Collaborative Information Behavior: User Engagement and Communication Sharing

Citation

Bar‐Ilan, J. (2011), "Collaborative Information Behavior: User Engagement and Communication Sharing", Online Information Review, Vol. 35 No. 3, pp. 502-503. https://doi.org/10.1108/14684521111151496

This edited volume is concerned with collaborative information behaviour (CIB), defined as the “study of collaboration with, through and in relation to information, along with the systems and practices that support this”. Key conditions for CIB include sharing, communicating and increased engagement in information processes and information production.

The book consists of 12 chapters in three sections. The first section discusses CIB in large groups. Richter, Bray and Dutton provide a framework for categorising CNOs (collaborative network organisations) into CNO 1.0, characterised by sharing; CNO 2.0, characterised by contributing; and CNO 3.0, characterised by creating. They emphasise that, in order to succeed, such networks need to be “cultivated” in a bottom‐up fashion instead of being managed in more traditional ways. Wong describes several creative ways in which the poor in Bangladesh utilise mobile phones – in particular how they share strategies for economic use of mobile phones. Beamish looks at contributors and lurkers in an international online community. She shows that, although there are multiple and complex reasons for lurking instead of contributing, the large majority of the lurkers are satisfied with what they get from the online community. The last chapter in this section, by Noël and Lemire, is on large‐scale data sets; specifically, they provide a quantitative analysis of three Web 2.0 visualisation sites: Swivel, IBM Many Eyes and StatCrunch.

The second section concentrates on CIB (collaborative information behaviour) in small groups. It is assumed that the relationships between individuals in small groups are stronger than in large groups. Reddy, Hansen and Spence provide a preliminary CIB model based on two factors: behaviour (from searching to seeking) and context (from individual to collaborative). They discuss findings from the use of their prototype collaborative information retrieval system. Ikeya, Awamura and Sakai provide a detailed empirical example of transforming task management within an organisation into a more collaborative activity. Goggins and Erdelez study the collaborative information behaviour of completely online groups (COGs), where COGs are characterised by common organisational affiliation of its members and by being assigned to the groups instead of joining freely. They explore COGs in the context of an online graduate course, and find that the use of shared information resources reduces collaborative frustration. In another chapter in the educational setting, Scown discusses the ways learners and students collaborate in the production of a video podcast. Participating students' feedback was positive, and their mean grade was higher than that of students who chose to do a written assignment. Shah provides requirements and design guidelines for a good CIB system, emphasising that the most critical aspects of CIB systems are control, communication and awareness of the activities of the others in the system.

The last section addresses the role of language and communication in CIB. Hendrickson uses a cross‐disciplinary conceptual framework to study a “virtual newsroom”. In the specific case five editors and a managing editor were in charge of publishing the news culled from online versions of conventional news sources. The editors used instant messaging as their primary source of communication. The next two chapters discuss information sharing and communication in the medical domain. Chalfen and Rich describe the use of a collaborative patient‐doctor system called Video Intervention/Prevention Assessment, while McKenzie uses the method of analytical bracketing to analyse communication and interaction between midwifes and clients. She looks for “interactional traces” of information, where these traces refer to past events or to information communicated previously. The last chapter is by Jonathan Foster, the editor, who provides a detailed coding guide for analysing peer talk during educational information seeking. The coding guide is informed by a language‐based theory of learning and sequential organisation of spoken discourse. The major categories in the code are steps, sequences, exchanges and moves.

The book provides a good overview of state‐of‐the‐art research in collaborative information behaviour. One technical remark: the computer screen shots are sometimes not sharp enough. The concept of CIB in the book is defined widely, thus allowing the presentation of a large range of perspectives and directions in this area. Some of the chapters in the book can definitely be incorporated in information behaviour courses.