General Information Behavior of Humanities Scholars
The humanities are one of the oldest groups of professions currently studied today.
Sukovic says in her article “Humanities Scholars and their Interactions with Electronic
Text,” “A decade is a split-second in the life of the humanities, probably the oldest
scholarly field” (Sukovic 3). She discovered five stages in which the humanities
researcher moves through: problem selection, detailed planning, data selection, analysis
and interpretation, and writing/rewriting. These stages often occur simultaneously. When
asked to describe their area of expertise 86% of humanities scholars divide themselves by
geography, 82% by topic, and 56% chronologically.
The standard description of humanities scholars comes from Sue Stone’s 1982 study as
referenced by Stieg Dalton. Humanities scholars prefer to browse, borrow from other
disciplines, use mostly primary documents, and they work alone even to the extant that
they conduct their own electronic searches. However, the profession has gone through
many recent changes. For example, the rise of social media outlets such as Facebook, and
wiki’s have made interaction within the humanities community easy. Humanities scholars
often cite, greatly admire, and build upon the works of those they have very limited
contact with. This type of limited contact community is described as “latent ties” by
Caroline Haythornthwaite.
Libraries/Librarians
Humanities scholars do not use the services of reference librarians very often. They feel
that the reference librarian’s knowledge is to general, and that they can’t relate to the
humanities needs. One humanities scholar was quoted by Massey Burzio as saying “you
are giving things to us which are to complicated …which do not correspond to my needs,
which go overboard for me…” (627) Humanities scholars also feel that they do not need
the services of a librarian because they are very familiar with the libraries resources on
their own, especially the section(s) they most often visit for their research. Subject
librarians, however, are viewed as a good resource and can be enacted upon to operate as
a buffer between the humanities and technology.
Because the humanities are so dependent on multiple sources, they thrive on interlibrary
loan. Many of the books and documents they use are rare, and it can be difficult to gain
immediate access to them, or any access at all when working with a limited budget. Aside
from the library of Alexandria, no one library can hold all the information an entire
department of humanities could possibly desire, thus creating another barrier to access,
along with the need for foreign language documents. The library is also considered a
good place to ‘try’ a book, to evaluate it before purchasing a copy for personal collection.
Types of Sources
Humanities scholars search first for primary sources to form the core of their papers, then
move onto secondary sources to add detail and opinion. They prefer books more than
periodicals because they tend to be more in-depth, and because periodicals are often
concerned with new trends and discoveries. Humanities scholars study human behavior
back to its roots, sometimes going back 2000 to 3000 years, therefore, as de Tiratel
quotes Stone in her 2000 study “having retrospective coverage may be more important to
the humanist then having access to current material” (347). Recently though, periodicals
have been gaining popularity, as have audio-video materials. From a publishing
perspective periodicals allow for relatively fast and easy publication, and require fewer
resources to write, yet, they take the same amount of space on a resume.
Channels of information
After browsing the most popular sources to check for possible research material are book
reviews, footnotes, citations, and other references. Most humanities scholars stop
collecting information when they have acquired enough for their current research needs,
regardless of if there is more available.
How do they organize material?
How do humanities scholars organize material, as summarized from Case 1990?
Categorization in the humanities can be difficult because most sources can fit into more
then one subject category. For example, a book on the Civil War can be sorted under
topic, person, time period, geography, or all of the above. Note cards are the preferred
and traditional way to organize thought and information, thus allowing the afore
mentioned book to be referenced simultaneously under all of the applicable categories.
Categorization is often mixed with storage using a combination of spatial and explicit
labels. Books on the shelves are often arraigned first by topic, then in chronological order.
Information sources being actively worked with are kept closer to the desk. This allows
them to be with in easy reach and to serve as a reminder to act upon them. It also allows
for spatial clues to be used for recall of specific sources, such as the needed book is on
the chair by the door.
Humanities scholars often employ an old technique called “memory palaces” to recall the
placement of specific items. Using this technique the humanities scholar envisions rooms
in his or her mind, and fills them with ‘furniture’ which represent the items they wish to
remember. This is similar to the practice of tying a piece of string around your finger, and
makes it doubly important to not tidy up someone else’s office or palace.
Direct Comparison to Social Scientist
Social scientists and humanities scholars do directly parallel each other on some
preferences. They both cite from other disciplines, speak multiple languages, look to
citations before bibliographic databases, and prefer to consult their own personal library
before going to a public or academic library where they both browse the shelves.
Technology
Wiberley followed a group of 11 humanities scholars over the course of ten years and
identified four types of time in humanities scholars use of technology: anticipated startup
time, actual start up time, use time, and time of life. Anticipated start up time comprises
of the anxiety the humanities scholar thinks learning the technology will take. Even
junior researchers who grew up with technology will often avoid new technology for fear
that it will take too much time to learn. Actual start up time is the amount of time that it
takes to learn a new piece of technology, and use time is the time spent using the
technology for it’s intended purpose. Time of life refers to the stage at which the
researcher is at his or her career, or research project. Someone at the beginning of a
project is more inclined to learn a new piece of technology then someone at the end.
Humanities scholars tend to use the digital equivalent of familiar paper based sources.
Word processing ranks as number one used overall even in 1987, the beginning of
Wiberley’s study. With the advent of laptops to allow for word processors to be used for
on cite note-taking, there is “no nostalgia for pencil, pen, or typewriter” (425). The
second most used technology application is e-mail, though it was only used by two of the
seven humanities scholars studied in 1987, and then was usually introduces as a necessity
of administrative tasks. Third is on-line catalogs which all used in 1987. Surfing the
internet is mostly used for gathering background information at the onset of research
projects, to keep current on issues and topics, as well as to compare and contrast
information. The popularity of personal webpages allows for “Googling” of others in the
field.
According to Masey-Bruzio, while there are many aspects of the rush to technology that
humanities scholars are apprehensive of, there are some that they universally accept as
better. For instance, the general consensus is that microfilm sucks. Humanities scholars
also prefer digital versions of dictionaries and encyclopedias, along with general journals
and periodicals which took up much physical space in often small offices. Also online
articles can be commented on, brining immediate feedback and a sense of discourse to
publishing. With online catalogues the humanist scholars can determine what another
library has on its shelves without first traveling to it, as well as having digital copies sent
to him or her from almost any institution.
With the plethora of different pieces of information available on the internet even the
most narrow of topics can be accommodated, and simply searched for using Boolean
properties, on sites of known quality such as The NY Times, or government. As stated in
Sukovic on page 10, electronic sources allow for a fluid integration of print, audio, video,
and animation that is not possible on hard copy material. One reason for the push of the
humanities scholars towards technology is the inclusion of education within its ranks.
Even those humanities scholars not studying education are often called on to teach.
Access, the very thing that was praised about technology is also one of its downfalls.
Many of the databases needed by humanities are available only through paid subscription,
and often don’t include older articles, rare articles, articles that contain local information,
or full text articles. Even once these obstacles have been overcome the issue of a useable
user interface comes into question. Many have shied away from potential gold mines of
information because they are unable to navigate the user interface. One scholar
questioned by Massey-Burzio likened his libraries fancy new electronic catalogue to
getting a “thourghbred when you want a cart horse” (624), while another stated that most
online catalogs offer a “tourist view” of the collection rather then a “scholarly view”
(626).
When conducting searches using Boolean systems humanities scholars often receive too
many results or not enough. To achieve the best results they may have to search for the
same item many times using alternate forms of names. Search quality also depends on the
information needed being correctly entered, and/or entered in the way the humanities
scholar expects. Once sources are found, it can be difficult to ascertain the quality of the
information, or to annotate it. The hesitancy of the four types of time mentioned above
also comes into play.
Ellis' information seeking model of starting, chaining, browsing, differentiating,
monitoring and extracting can be applied to electronic sources with a little adaptation. To
help fit the new medium the addition of two sections is suggested by Ge. Preparation and
Planning to follow the most efficient research route, and Information Management to
organize the new information acquired during the search. Browsing in the stacks
incorporates physical movement into the process, and all aspects of it cannot be easily
replicated in the computer environment which instead introduces back and eye strain.
However, an integral part of humanities searching is serendipitous discovery which can
be easily achieved using hyperlinks.