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Cyberchondria describes excessive or repeated online health-related information seeking associated with an increased level of health anxiety. Given the nascent nature of the concept of cyberchondria, this systematic review attempts to summarize the current landscape of cyberchondria research.

Based on a comprehensive search and systematic filtering process, 40 articles were included in the final sample.

Characteristics of these articles, measures of cyberchondria and factors related to cyberchondria were reported. This review found that the measures of cyberchondria are still in the developmental stages and thus require further validation in future studies. In addition, while studies have examined various factors associated with cyberchondria, the detailed processes involved in the development of cyberchondria require further conceptualization.

The contributions of this review are threefold: first, it presented a comprehensive overview of studies on cyberchondria by addressing their key characteristics such as country of study, sample size and research method. Second, this review analyzed major assessment tools of cyberchondria to offer useful guidance on future investigations on cyberchondria. Third, it identified important antecedents and consequences of cyberchondria in previous research, which contributes to theoretical understanding of how cyberchondria develops.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to identify prominent patterns of media use across six media (e.g. television, social media, public libraries) and four gratification contexts (e.g. studying, leisure activities), and second, to investigate whether media use patterns vary with six individual characteristics by introducing the construct of information repertoire.

Data were collected through an online questionnaire completed by 811 adult internet users in the USA. Latent class analysis (LCA), including latent class regression, was performed to analyse the data.

The study found eight information repertoire profiles. The user characteristics associated with each profile, such as age, race and ethnicity, were identified. The profile with the most respondents was characterised by heavy use of TV and the internet for everyday leisure activities. Overall, the eight profiles do not show exclusive use of one or two media (such as a power-law pattern). However, the profiles do exhibit patterned behaviour, in which respondents use the same configuration of media in two or more gratification contexts. These findings suggest some level of gratification-based heuristic in media selection and use when respondents face contexts they deem to be similar.

In conceptual development, the study introduced the construct of information repertoire to capture media use profiles that account for multiple media use across multiple contexts. Methodologically, less-used LCA was applied, which allowed combining the 24 variables (6 media×4 gratification contexts) and the six demographic covariates in a single, unified analysis.

Drawing from social cognitive theory, the purpose of this study is to examine how personal, environmental and behavioral factors can interplay to influence people's use of YouTube as a learning resource.

This study proposed a conceptual model, which was then tested with data collected from a survey with 150 participants who had the experience of using YouTube for learning. The bootstrap method was employed to test the direct and mediation hypotheses in the model.

The results revealed that personal factors, i.e. learning outcome expectations and attitude, had direct effects on using YouTube as a learning resource (person → behavior). The environmental factor, i.e. the sociability of YouTube, influenced the attitude (environment → person), while the behavioral factor, i.e. prior experience of learning on YouTube, affected learning outcome expectations (behavior → person). Moreover, the two personal factors fully mediated the influences of sociability and prior experience on YouTube usage for learning.

The factors and their relationships identified in this study provide important implications for individual learners, platform designers, educators and other stakeholders who encourage the use of YouTube as a learning resource.

This study draws on a comprehensive theoretical perspective (i.e. social cognitive theory) to investigate the interplay of critical components (i.e. individual, environment and behavior) in YouTube's learning ecosystem. Personal factors not only directly influenced the extent to which people use YouTube as a learning resource but also mediated the effects of environmental and behavioral factors on the usage behavior.

This chapter introduces the Person-in-Environment (PIE) framework, a research design and a nationwide empirical study, developed by the author, to measure the relative impacts of socio-structural and personal factors on individual-level information behaviours (IB) and outcomes. The IB field needs to tackle two questions: (1) In a particular situation, how much of an individual's IB is influenced by personal characteristics? and (2) How much of this behaviour is shaped by one's environment, such as socio-structural barriers? PIE is a beginning effort to address this agency–structure debate, which is a topic that confronts many social scientists. This chapter first outlines IB research relevant to agency–structure integration. It then presents six principles of the PIE framework. Personal characteristics (e.g. cognitive and affective factors) and socio-structural factors (e.g. information resources distribution) are conceptualised as interrelated. Thus, these need to be tested simultaneously. Previously, it was difficult to link individual- and societal-level datasets because their units of observation often vary. To overcome these methodological challenges, this author purposed a research design that employs secondary analysis, geographic information systems techniques and structural equation modelling. An empirical study of the library usage by 13,000 American 12th graders is presented to demonstrate PIE's applicability. Discussions on the future directions of PIE studies conclude the chapter. The PIE framework can contribute to conceptual and methodological development in IB research. It also offers scholars and policymakers a way to empirically assess the contributions of information services on an individual's life, while taking personal differences into account.

Ever since our cognitive make-up allowed it, human beings have used their information behaviour abilities to help them survive. Information behaviour evolved in response to the need by early humans to benefit from information that could not be immediately accessible in the nearby environment or obtained through communication. Humans developed an information behaviour ability, including processes of information sense making, foraging, seeking, organising and using. Information behaviour brought several benefits to early humans, including greater influence and control over their environment, and the degree in which they could use the environment for their own gain and survival. Information behaviour thus brought several advantages for the survival of early humans, and consequently emerged as a genetically favoured trait (Spink, 2010).

The purpose of this paper is to compare the perceived benefits of public libraries between five culturally different countries: Finland, Norway, the Netherlands, South Korea and the USA.

The data were based on representative samples of Finnish, Norwegian, Dutch, Korean and American adult library users. In Finland a mail survey was used and in other countries web surveys were used for data collection. The distribution of the proportion of those benefiting from the library in various areas of life at least sometimes was compared across countries. The pattern of benefits was compared across countries by forming four outcome indexes from the 19 benefit areas. The differences in the outcomes between the countries were explained by demographics and library use variables.

The intensity of perceived benefits differ considerably, with the Finns and Americans reporting a higher level of benefits than the South Koreans, who in turn derive more profit than the Norwegians and the Dutch. The large difference in library supply between Finland and other countries may explain the differences in the perceived benefits in part of other countries but the USA.

The study covered only some socio-economic and library usage factors as independent variables explaining the variation of benefit patterns. A more thorough analysis of library supply between the countries may explain some differences in perceived benefits.

The policy implications of these findings are discussed.

This is the first across-country study comparing and explaining the patterns of perceived benefits between culturally different countries.

David Bawden is professor of information science at City University London, UK. He has a first degree in organic chemistry (Liverpool University) and masters and doctoral degrees in information science (Sheffield University). He worked in research information services in the pharmaceutical industry before joining City University in 1990. His academic interests include the history and philosophy of the information sciences, information-related behaviour, knowledge organisation, scientific information, digital literacy and academic-practitioner research collaboration. He is editor of the Journal of Documentation, the leading European journal of library/information science, and is a member of the board of EUCLID, the European Association for Library and Information Teaching and Research. His interests in individual differences in information behaviour stem from studies of ‘information for creativity’ in the 1980s, and he has a particularly interest in ways of understanding individual attitudes and preferences as a way of improving information provision. His email address is db@soi.city.ac.uk.