3) Artifact name: LI802: Barriers to Usability for Public library patrons: An information-seeking model to improve library patrons' information

seeking experience [Group Project: Heather Elliott, Parker Nystrom, and Karen Semprevivo] Type: Manuscript (Power Point Presentation] MLS Outcome: P.O. 1, P.O. 4, P.O. 5 MLS Values: P.V. 1, P. V. 2, P.V. 3 Reflective The purpose of the LI802 course, as the Fall 2011 syllabus is to offer:
An approach to diagnosis and customization of information services that seeks to apply cognitive and psychological theories. Understanding individual personality, learning styles, communication styles, and characteristics of human information use will serve as a framework for the subsequent creation and development of individualized, user-centered services (Syllabus, LI802, Fall Semester 2011, Rob Gibson).

I learned about several different theories and models of innformation seeking and that certain barriers exist to information seeking. I wondered why no one has yet been able to perfect searching and found this was due to individual, innate differences about how human beings perceive reality. It was interesting to read articles on varied topics, from authors who often had quite different views on just how users seek information. Some provided recommendations on how to improve the users information seeking, with focus on creating user-based systems and providing the best customer service to library patrons. Among the topics I learned, aside from numerous articles, were my first glimpse (and not the last!) about Library of Congress subject headings, Myers-Briggs tests to see our own and our classmates personality types, and Kuhlthaus (2004) information search process. . I enjoyed reading Dervins (1976) and Kuhlthaus (2004) constructivist theories of information behavior, as well as how these theories came from the educational and psychology fields about how human beings seek information and turn it into knowledge. In addition to these information seeking models, I was introduced to how the barriers of strictlybibliographic systems can hinder or prevent information seeking. One of my favorite information-seeking models was from Marcia Bates (1999), who presented her berry picking model, which describes how she viewed information seeking. In fact, our team chose berry picking for our model to adapt for our project.

I learned that Bates (1989) demonstrated the way she saw how users searched, found something, and continued to find other items. According to Bates (1989):
We need first to have a realistic view of how people go about looking for information now, and second, to find ways to devise databases and search interfaces that enable searches to operate in ways that feel natural (Bates, 1989, pp. 13-14)

There are clusters of information, similar to the arrangement of berries on a berry bush, which a user would pick, (information hit), then continue picking on the same bush, or go on to an adjacent bush loaded with more berries Figure 1: Adapted from The Design of Browsing and Berrypicking, 1989. (information hits). I liked the way Bates drew her model (see left): it shows quite clearly a meandering pattern of searching and getting information hits (she called them e-hits) and how she would organize information to make the searches successful for a user. The artifact is the Power Point presentation of our Adaptive Catalog of Electronic Resources (ACER) was our teams effort to accelerate the Bates berry picking process by buildin g in systemic ways to get faster hits by making the system adapt to how the user searches and be responsive to those searches, allowing subsequent searches faster, yet fruitful. We not only presented Bates (1989) and ACER to the class, but also invited several willing students to search using ACER a number of times. Parker Nystrom collected these data, then presented the results in at the end of the class. While our test subjects believed ACER was not helping them search faster, the statistics from their searches revealed that each of their subsequent searches were faster than the previous ones, which shows that ACER was adaptive, making their searches faster, if not visually easier.

This artifact provides evidence that I can diagnosis information user needs and style and provide customized services. References American Psychological Association. (2009). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (6th ed.). Washington, D.C.: Author. Bates, M. J. (1989). The Design of Browsing and Berrypicking Techniques for the Online Search Interface, p. 4. University of California. Los Angeles: California. Case, D. O. (2007). Looking for information: A Survey of research on information seeking, needs and behavior. 2nd Ed. Elsevier, Amsterdam Dervin, Brenda. (1976).Strategies for Dealing with Human Information Needs: Information or Communication? Gibson, R. (2011). Son1Course Syllabus - LI 802XO Theoretical Foundations of Service Diagnosis & Customization. Emporia Kansas: Emporia State University SLIM Program. Kuhlthau, C. C. (2004). Seeking meaning: A process approach to library and information services. Westport, CT: Libraries Unlimited. Figures Figure 2: Adapted from The Design of Browsing and Berrypicking