In the interdisciplinary fields of sociology, social ontology, and communication theory, social constructionism serves as a theoretical framework that suggests various facets of social reality—such as concepts, beliefs, norms, and values—are formed through continuous interactions and negotiations among society's members, instead of the pure objective observation of physical reality. The theory of social constructionism posits that much of what individuals perceive as 'reality' is actually the outcome of a dynamic process of construction influenced by social conventions and structures.
In information science and information retrieval, relevance denotes how well a retrieved document or set of documents meets the information need of the user. Relevance may include concerns such as timeliness, authority or novelty of the result.
Relevance is the concept of one topic being connected to another topic in a way that makes it useful to consider the second topic when considering the first. The concept of relevance is studied in many different fields, including cognitive sciences, logic, and library and information science. Most fundamentally, however, it is studied in epistemology. Different theories of knowledge have different implications for what is considered relevant and these fundamental views have implications for all other fields as well.
Actor–network theory (ANT) is a theoretical and methodological approach to social theory where everything in the social and natural worlds exists in constantly shifting networks of relationships. It posits that nothing exists outside those relationships. All the factors involved in a social situation are on the same level, and thus there are no external social forces beyond what and how the network participants interact at present. Thus, objects, ideas, processes, and any other relevant factors are seen as just as important in creating social situations as humans.
The uncertainty reduction theory, also known as initial interaction theory, developed in 1975 by Charles Berger and Richard Calabrese, is a communication theory from the post-positivist tradition. It is one of the few communication theories that specifically looks into the initial interaction between people prior to the actual communication process. Uncertainty reduction theory originators main goal when constructing it was to explain how communication is used to reduce uncertainty between strangers during a first interaction. Uncertainty reduction theory claims that everyone activates two processes in order to reduce uncertainty. The first being a proactive process, which focuses on what someone might do. The second being a retroactive process, which focuses on how people understand what another does or says. This theory's main claim is that people must receive information about another party in order to reduce their uncertainty and, that people want to do so. While uncertainty reduction theory claims that communication will lead to reduced uncertainty, it is important to note that this is not always the case. Dr. Dale E. Brashers of the University of Illinois argues that in some scenarios, more communication may lead to greater uncertainty.
Information processing theory is the approach to the study of cognitive development evolved out of the American experimental tradition in psychology. Developmental psychologists who adopt the information processing perspective account for mental development in terms of maturational changes in basic components of a child's mind. The theory is based on the idea that humans process the information they receive, rather than merely responding to stimuli. This perspective uses an analogy to consider how the mind works like a computer. In this way, the mind functions like a biological computer responsible for analyzing information from the environment. According to the standard information-processing model for mental development, the mind's machinery includes attention mechanisms for bringing information in, working memory for actively manipulating information, and long-term memory for passively holding information so that it can be used in the future. This theory addresses how as children grow, their brains likewise mature, leading to advances in their ability to process and respond to the information they received through their senses. The theory emphasizes a continuous pattern of development, in contrast with cognitive-developmental theorists such as Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development that thought development occurs in stages at a time.
A metatheory or meta-theory is a theory the subject matter of which is theory itself, for example as an analysis or description of existing theory. For mathematics and mathematical logic, a metatheory is a mathematical theory about another mathematical theory. Meta-theoretical investigations are part of the philosophy of science. The topic of metascience is an attempt to use scientific knowledge to improve the practice of science itself.
Exploratory search is a specialization of information exploration which represents the activities carried out by searchers who are:
Marcia J. Bates is Professor VI Emerita of Information Studies in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies, University of California, Los Angeles.
Information seeking is the process or activity of attempting to obtain information in both human and technological contexts. Information seeking is related to, but different from, information retrieval (IR).
The sociology of human consciousness or the sociology of consciousness uses the theories and methodology of sociology to explore and examine consciousness.
The Human–Computer Interaction Lab (HCIL) at the University of Maryland, College Park is an academic research center specializing in the field of human-computer interaction (HCI). Founded in 1983 by Ben Shneiderman, it is one of the oldest HCI labs of its kind. The HCIL conducts research on the design, implementation, and evaluation of computer interface technologies. Additional research focuses on the development of user interfaces and design methods. Primary activities of the HCIL include collaborative research, publication and the sponsorship of open houses, workshops and annual symposiums.
Faceted search augments lexical search with a faceted navigation system, allowing users to narrow results by applying filters based on a faceted classification of the items. It is a parametric search technique. A faceted classification system classifies each information element along multiple explicit dimensions, facets, enabling the classifications to be accessed and ordered in multiple ways rather than in a single, pre-determined, taxonomic order.
Nicholas J. Belkin is a professor at the School of Communication and Information at Rutgers University. Among the main themes of his research are digital libraries; information-seeking behaviors; and interaction between humans and information retrieval systems. Belkin is best known for his work on human-centered Information Retrieval and the hypothesis of Anomalous State of Knowledge (ASK). Belkin realized that in many cases, users of search systems are unable to precisely formulate what they need. They miss some vital knowledge to formulate their queries. In such cases it is more suitable to attempt to describe a user's anomalous state of knowledge than to ask the user to specify her/his need as a request to the system.
Subject indexing is the act of describing or classifying a document by index terms, keywords, or other symbols in order to indicate what different documents are about, to summarize their contents or to increase findability. In other words, it is about identifying and describing the subject of documents. Indexes are constructed, separately, on three distinct levels: terms in a document such as a book; objects in a collection such as a library; and documents within a field of knowledge.
Aboutness is a term used in library and information science (LIS), linguistics, philosophy of language, and philosophy of mind. In LIS, it is often considered synonymous with subject (documents). In the philosophy of mind it has been often considered synonymous with intentionality, perhaps since John Searle (1983). In the philosophy of logic and language it is understood as the way a piece of text relates to a subject matter or topic. In general, the term refers to the concept that a text, utterance, image, or action is on or of something.
Information behavior is a field of information science research that seeks to understand the way people search for and use information in various contexts. It can include information seeking and information retrieval, but it also aims to understand why people seek information and how they use it. The term 'information behavior' was coined by Thomas D. Wilson in 1982 and sparked controversy upon its introduction. The term has now been adopted and Wilson's model of information behavior is widely cited in information behavior literature. In 2000, Wilson defined information behavior as "the totality of human behavior in relation to sources and channels of information".
Collaborative information seeking (CIS) is a field of research that involves studying situations, motivations, and methods for people working in collaborative groups for information seeking projects, as well as building systems for supporting such activities. Such projects often involve information searching or information retrieval (IR), information gathering, and information sharing. Beyond that, CIS can extend to collaborative information synthesis and collaborative sense-making.
Birger Hjørland is a professor of knowledge organization at the Royal School of Library and Information Science (RSLIS) in Copenhagen. His main areas of study pertain to theory of library and information science and of knowledge organization. Hjørland has contributed important developments to domain analysis and concept theory. He has been cited as an anchor of North American knowledge organization studies, as well as an information science pioneer.
Gary Marchionini is an American information scientist and educator at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1998-present).
