Search results

By selectively reviewing theory‐driven survey studies on internet health information seeking, the paper aims to provide an informal assessment of the theoretical foundations and research methods that have been used to study this information behavior.

After a review of the literature, four theory‐driven quantitative survey studies are analyzed in detail. Each study is examined in terms of: theoretical framework; research variables that form the focus of the study; research design (sampling, data collection and analysis); and findings and results of hypothesis testing and model testing. The authors then discuss the theoretical models and analytical methods adopted, and identify suggestions that could be helpful to future researchers.

Taken as a whole, the studies reviewed point strongly to the need for multidisciplinary frameworks that can capture the complexity of online health information behavior. The studies developed theoretical frameworks by drawing from many sources – theory of planned behavior, technology acceptance model, uses and gratifications, health belief model, and information seeking models – demonstrating that an integration of theoretical perspectives from the health sciences, social psychology, communication research, and information science, is required to fully understand this behavior. The results of these studies suggest that the conceptual models and analytical methods they adopted are viable and promising. Many relationships tested showed large effect sizes, and the models evaluated were able to account for between 23 and 50 percent of the variance in the dependent variables.

The paper represents a first attempt to compare, evaluate, and to a degree synthesize the work that has been done to develop and test theoretical models of health information seeking on the web.

This paper aims to examine how knowledge sharing behavior is influenced by three sets of dynamics: a rational calculus that weighs the costs and benefits of sharing; a dispositional preference that favors certain patterns of sharing outcomes; and a relational effect based on working relationships.

Concepts from social exchange theory, social value orientation, and leader‐member exchange theory are applied to analyze behavioral intentions to share knowledge. The study population consists of employees of a large pension fund in Canada. Participants answered a survey that used allocation games and situational vignettes to measure social value orientation, propensity to share knowledge, and perception of cost and benefit.

The results suggest that personal preferences about the distribution of sharing outcomes, individual perceptions about costs and benefits, and structural relationship with knowledge recipients, all affect knowledge sharing behavior significantly. Notably, it was found that propensity to share knowledge is positively related to perceived benefit to the recipient, thus suggesting that evaluation of cost and benefit in social exchange is not limited to self‐interest, but is also influenced by perceived recipient benefit. Moreover, it was found that the relationship with the sharing target (superior or colleague) also influenced sharing.

Most studies emphasize the organizational benefits of knowledge sharing. This study examines knowledge sharing from the perspective of the individual who approaches knowledge sharing as a social exchange that involves perceptions of costs and benefits, preferences about sharing outcomes, and relationship with the sharing target. The study also introduces innovative methods to measure social value orientation and propensity to share knowledge.

Looking at the practical experience of organizations pursuing knowledge management, it is found that their efforts are primarily focused on creating the conditions and the context that will enable knowledge creation. This need for developing enabling conditions and contexts was identified more than a decade ago when Nonaka and associates introduced the concept of “ba.” This paper aims to map the development of the concept of “ba” in a number of disciplines in order to understand its theoretical evolution and practical application.

A comprehensive search and evaluation of the literature resulted in a database of 135 papers, four dissertations and four books. Using content analysis, citation analysis, and concept mapping, four categories of research findings are identified that in turn suggest four groups of conditions for enabling knowledge creation.

The paper discusses each of these conditions (the social/behavioral, cognitive/epistemic, information systems/management, and strategy/structural), and introduces a framework that relates these conditions to the type of knowledge process and the level of interaction that characterize a knowledge management activity in the organization.

It is concluded that managing knowledge in organizations is fundamentally about creating an environment in the organization that is conducive to and encourages knowledge creation, sharing and use. Organizations interested in pursuing knowledge management and innovation may wish to be guided by the enabling conditions presented here that have been discovered over ten years of research. These conditions and the frameworks of which they are part can help managers to analyze, discuss, and introduce specific combinations of enabling factors that are tailored according to the type of knowledge process and level of interaction needed to address a particular knowledge problem or vision.

This paper aims to forecast the changing roles of librarians – especially catalogers and metadata specialists – in today's technology‐driven research, teaching, and learning environments, in which information seekers behave more and more self‐sufficiently and move well beyond library collections in their pursuit of information.

Places the roles of librarians and library collections in the larger context of knowledge management and campus information network processes, which occur in every knowledge community, with or without a library. Explores and provides examples of how knowledge creators can collaborate with information technology experts and librarians to transform how faculty members teach and conduct research; how students learn; and how libraries support these activities.

Librarians need to make their collections and services much more visible through human and technological interconnections and greatly improved delivery of information content. Metadata and metadata specialists are strategic assets for libraries, but the service model for cataloging faces critical challenges. Two tables list these challenges and the implications for metadata specialists.

Offers new observations and insights into how librarians can continue to contribute to saving information seekers' time and advancing the state of knowledge in the increasingly interconnected world of the web. Drawing from the larger context of the global infosphere, information‐seeking behavior, and changing roles for library collections and information systems, forecasts the role of metadata and metadata specialists in libraries.