Modeling the interplay of information seeking and information sharing : A conceptual analysis

Modeling the interplay of information seeking and information sharing A conceptual analysis Reijo Savolainen Department of Information Technology and Communication Sciences, Tampere University, Tampere, Finland Abstract Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the creation of a holistic picture of information behavior by examining the connections between information seeking and sharing. Design/methodology/approach –Conceptual analysis is used to focus on the ways in which the researchers have modeled the interplay of information seeking and sharing. The study draws on conceptual analysis of 27 key studies examining the above issue, with a focus on the scrutiny of six major models for information behavior. Findings –Researchers have employed three main approaches to model the relationships between information seeking and sharing. The indirect approach conceptualizes information seeking and sharing as discrete activities connected by an intermediating factor, for example, information need. The sequential approach assumes that information seeking precedes information sharing. From the viewpoint of the interactive approach, information seeking and sharing appear as mutually related activities shaping each other iteratively or in a cyclical manner. The interactive approach provides the most sophisticated research perspective on the relationships of information seeking and sharing and contributes to holistic understanding of human information behavior. Research limitations/implications –As the study focuses on information seeking and sharing, no attention is devoted to other activities constitutive of information behavior, for example, information use. Originality/value –The study pioneers by providing an in-depth analysis of the connections of information seeking and information sharing. Keywords Human Information Behaviour, Information sharing, Information seeking, Models for information behaviour, Conceptual analysis, Connection of information seeking and information sharing Paper type Conceptual paper Introduction Human information behavior (HIB) is a complex phenomenon constituted by activities such as information seeking, information use and information sharing (Wilson, 2000). Most HIB models developed so far focus on information seeking, while there is a paucity of frameworks conceptualizing the issues of information sharing (Wilson, 2010b). On the other hand, the conceptual growth in HIB research is hampered by the fact that researchers tend to focus on the development of separate models depicting diverse aspects of information behavior (Case and Given, 2016, pp. 141-175). Less attention has been devoted to the construction of integrative models specifying the relationships of components constitutive of HIB, for example, information seeking and sharing. The present study contributes to information behavior research by scrutinizing how HIB models developed so far have conceptualized the interplay of information seeking and sharing. Moreover, an attempt will be made to assess the strengths and weaknesses of such Aslib Journal of Information Management Vol. 71 No. 4, 2019 pp. 518-534 Emerald Publishing Limited 2050-3806 DOI 10.1108/AJIM-10-2018-0266 Received 7 November 2018 Revised 5 February 2019 22 March 2019 Accepted 9 April 2019 The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/2050-3806.htm © Reijo Savolainen. Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial & non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http:// creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode 518 AJIM 71,4 models from the perspective of the increasing significance of the networked information environments in HIB. Particularly social media platforms such as Q&A sites and online discussion forums provide new opportunities for the combination of information seeking and sharing because an individual can act in double roles as a seeker and provider of information. Therefore, one of the tasks of the present study is to reflect the extent to which the HIB models developed so far would be relevant for the conceptualization of the interplay of information seeking and sharing occurring in interactive online forums. Information seeking is a multi-faceted phenomenon that has been modeled in diverse contexts ranging from work task (WT) performance (Leckie et al., 1996) and learning (Kuhlthau, 2004) to health (McKenzie, 2003) and leisure (Hartel, 2006). The analysis of HIB models is complicated due to various terms used in studies on information seeking. For example, terms such as information acquisition and information search are often used interchangeably with information seeking. The terminology can be clarified by making use of Wilson’s (2000, pp. 49-50) nested model of information behavior. In this model, HIB is posited as an umbrella category covering all aspects of human information interactions with various forms of information. A subset is information seeking behavior, which encompasses the range of ways employed in discovering and accessing information resources (both humans and systems) in response to goals and intentions. Information searching behavior is a subset of information seeking –a micro-level behavior –referring to the purposive actions involved in interacting with an information search system, including information retrieval (IR) systems and the Word Wide Web (WWW). The present study uses the term information seeking in the above sense. For the sake of simplicity, the terms information seeking and its subset, i.e. information search will be used interchangeably. Similarly, for the sake of terminological simplification, the term information acquisition is understood as a synonym with information seeking. There is also terminological variation in studies on information sharing. The term information sharing is preferred in library and information science in particular, while researchers coming from fields such as management science, strategic management and human–computer interaction favor the term knowledge sharing (Savolainen, 2017b). The present investigation prefers the term information sharing because it is a natural counterpart of information seeking. Moreover, the HIB models examined in the present investigation conceptualize the phenomena of information seeking, not “knowledge seeking.”Information sharing is approached a set of activities by which information is provided to others, either proactively or upon request (Sonnenwald, 2006). There are two major perspectives on the study of information sharing. On the one hand, it can be understood as a one-way communication process in which information is transferred or disseminated from a sender to recipients (Haythornthwaite, 2010). On the other hand, information sharing can be conceptualized as a two-way communication process in terms of mutual information exchange occurring within small groups or online communities (Burnett, 2000; Pettigrew, 1999). In HIB research so far, information seeking and information sharing have mainly been examined as separate activities. On the other hand, there are empirical studies reviewing both information seeking and information sharing but leaving open the question about their relationships (e.g. Chatman, 1992; Fleming-May and Miller, 2010; Khoir et al., 2015; Murgatroyd and Calvert, 2013). The present study fills gaps in HIB research by conducting a conceptual analysis of the ways in which researchers have modeled the connections of information seeking and sharing. In the study of the above issues, the analysis of HIB models is particularly important because they explicate most clearly the relationships between information seeking and sharing. To give background, the paper first characterizes the nature of HIB models, followed by the specification of research questions and methodology. The findings section reviews three major 519 Information seeking and information sharing approaches to modeling the relationships of information seeking and sharing: indirect, sequential and interactive. The final sections discuss the research findings and draw conclusions of their significance to HIB research. The features of HIB models Scientific models are constructs that represent a phenomenon, covering all relatively stable and general features of the world that are interesting from a scientific point of view (Frigg and Hartmann, 2012). Models therefore simplify complex reality in order to make it understandable. Empirically validated models can be referred to as theories. However, so far, there is no consensus among researchers about the existence of genuine, empirically validated (explanatory) theories of HIB (Case and Given, 2016, pp. 183-187; Cole, 2013, pp. 14-19; Wilson, 2016). For this reason, the present study uses the term HIB model while referring to conceptualizations specifying the connections of information seeking and sharing. Wilson (2010a, p. 2392) identified two major types of scientific models relevant to HIB research. Textual models are based on the description of a set of theoretical propositions in words. For example, Ellis (1989) developed a model for information seeking by characterizing the features of diverse information activities such as starting, chaining and monitoring. Models can also be graphical in nature; in this case, diagrams or flow charts may be used to depict the relationships of concepts (e.g. Meho and Tibbo, 2003). Many models of HIB include both a textual and graphic representation so that diagrams are used to express actual or theoretical relationships, or ideal processes of interaction with information (Wilson, 2010a, p. 2393). The components of such models may include, for example, the information user, the context of information seeking and the information resources available to the user. Research questions Previous studies have reviewed the nature of diverse models for information behavior (e.g. Case and Given, 2016, pp. 141-175) or scrutinized the features of individual frameworks such as Ellis’s (1989) model for information seeking (Savolainen, 2017a). However, so far, we lack investigations examining how information seeking and information sharing are related as key activities of HIB. The present study fills gaps in HIB research by addressing the following research questions: RQ1. In which ways have researchers conceptualized the interplay of information seeking and information sharing in the models for HIB? RQ2. What are the main strengths and weaknesses of such models for the study of information seeking and sharing occurring in the networked information environments in particular? The focus of the study was strengthened by excluding investigations examining the relationships of knowledge seeking and knowledge sharing (e.g. He and Wei, 2009). This is mainly due to that the number of relevant studies preferring the above terms appeared to be low. Investigations of this type seldom reflect how knowledge seeking and knowledge sharing are related; the emphasis is placed almost exclusively on the latter activity. Moreover, models for collaborative information behavior (CIB), including collaborative information seeking (e.g. Shah, 2012) and social search (Evans and Chi, 2010; Shah, 2017) were excluded from the study. It is evident that due to space restrictions alone, the analysis of the ways in which CIB models have approached the interplay of information seeking and sharing would require a separate study. Research material and analysis To identify relevant literature, key studies reviewing the conceptualizations of information seeking and sharing were scrutinized (Case and Given, 2016, pp. 141-175; Pilerot, 2012; 520 AJIM 71,4 Wilson, 2010a; Wilson, 2010b). To substantiate the research material, four major databases were searched in autumn 2018: EBSCO Academic Search Premier, Google Scholar, Library and Information Science Abstracts and Scopus. Queries used in the searches included, for example, “information seeking AND information sharing,”“information searching AND information sharing”and “information seeking AND information exchange.”These efforts resulted in the identification of 60 items relevant to the research topic. After having excluded redundant studies mainly reviewing the findings of previous investigations, the final sample included 27 studies examining the interplay of information seeking and information sharing. The focus was placed on the scrutiny of six major models specifying the connections of information seeking and sharing: Du (2014); Krikelas (1983); McKenzie (2003); Rioux (2005); Robson and Robinson (2015) and Wilson (1981, 1999). Conceptual analysis is a method that treats the components of the study objects as classes of objects, events, properties or relationships (Furner, 2004). The analysis involves defining the meaning of a concept and its attributes by identifying and specifying the contexts in which it is classified under the concept in question. To conduct the conceptual analysis, relevant text portions (paragraphs and sentences) characterizing the main objects of the study, that is, information seeking and information sharing were identified. Second, their properties –named as constituents –were identified; constituents of this kind include, for example, work-task oriented information seeking (Du, 2014), information seeking by proxy (McKenzie, 2003), information transfer (Wilson, 1999) and sharing information encountered for others (Erdelez and Rioux, 2000). Third, it was examined how researchers have defined and described such constituents. Fourth and most importantly, the analysis was concentrated on the ways in which the relationships between diverse constituents of information seeking and sharing have been conceptualized in the above models. To this end, the diagrams and texts explaining them were scrutinized in order to identify similarities and differences between diverse conceptualizations modeling interplay of information seeking and sharing. Findings The conceptual analysis indicated that researchers have modeled the interplay of information seeking and sharing in three major ways. First, information seeking and sharing are approached as discrete activities that are connected by an intermediating factor, for example, information use. Second, the relationships of the above activities are approached in terms of a sequential connection: information seeking occurs first, followed by information sharing. Third, the relationship is approached as an interactive connection: information seeking and sharing affect mutually each other. The prefix inter means “between,”“among,”“in the midst of,”indicating something that is happening between two or more distinct things (Latham, 2014, p. 548). Therefore, the term interactive has dualistic overtones, suggesting the information seeking and sharing are separate and distinct entities on one another. The approaches are illustrated in Figure 1. Figure 1 is schematic because the nature of the connections is not specified; they are merely labeled to provide an introductory view. Moreover, for the sake of simplicity, interactive connection is depicted without devoting attention to the fact that the interactions may entail several rounds or cycles. The findings will be presented by starting with the analysis of studies characterizing the indirect connection. Consequently, this viewpoint is labeled as the indirect approach. The analysis continues by the review of the sequential approach, followed by the examination of the interactive approach. Indirect approach The indirect approach conceptualizes information seeking and sharing as discrete activities that are connected through intermediating factors such as information use and information need. 521 Information seeking and information sharing One of the earliest attempts to characterize the connections of information seeking and sharing from this perspective was made by Wilson (1981) in an article characterizing the field of user studies and the nature of information needs. To illustrate the interrelationships among concepts employed in user studies Wilson (1981, p. 4) presented a diagram. Later on, Wilson (1999) slightly modified the diagram and proposed a model of information behavior shown in Figure 2. The model suggests that a particular need leads a user to seek access to information systems such as libraries or other information sources. If information is found, it can be used and may fully or partially satisfy the perceived need, or it may fail to do so, in which case the user may look for further information. A person may also seek information from other people and this is termed in Figure 2 as information exchange. Wilson (1999, p. 251) preferred the above term in order to draw attention to reciprocity as a fundamental aspect of human interaction occurring in face-to-face information seeking. In Wilson’s model, information sharing is approached in terms of information transfer, thereby suggesting a one-way transmission of information from a user to recipients referred to as “other people.”Information thus transferred draws on the use of information sought from sources of various types. The interplay of information seeking and sharing is Information seeking Information seeking Information seeking Information sharing Information sharing Information sharing Intermediating factor, e.g. information use Indirect connection Sequential connection Interactive connection Figure 1. Approaches to the connections of information seeking and sharing Information user “Need” Satisfaction/ non-satisfaction Information use Information transfer Information-seeking behavior Information exchange Other people Demands on information systems Demands on other information sources Failure Success Source: Wilson (1999, p. 251) Figure 2. Model of information behavior 522 AJIM 71,4 characterized by adopting an indirect approach so that the category of information use is posited as an intermediating factor. Information acquired from information systems and information sources is used (interpreted) in some way. Information perceived as relevant may be used by the person himself or herself; information may also be passed (transferred) to other people. On the other hand, Wilson’s model does not provide a pure example of the indirect approach because there are elements of the sequential approach, too. This is because information sharing (depicted as information transfer) is preceded by information use. As a whole, however, the sequential viewpoint is secondary and Wilson himself does not emphasize this aspect in the explication of the model. The model for information-seeking behavior developed by Krikelas (1983) provides another example of the indirect approach. In his model, the category of need functions as an intermediating factor that triggers information seeking and sharing (see Figure 3). Krikelas (1983, p. 18) labeled information activities associated with satisfying immediate needs as information giving –a category describing “the act of disseminating messages.”In turn, activities associated with satisfying deferred needs are referred to as information gathering dealing with the “acceptance and holding of stimuli […] in storage to be called on demand. Such efforts may have a purpose (directed but not problem-specific)”(Krikelas, 1983, p. 9). Despite the above specifications, the connections of information giving, i.e. information sharing denoting one-way communication from senders to recipients, and information gathering, i.e. information seeking remain somewhat vague. Similar to Wilson’s (1999) model reviewed above, information seeking and sharing are linked by a third factor. Different from Wilson’s framework, the intermediating factors is need, either immediate or deferred. The two-pronged arrow depicted in Krikelas’s model suggests that needs of these kinds can shape each other in the context of needs-creating events or environments. Nevertheless, it remains unclear how the interaction of needs affects information seeking and sharing. They are characterized as discrete activities; as a whole, the picture of their connection remains vague. Information gathering Information giving Needs-creating event/environment Needs (deferred) Needs (immediate) Source preference Internal Memory Direct (structured) observations Direct (interpersonal) contact Recorded (literature) External Personal files Source: Krikelas (1983, p. 17) Figure 3. The model of information seeking behavior 523 Information seeking and information sharing As the above models were developed in a pre-internet era, it is evident that they are less suitable for the conceptualization of information seeking and sharing occurring in networked information environments. Krikelas (1983) emphasized the role of traditional sources of information such as memory, other people, personal files and recorded literature. Wilson’s (1999) model is more flexible in this regard because the component of “other information sources”may also incorporate information resources available in the internet. Interestingly, Wilson (1999, p. 258) echoed the future developments by stating that IR systems could become genuine tools for collaborative work. Thinking the new type interplay of information seeking and sharing in the context of collaborative work, Wilson drew attention to a pertinent issue by pointing out that “the potential for this has been made real by the development of the internet and by modern software tools that allow the ‘desk-top’to act as the interface to the internet and World Wide Web.”This perspective suggests the need to develop the models drawing on the indirect approach. However, the lack of newer models of this kind evidences that researchers have shifted their interest to conceptualizations that more tightly connect information seeking to information sharing. Sequential approach An alternative way to conceptualize the interplay of information seeking and sharing departs from the assumption that the former activity precedes the latter. One-way connection of this kind suggests that information has first to be sought or acquired before it can be shared to others. An early example of this approach is provided in Allen’s (1977) study on information sharing among engineers. According to Allen (1977), the gatekeeper takes the responsibility to look for information and forward it to colleagues in his or her team or organization. More recently, the sequential approach has been used in studies characterizing information encountering. According to Erdelez (2005, p. 180), encountering can be understood as “an instance of accidental discovery of information during an active search for some other information.”Erdelez and Rioux (2000) introduced other relevant categories for the characterization of the connection of information seeking and sharing, that is, sharing information encountered for others, and sharing information found for others on the Web. The elaboration of the above concepts resulted in the development of the model for Information Acquiring-and‐Sharing (IA&S) (Rioux, 2004, 2005). Different from the models reviewed above, Rioux (2005) did not present his framework by means of a diagram; only a textual description is provided. In general, IA&S refers to a set of combined behaviors and processes in which an individual: •cognitively stores representations of other people’s information needs; •recalls those needs when acquiring (in various contexts) information of a particular type or quality; •makes associations between the information that a person acquired and someone he or she knows who needs or wants this information; and •finally shares this information in some way. Rioux (2004) examined the nature of IA&S in virtual environments. WWW, e-mail and electronic mailing lists appeared to be the primary information sources that are acquired and subsequently shared online. Information was acquired through a mix of directed (e.g. purposeful searches), semi-directed (e.g. information encountering) and undirected processes (e.g. receiving information via e-mail from others). When users acquired a useful piece of information in an internet-based environment, they usually cut andpastedaURLintoane-mailmessageandhit the “send”button. The above characterization provides a concrete example of the sequential approach to the connection of information seeking and sharing depicted as activities performed 524 AJIM 71,4 in a certain temporal order. However, the relationship is not causal because the acquisition of information does not automatically lead to its sharing to others. Rioux (2004) found that before sharing a piece of information or a document, the user may consider, case by case, whether they would be relevant for the recipient in the current situation. The model of IA&S has similarities with the concept of information seeking by proxy proposed by McKenzie (2003). It is one of the modes constitutive of the model for information practices. This framework identifies three other modes of information practice: active seeking, active scanning and non-directed monitoring. The model depicted in Figure 4 also specifies two phases of information practices: connecting and interacting. The modes of active seeking and active scanning deal with purposeful information seeking, while non-directed monitoring and information practice by proxy are also relevant for the conceptualization of the interplay of information seeking and information sharing. McKenzie’s model suggests that the interplay occurs in two phases. During the connecting phase, a potentially useful source of information is identified and accessed, while at the phase of interacting, the main attention is placed on the utilization of the information content. In the case of non-directed monitoring, information is acquired through serendipitous encountering with information available in unexpected places. The interplay of information seeking and sharing occurs at the interacting phase when a person occasionally engaged in Individual-in-context Mode Phase Connecting Interacting Active seeking Actively seeking contact within an identified source in a specific information ground Asking a pre-planned question; active questioning strategies, e.g. list-making Active scanning Identifying a likely source; browsing in a likely information ground Identifying an opportunity to ask a question; actively observing or listening Non-directed monitoring Serendipitous encounters in unexpected places Observing or overhearing in unexpected settings, chatting with acquaintances By proxy Being identified as an information seeker; being referred to as a source through a gatekeeper Being told Information practices: may be used as counter-strategies in the face of connection of communication barriers Source: McKenzie (2003, p. 26) Figure 4. Two-dimensional model of the information practices 525 Information seeking and information sharing face-to-face discussion about a topic may present specifying questions and obtain answers from others. However, the aspect of information sharing is emphasized more strongly when information is sought by proxy. Activities constitutive of this mode occur in situations in which individuals contact with or interact with information sources through the initiative of another agent, either the information source or some other gatekeeper or intermediary. In other words, proxy connections occur when an individual other than the primary information seeker engages in active seeking or active scanning on the primary seeker’s behalf or identifies the primary seeker as an information seeker through non-directed monitoring (McKenzie, 2003, p. 30). Thus, the connection of information seeking and sharing is conceptualized from a sequential point of view so that information is sought or acquired first, followed by the sharing of such information. Information sharing results in “being told,”suggesting that information sharing is primarily conceptualized from the perspective of one-way information transfer. Drawing on similar ideas about information seeking by proxy, Veinot (2009) demonstrated that people with HIV/AIDS were sometimes “exposed”to HIV/AIDS information by others. The concept of network-mediated exposure to information was used to refer to incidents where participants did not actively seek information, but social proximity exposed them to HIV/ AIDS-related information in ways that were either human-related or document-related. Similar to McKenzie (2003), Veinot (2009) found that as a part of the network-mediated exposure interactions, there was an “agent”of the information, a person who presented information, or brought it forth; and another person, who experienced the interaction as “exposure.”This agent exposed the other person to information conversationally, or by actively or passively sharing his/her print or electronic documents. Veinot (2009) concluded that network-mediated exposure can thus be thought of as a specific type of network-mediated information acquisition and sharing, incorporating both active and explicit and less goal-oriented exchanges of “already acquired”information (Talja and Hansen, 2006, p. 114). Compared to the indirect approach, the frameworks drawing on the sequential approach enable a more detailed examination of the interplay of information seeking and sharing. The models proposed by McKenzie (2003) and Rioux (2005) emphasize the importance of face-to-face conversation as a context of such an interplay. On the other hand, as demonstrated by Rioux (2004) and Veinot (2009), the ideas of the sequential approach can also be utilized while specifying the connections of information seeking and sharing occurring in the networked information environments. Nevertheless, the sequential approach is limited because it assumes a fixed order between information seeking and sharing; the former necessarily occurs first. Moreover, as the sequential approach emphasizes the role of gatekeepers or “intermediating agents,”information sharing is primarily approached in terms of a one-way information transfer. However, this approach may be too restrictive for the needs of examining the interactions occurring between information seekers and information providers in social media forums such as online discussion groups. Interactive approach Different from the sequential approach, information seeking and sharing can be conceptualized as activities occurring in a varying temporal order: information sharing may take place before or after the information seeking process. The activities may also shape each other so that information sharing can result in a new round of information seeking which in turn may lead to sharing of additional information. The whole process may incorporate several cycles of information seeking and sharing, and this process can evolve at least some time, depending on a task at hand, interest in an issue or other triggers of information behavior. Conceptualizations of this kind are central to the interactive approach to connection of information seeking and sharing. The interactive approach has been utilized in the context of Information Journey –amodel of information behavior originally developed by Adams and Blandford (2005). Information 526 AJIM 71,4 Frigg, R. and Hartmann, S. 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(2011a), “Asking and sharing information in the blogosphere: the case of slimming blogs”,Library & Information Science Research, Vol. 33 No. 1, pp. 73-79. Savolainen, R. (2011b), “Requesting and providing information in blogs and internet discussion forums”,Journal of Documentation, Vol. 67 No. 5, pp. 863-886. Corresponding author Reijo Savolainen can be contacted at: [email protected] For instructions on how to order reprints of this article, please visit our website: www.emeraldgrouppublishing.com/licensing/reprints.htm Or contact us for further details: [email protected] 534 AJIM 71,4