PurposeTo date, few studies have been undertaken to make explicit how microblogging technologies are used by and can benefit scholars. This paper investigates the use of Twitter by an academic community, and poses the following questions: does the use of a Twitter enabled backchannel enhance the conference experience, collaboration and the co-construction of knowledge? How is microblogging used within an academic conference setting, and can we articulate the benefits it may bring to a discipline? Prominent Tweeters were identified and a small qualitative survey was undertaken to ascertain individuals' attitudes towards a Twitter enabled backchannel. Findings Draft for comment2 Conference hashtagged Twitter activity does not constitute a single distributed conversation but, rather multiple monologues with a few intermittent, discontinuous, loosely joined dialogues between users. The digital backchannel constitutes a multidirectional complex space in which the users make notes, share resources, hold discussions and ask questions as well as establishing a clear individual online presence. The use of Twitter as a platform for conference backchannels enables the community to expand communication and participation of events amongst its members. The analysis revealed the close knit nature of the DH researcher community, which may be somewhat intimidating for those new to the field or conference. Practical implicationsThis study has indicated that, given Twitter is becoming increasingly important for academic communities, new, dedicated methodologies for the analysis and understanding of Tweet based corpora are necessary. Routinely used textual analysis tools cannot be applied to corpora of tweets in a straightforward manner, due to the creative and fragmentary nature of language used within microblogging. In this paper, a method has been suggesting to categorize tweets using open coded analysis to facilitate understanding of tweet based corpora, which could be adopted by other studies. Originality/valueThis paper is the first exhaustive study that we are aware of concentrating on how microblogging technologies such as twitter are used by and can benefit scholars. This data set provides both a valuable insight into the prevalence of a variety of Twitter practices within the constraints of a conference setting, and highlights the need for methodologies to be developed to analyse social media streams such as twitter feeds. It also provides a comprehensive bibliography of other research into microblogging.

The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that:• a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in DRO • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders.Please consult the full DRO policy for further details. What people study when they study Twitter Classifying Twitter related academic papers Structured Abstract PurposeSince its introduction in 2006, messages posted to the microblogging system Twitter have provided a rich dataset for researchers, leading to the publication of over a thousand academic papers. This paper aims to identify this published work and to classify it in order to understand Twitter based research. Design/methodology/approachFirstly the papers on Twitter were identified. Secondly, following a review of the literature, a classification of the dimensions of microblogging research was established. Thirdly, papers were qualitatively classified using open coded content analysis, based on the paper's title and abstract, in order to analyze method, subject, and approach. FindingsThe majority of published work relating to Twitter concentrates on aspects of the messages sent and details of the users. A variety of methodological approaches are used across a range of identified domains. Research LimitationsThis work reviewed the abstracts of all papers available via database search on the term "Twitter" and this has two major implications: 1) the full papers are not considered and so works may be misclassified if their abstract is not clear, 2) publications not indexed by the databases, such as book chapters, are not included. The study is focussed on microblogging, the applicability of the approach to other media is not considered. Originality/valueTo date there has not been an overarching study to look at the methods and purpose of those using Twitter as a research subject. Our major contribution is to scope out papers published on Twitter until the close of 2011. The classification derived here will provide a framework within which researchers studying Twitter related topics will be able to position and ground their work.

Architectural design projects are heavily reliant on electronic information seeking. However, there have been few studies on how architects look for and use information on the Web. We examined the electronic information behavior of 9 postgraduate architectural design and urban design students. We observed them undertake a selfchosen, naturalistic information task related to one of their design projects and found that although the architectural students performed many similar interactive information behaviors to academics and practitioners in other disciplines, they also performed behaviors reflective of the nature of their domain. The included exploring and encountering information (in addition to searching and browsing for it) and visualizing/appropriating information.The observations also highlighted the importance of information use behaviors (such as editing and recording) and communication behaviors (such as sharing and distributing) as well as the importance of multimedia materials, particularly images, for architectural design projects. A key overarching theme was that inspiration was found to be both an important driver for and potential outcome of information work in the architecture domain, suggesting the need to design electronic information tools for architects that encourage and foster creativity. We make suggestions for the design of such tools based on our findings. IntroductionInformation is of great importance when planning, designing and reviewing the construction of buildings or other structures. Indeed, Shaaban et al. (2001) highlight that "information is a critical element for architects to accomplish their tasks" (p. 43), with the architect's role being "to Received December 14, 2009; revised February 16, 2010; accepted February 16, 2010 © 2010 ASIS&T • Published online 19 July 2010 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com). DOI: 10.1002/asi.21338 manipulate this information to reproduce it in a meaningful form, which are often described as designs" (p. 43). Despite the importance of information for architectural design, there has been relatively little research on how architects look for, interpret, and use information in the context of their design projects. There has been even less research aimed at supporting architects in conducting their information-related activities (whether by informing the design of electronic tools to support this work or through the design and delivery of information-related training).As a step towards addressing these gaps in research, we conducted naturalistic observations of nine postgraduate architectural design and urban design master of architecture (MArch) students-observing the students undertake a self-chosen, naturalistic information task that was related to one of their current or recent design projects. The aim of these observations was to gain a detailed understanding of the information behavior displayed by the architectural students, encompassing how they not only find information but also interpret and use this information as part o...

A user's understanding of the libraries they work in, andhence of what they can do in those libraries, is encapsulated in their "mental models" of those libraries. In this article, we present a focused case study of users' mental models of traditional and digital libraries based on observations and interviews with eight participants. It was found that a poor understanding of access restrictions led to risk-averse behavior, whereas a poor understanding of search algorithms and relevance ranking resulted in trial-and-error behavior. This highlights the importance of rich feedback in helping users to construct useful mental models. Although the use of concrete analogies for digital libraries was not widespread, participants used their knowledge of Internet search engines to infer how searching might work in digital libraries. Indeed, most participants did not clearly distinguish between different kinds of digital resource, viewing the electronic library catalogue, abstracting services, digital libraries, and Internet search engines as variants on a theme.

Use policyThe full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-pro t purposes provided that:• a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in DRO • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders.Please consult the full DRO policy for further details. AbstractThis paper reports on a longitudinal study of information seeking by undergraduate Information Management students. It describes how they found and used information, and explores their motivation and decision making. We employed a use-in-context approach where students were observed conducting, and interviewed about, information seeking tasks carried out during their academic work.We found that participants were reluctant to engage with a complex range of information sources, preferring to use the internet. The main driver for progress in information seeking was the immediate demands of their work (e.g. assignments). Students used their growing expertise to justify a conservative information strategy, retaining established strategies as far as possible and completing tasks with minimum information seeking effort. The time cost of using library material limited the uptake of such resources. New methods for discovering and selecting information were only adopted when immediately relevant to the task at hand, and tasks are generally chosen or interpreted in ways that minimised the need to develop new strategies. Students were driven by the demands of the task to use different types of information resources, but remained reluctant to move beyond keyword searches, even when they proved ineffective. They also lacked confidence in evaluating the relative usefulness of resources.Whereas existing literature on satisficing has focused on stopping conditions, this work has highlighted a richer 2 repertoire of satisficing behaviours.

This paper investigates the information seeking of humanities academics and scholars using digital libraries. It furthers existing work by updating our knowledge of the information seeking techniques used by humanities scholars, where the current work predates the wide availability of the Internet. We also report some of the patterns observed in query and term usage by humanities scholars, and relate this to the patterns they report in their own information seeking and the problems that they encounter. This insight is used to reveal the current gap between the skills of information seekers and the technologies that they use. Searches for 'discipline terms' prove to be particularly problematic.

There are now many online, digital resources in the humanities, and their creation is funded by various governmental, academic, and philanthropic sources. What happens to these resources after completion is very poorly understood. No systematic survey of digital resource usage in the humanities has ever been undertaken -and the factors for use and non-use of digital resources are unknown. The LAIRAH (Log Analysis of Internet Resources in the Arts and Humanities) 1 Project is a 15 month long study into the factors which determine long term use and neglect of digital resources in the arts and humanities. Using quantitative Deep Log Analysis techniques to understand real time user behaviour, and qualitative user workshops to gain an understanding of user approaches to digital resources in the arts and humanities, the study identifies factors which may predispose a digital resource to become used or neglected in the long term.This paper provides an overview of the techniques used in the LAIRAH project, and presents some preliminary results which may be of use to both the creators of digital resources in the humanities, and the funders of these projects, to ensure that significant intellectual effort and time, and financial resources, are not wasted in the creation of projects which are then neglected by the user community.

Publisher's copyright statement: NOTICE: this is the author's version of a work that was accepted for publication in Information Processing and Management. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A denitive version was subsequently published in Information Processing and Management, 44, 3, 2008, 10.1016/j.ipm.2007.09.001. Additional information:Use policyThe full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that:• a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in DRO • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders.Please consult the full DRO policy for further details. AbstractTraditionally humanities scholars have worked in physical environments and with physical artefacts. Libraries are familiar places, built on cultural traditions over thousands of years, and books are comfortable research companions. Digital tools are a more recent addition to the resources available to a researcher. This paper explores both the physical and the digital qualities of modern Humanities research, drawing on existing literature and presenting a study of Humanities scholars' perceptions of the research resources they use. We highlight aspects of the physical and digital that can facilitate or hinder the researcher, focusing on three themes that emerge from the data: the working environment; the experience of finding resources; and the experience of working with documents. Rather than aiming to replace physical texts and libraries by digital surrogates, providers need to recognise the complementary roles they play: digital information environments have the potential to provide improved access and analysis features and the facility to exploit the library from any place, while the physical library and resources provide greater authenticity, trustworthiness and the demand to be in a particular place with important material properties.