specific group of researchers. These methods are valuable in evaluating information seeking behaviour in a qualitative or quantitative way; while with visual method, it can be explored from a different aspect of showing the diversity and complexity of information seeking behaviour. Context and personal characteristics are important variables in information seeking behaviour and it is a complex synthesis that is resulted from culture, social conventions and other factors (Agarwal, 2017). It is worthy to be looked at to get a better understanding of information seeking behaviour and identify any cultural diversity that lead to the different expressions. Cognitive mapping, as a visual method, has the potential to meet this goal because it is a straightforward form that is visible for all to spot any difference and is able to generate rich data in a short time(Hartel &amp; Foster, 2012). In the meantime, the contextual factors and information seeking behaviour can be reflected from the visual representations. Therefore, the purpose of this SIE session is to learn about (1) the information seeking behaviour of academic researchers (digitally or physically) from different background; (2) identify any cultural diversity of information seeking behaviour from cognitive maps; (3) discuss how cognitive mapping can be used to learn information behaviour as a research method. It also meant to engage participants to share their experience of seeking academic information to fulfill information needs under varied context and explore how cognitive mapping can be used in information studies. The organizer of this SIE will also share their project of using cognitive mapping to learn about information behaviour. <strong>Proposed activities including agenda, ramp-up (development), and follow-through </strong> PART ONE: introduction (15 minutes) In the first part of session, organizers will briefly introduce the theory of cognitive mapping as a research method. Examples from previous research will be given to show how it is used in practice in information studies. PART TWO: cognitive mapping and coding (20 minutes) In the second part, participants will draw cognitive maps about their information seeking behaviour as academic researchers individually in 6 minutes. After drawing, they will be asked to code and analyse their cognitive map by themselves. PART THREE: discussion in groups (40 minutes) Participants then break into groups in order to discuss: What they draw in their cognitive maps; (to see how they express themselves on paper) How they analyse the cognitive maps; How the cognitive mapping can be used to learn about information behaviour. PART FOUR: conclusion (15 minutes) The organizers will share their insights and experiences of using cognitive mapping to learn information behaviour. They will talk about their research, show how they gather and analyse data from cognitive mapping and what they find through this method. The potential of cognitive mapping in information studies will be summarized. <strong>Follow through </strong> We encourage our participants to post their cognitive maps online, be that on Twitter or other platforms. All the cognitive maps will be gathered either physically or digitally with the permission of participants to analyse further. A report will be generated afterwards as the result of this SIE. <strong>Relevance to the Conference/Significance to the Field </strong> The session explores cognitive mapping as a new way of learning information behaviour that is able to generate rich visual data in a short time. The visual method is extending its value in information studies as a strong supplement with other methods to enrich our understanding of how people seek for information. The varied presentation of cognitive maps also indicates the diversity of expression and has the potential to learn cognitive and cultural diversity. This interactive activity will also appeal participants to express their opinions in a creative visual form and to give them insights on information behaviour topic. <strong>Duration </strong> One 90-minute session <strong>Special Requirements </strong> A room with projector and presentation screen; some color pens with white papers that participants can draw their views. We anticipate this session would be suitable for 10-20 participants. <strong>References </strong> Agarwal, N. K. (2017). Exploring Context in Information Behavior. http://doi.org/10.2200/S00807ED1V01Y201710ICR061 Ellis, D., Cox, D., &amp; Hall, K. (1993). A comparison of the information seeking patterns of researchers in the physical and social sciences. Journal of Documentation, 49(4), 356–369. http://doi.org/10.1108/eb026919 Given, L. M., O’Brien, H., Absar, R., &amp; Greyson, D. (2013). Exploring the Complexities of Information Practices through Arts-Based Research. Proceedings of the ASIST Annual Meeting, 50(1). http://doi.org/10.1002/meet.14505001003 Graham-Cagney, A. (2014). Cognitive Mapping. In The SAGE Encyclopedia of Action Research (pp. 113–116). London, UK. http://doi.org/http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781446294406 Greyson, D., O’Brien, H., &amp; Shoveller, J. (2017). Information world mapping: A participatory arts-based elicitation method for information behavior interviews. Library and Information Science Research, 39(2), 149–157. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.lisr.2017.03.003 Hartel, J., &amp; Foster, N. F. (2012). State of the Art/Science : Visual Methods and Information Behavior Research. Proceedings of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 49(1), 1–4. Hemminger, B. M., Lu, D., Vaughan, K. T. L., &amp; Adams, S. J. (2007). Information seeking behavior of academic scientists. Journal of the American Society for Information Science &amp; Technology, 58(14), 2205–2225. Hicks, A., &amp; Lloyd, A. (2018). Seeing information: Visual methods as entry points to information practices. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 50(3), 229–238. http://doi.org/10.1177/0961000618769973 Kitchin, R. M., &amp; Freundschuh, S. (2000). Cognitive Mapping: Past, Present, and Future. London: Routledge. Spencer, S. (2011). Visual research methods in teh social sciences: awakening visions. Routledge.