Social Information Behaviour in Bookshops: Implications for Digital Libraries

Cunningham, Sally Jo; Vanderschantz, Nicholas; Timpany, Claire; Hinze, Annika; Buchanan, George

doi:10.1007/978-3-642-40501-3_9

Cited by 9 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…In the library our observations lasted two to three times longer than in the bookshop. This use of the library further supports the premise of third spaces in digital libraries discussed by Cunningham et al [13].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 81%

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Family Visits to Libraries and Bookshops: Observations and Implications for Digital Libraries

Vanderschantz

Timpany

Hinze

et al. 2014

The Emergence of Digital Libraries – Research and Practices

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Abstract. This paper explores how families select books for leisure reading. We recruited 17 families (adults and children) for this study, and spent time with each in both bookshops and public libraries. Our research aims to add to understanding of how families interact with books and bookshelves in these places, and how digital libraries might best support the shared needs of these inter-generational users. Much of our understanding of how an eBook should look and feel comes from generalizations about books and assumptions about the needs of those individuals who read them. We explore how children and adults search and browse for books together, with specific focus on the type of information seeking tasks that families undertake and on the families' shared search and browsing strategies. We further explore the implications of this study for the development of digital libraries for children and families.Keywords: participant observation, social space, collaborative information behaviour, families. IntroductionWe report here on an observational study exploring how family groups interacted with books in both library and bookshop environments. We aim for an added understanding of families' book selection strategies in these places, to provide insight into how digital libraries could be designed to support the collaborative family behaviour observed in physical environments. We conducted interviews and observations with 17 family groups who each visitied both a public library and a bookshop. Previous investigations of children's information behaviour have rarely focussed on recreational reading and family groups. Similarly, most digital libraries for children focus on supporting the needs of an individual child searching for a book on their own. We see in this present study and in an earlier study [1] that for children, the practice of searching for a book is often far more social than individual. The process of search, interaction and decision making is often completed in collaboration with, or, alongside a parent or sibling.The remainder of the paper is structured as follows: Section 2 discusses related work on children and book/ebook selection in physical and digital libraries. Section 3

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 81%

“…We noted previously that bookshops are predominantly social spaces / third places with the social uses of these spaces addressing more than just book search or book purchasing needs [13]. Our suggestions address how to incorporate this aspect of libraries and bookshops for families using digital libraries.…”

Section: Series and Recurring Charactersmentioning

confidence: 97%

Family Visits to Libraries and Bookshops: Observations and Implications for Digital Libraries

Vanderschantz

Timpany

Hinze

et al. 2014

The Emergence of Digital Libraries – Research and Practices

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…They find that enquiries often arise from cultural context-reading with others, references and reviews in media-and argue that customers' mental models may deviate from the standard bibliographic metadata. Cunningham et al [8] studied collaborative information behaviour in bookshops. They found that groups of customers use many different ways to share information about books, e.g., talking aloud, pointing, reading, and searching together, and that they use these interactions to achieve agreement on which books to select.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Looking for Books in Social Media: An Analysis of Complex Search Requests

Koolen

Bogers

Bosch

et al. 2015

Lecture Notes in Computer Science

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Abstract. Real-world information needs are generally complex, yet almost all research focuses on either relatively simple search based on queries or recommendation based on profiles. It is difficult to gain insight into complex information needs from observational studies with existing systems; potentially complex needs are obscured by the systems' limitations. In this paper we study explicit information requests in social media, focusing on the rich area of social book search. We analyse a large set of annotated book requests from the LibraryThing discussion forums. We investigate 1) the comprehensiveness of book requests on the forums, 2) what relevance aspects are expressed in real-world book search requests, and 3) how different types of search topics are related to types of users, human recommendations, and results returned by retrieval and recommender systems. We find that book search requests combine search and recommendation aspects in intricate ways that require more than only traditional search or (hybrid) recommendation approaches.

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“…The few prior studies of information behavior in bookshops demonstrate very little evidence of encountering (or exploration in general). But this is perhaps because of their focus -on enquiries made by customers [27], collaborative interactions with books [38], children's book selection process for recreational reading [39] and general reading practices [28]. Although one study had a think-aloud element [39], all were primarily based on anonymous observations, which limits capture of rationale for choosing books.…”

Section: Bookshops As Information Environmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Discovering the Unfindable: The Tension Between Findability and Discoverability in a Bookshop Designed for Serendipity

Makri

Chen

McKay

et al. 2019

Lecture Notes in Computer Science

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Serendipity is a key aspect of user experience, particularly in the context of information acquisition-where it is known as information encountering. Unexpectedly encountering interesting or useful information can spark new insights while surprising and delighting. However, digital environments have been designed primarily for goal-directed seeking over loosely-directed exploration, searching over discovering. In this paper we examine a novel physical environment-a bookshop designed primarily for serendipity-for cues as to how information encountering might be helped or hindered by digital design. Naturalistic observations and interviews revealed it was almost impossible for participants to find specific books or topics other than by accident. But all unexpectedly encountered interesting books, highlighting a tension between findability and discoverability. While some of the bookshop's design features enabled information encountering, others inhibited it. However, encountering was resilient, as it occurred despite participants finding it hard to understand the purpose of even those features that did enable it. Findings suggest the need to consider how transparent or opaque the purpose of design features should be and to balance structure and lack of it when designing digital environments for findability and discoverability.

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Social Information Behaviour in Bookshops: Implications for Digital Libraries

Cited by 9 publications

References 20 publications

Family Visits to Libraries and Bookshops: Observations and Implications for Digital Libraries

Family Visits to Libraries and Bookshops: Observations and Implications for Digital Libraries

Looking for Books in Social Media: An Analysis of Complex Search Requests

Discovering the Unfindable: The Tension Between Findability and Discoverability in a Bookshop Designed for Serendipity

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