The Evolution of User Studies

Abstract

User studies are one of the most researched areas in library and Information science. These studies form a large body of literature in the discipline. Since user studies first appeared in the late 1940s their number has constantly increased. Menzel in the first Annual Review of Information Science and Technology (1966) refers to two comprehensive bibliographies of user studies in 1964 and 1965, each containing 438 and 676 studies respectively This was just a first indication of the explosion tliat would take place a couple of decades later. This article recounts the evolution of user studies by explpring related key concepts of the field. It also discusses how research methods in other areas have influenced the work in this field. Fin lly, a literature review shows the diversity and plethora of topics explored by various studies.Ranja Siatri is research Student, Manchester Metropolitan University,

Library User Survey: Based on the Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Jaffna

“…According to Siatri (1999), user studies in library and information sciences emerged in the late 1940s and have continued to progress rapidly since then in conjunction with research developments in related fields. (1) "Historically the quality of academic libraries had been evaluated on the basis of richness of collections and the space they possess, whereas the element of quality services had been largely ignored" (2) as expressed by Nitecki. In the past few decades, quality of user services has been given greater importance, based on users' perceptions and expectations. The concept of Total Quality Management (TQM) and other Management techniques have been incorporated in evaluating service qualities in Libraries & Library Management.…”

Methods for Evaluating Interactive Information Retrieval Systems with Users

“…Interestingly, the phrase user study was originally used in information science to describe studies that investigated people's information seeking needs. Siatri [242] traced the first user studies in information science to the 1948 works by Urquhart [278] and Bernal [26] who studied the distribution and use of scientific information, and the reading habits and needs of scientists, respectively. These days user study is used more generally to describe any study that involves human participants, which really dilutes its meaning.…”

¿Teoría o metateoría? En el dominio usuario

“…En este trabajo el autor investiga los conceptos relacionados con este tipo de estudio, además de la infl uencia ejercida por los métodos de investigación procedente de otras áreas y los temas abordados en las pesquisas. Otro de los estudios realizados con este fi n es el de Siatri (1999).…”

“…A pesar de que algunos autores (Sanz,1994) le conceden al segundo decenio del siglo XX la maternidad de los estudios de usuario, otros (Siatri, 1999) se lo adjudican a la década del 40.…”

“…Sin embargo ya a fi nes de esta década empieza a estar latente la necesidad de incorporar a estos estudios dimensiones relativas al aspecto emocional y afectivo de los individuos. Dos ejemplos se mencionan a continuación (Siatri, 1999):…”