HIB Model Comparison - Kuhlthau and Dervin
510 TX Fusco
Deborah Bancroft
26 September 2004
In this paper I will attempt to compare Carol Kuhlthau’s model of Information Search
Process (ISP) with Brenda Dervin’s theory of sense-making. Each author diligently
privileges the user in information seeking in contrast to the bias of earlier systems centric
theories and models. Although they similarly insist on user centered constructs, there are
some fine differences in approach which I will explore.
Dervin is a communications researcher who has collaborated over the past 17 years
with LIS researchers, publishing both together and alone. She is perhaps the most often
quoted theorist of user centered information science. She is best known for her theory, or
set of methods, called sense-making which describes the dialogue and actions that
humans take to make sense of this world.
Underlying Dervin’s sense-making is a core assumption that “discontinuity is a
fundamental aspect of reality.” In light of this reality human beings construct
information. Dervin’s methodology sees humans as systematic and active sense-makers.
In that context, “each moment is potentially a sense-making moment.”
The metaphor she uses for this communication is a gap (or break in communication, or
moment of discontinuity) and a bridge across it. What the human actor does in a
situation where he faces a gap is either to reconstruct a previous strategy or to create a
new one to bridge that gap. The crux of the metaphor is the question, what helped? One
graphic model of this metaphor that Dervin uses is a triangle where the angles are named
“situation,” “gap” and “helps or uses.” This last is what remains after the actor
successfully bridges the gap: what helps you get across? Or what uses do you make of
it? Wilson (1999) calls this last angle “outcome.”
Dervin credits the work of fellow communications researcher Richard F. Carter for
helping her theorize about sense-making.
In acknowledging that her own work has drawn on G.A. Kelly’s (1963) book on
personal construct theory, Carol Kuhlthau writes, “personal construct theory describes the
affective experience of individuals involved in the process of constructing meaning from
the information they encounter.” Like Dervin, Kuhlthau privileges the user’s experience
and agrees that information is a human construct. But unlike Dervin, Kuhlthau considers
the emotions or affect of a user to be as significant a consideration as actions and
thoughts.
Kuhlthau’s model of Information Search Process (ISP) is based on studies she
conducted of high school students assigned to do research papers. From her findings she
developed a model that reveals six stages of the Information Search Process. At each
stage she observed not only the cognitive and physical realms but the affective one as
well. Initiation, Selection, Exploration, Formulation, Collection, and Presentation
represent a schema that differs from Dervin’s triangle but in some ways covers the same
ground. The user in an ISP could act based on past experience, or construct a new action,
as might Dervin’s user, but the steps and environment in Kuhlthau’s model are far more
detailed than in the sense-making theory. This, however, reflects the development of
their research as much as anything.
In Kuhlthau’s analysis of the emotion within the ISP experience, she finds that
uncertainty and anxiety are natural and common phenomena. She notes that while
unfamiliarity with the tools or resources of an information system can certainly cause a
user anxiety, the appropriate solution would not be simply to train all new users in the
system. The natural anxiety of being in a state of not knowing would remain, hence the
solution demands not simply a system patch but an open ended engagement with the user
and active listening.
Both authors’ works point to improvements that must be made in library and other
informational institutions. In Chapter 2 of Harris and Dewdney (1994), a 1993
representation of Dervin’s triangle is illustrated with accompanying questions. Open
ended responses by the reference librarian along the following lines would go a long way
toward accommodating users’ needs.
For Situations: What happened? What got you stopped? What are you working
on? What brought you here today?
For Gaps: What’s missing in your understanding? What are you trying to find
out? What would you like to know?
For Uses: What would help you? How do you plan to use this? What are you
trying to do?
The efforts of these two researchers, among others, have been instrumental in opening
doors for new populations of information systems users—at least in theory and in the
literature. What remains is for the institutions to fully implement these user centered
practices.
References cited
Dervin, B. (1992). From the mind’s eye of the user: The Sense-Making qualitativequantitative methodology. In J.D. Glazier & R.R. Powell (Eds). Qualitative research in
information management. Englewood, CO, Libraries Unlimited.
Harris, R.M. & Dewdney, P. (1994). Barriers to information: How formal help systems
fail battered women. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.
Kuhlthau, C. (1991). Inside the search process: Information seeking from the user’s
perspective. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 42, 361-371.
Wilson, T.D. (1999) Models in information behaviour research. Journal of
Documentation, 55.3, 249-270.