Preface

This book brings together chapters that present a range of new directions intheories, models and ideas related to information behaviour. The aim of thebook has been to draw out and examine new directions in informationbehaviour research. Information behaviour is conceptualized as complexhuman information-related processes that are embedded within anindividual’s everyday social and life processes with evolutionary anddevelopmental foundations. Information behaviour is an important partof the human condition and critical to the development of new approachesto the design of Web and information retrieval (IR) systems. Informationbehaviour studies are growing as an interdisciplinary area of research thatincludes studies from information science, social and evolutionarypsychology and other behavioural disciplines.

This book provides some cutting-edge interdisciplinary theories, modelsand directions in information behaviour research. The book does not providea history of the field of information behaviour, but includes papers thatrepresent potentially significant and new research into many aspects ofinformation behaviour. Emerging frameworks, models and theories areproviding a more complex view of information behaviour that includesevolutionary and developmental foundations, meta-synthesis, individual andcontextual dimensions, information interaction, impact of information andlongitudinal process models. In particular, the book is diverse in nature andincludes chapters by well-established and also early career researchers.

We focused on collecting papers that broaden and deepen the framework forour understanding of information behaviour. Some chapters seek to challengethe established views and paradigms of information behaviour research. Theeditors invited authors to contribute chapters that represented emergingresearch directions and ideas, in an effort to build a framework that extendsbeyond existing models and research, and provide new directions for furtherresearch. The editors and chapter authors are drawn from the internationalboundaries of information behaviour research, and this international spreadcontributed greatly to the interdisciplinary nature of the chapters.

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In addition, the book represents a major intellectual endeavour for theeditors. The first editor (Spink) is an information scientist who has workedwith, taught and researched various dimensions of information behavioursince 1990. The second editor (Heinstrom) is an information scientist whohas worked with, taught and researched in various areas of informationbehaviour research for 10 years. The editors have produced significantinformation behaviour research, including empirical and theoretical studies,journal and conference papers and special journal issues.

The book is organized into 12 chapters within 5 sections.Section I provides a brief introduction to the interdisciplinary field of

information behaviour.Section II includes two chapters that provide an overview of the research

history of information behaviour within the field of information science.The three chapters in Section III discuss some of the key cognitive and

personality dimensions for understanding information behaviour.Section IV includes three chapters that highlight the contextual aspects of

information behaviour.The two chapters in Section V discuss some new emerging directions in

the development of an information behaviour framework.The final chapter of the book provides an initial integrated framework

and an overview of the key trends, theories and models emerging in the field.Each section contains one or more chapters relating to the broader area

of the section. Although each chapter is unique and comprehensive withinits particular framework, and with its own reference list, the chapters arecross-referenced where appropriate to illustrate how the different topicsmesh together to form a broader expanse of information behaviour.

This book is intended as a resource for information behaviour researchers,educators and practitioners. Researchers and students in the fields ofinformation science, social psychology, evolutionary psychology, computerscience, cognitive science and related disciplines and scholars investigatinginformation behaviour will find the chapters presented here as a valuablesource of new ideas. This book is also an appropriate textbook forundergraduate, graduate and doctoral level courses in information behaviourand information science. Librarians, information professionals and otherswill find this book useful for research into information behaviour. In addition,anyone who is interested in understanding their own information behaviourwill find this book a valuable and interesting read.

We greatly thank the chapter authors for their stimulating and ground-breaking contributions. Some chapters represent the work of collaborationsbetween researchers and their students.

Amanda SpinkJannica Heinstrom