Collaborative Information Seeking: The Art and Science of Making the Whole Greater than the Sum of All

Citation

du Preez, M. (2013), "Collaborative Information Seeking: The Art and Science of Making the Whole Greater than the Sum of All", Online Information Review, Vol. 37 No. 3, pp. 479-480. https://doi.org/10.1108/OIR-04-2013-0084

Information seeking is an information behaviour activity aimed at satisfying an information need. Studies investigating information‐seeking behaviour have generally focused on individuals' information‐seeking behaviour within specific contexts such as everyday life or work and task‐related contexts. However, Marchionini (p. vii) maintains that information work is usually a collaborative activity where people seek, create, analyse and selectively share information at different stages of the information life cycle. The theory and systems of collaborative information seeking as well as the evaluation thereof, is the focus of Shah's new book, Collaborative Information Seeking.

The book is divided into three parts. Part 1 introduces the notions of collaboration and information seeking. It also provides a context for the discussion of these concepts; in this introductory part Shah also sheds some light on the different aspects of collaboration and shows how they correspond to information seeking in collaboration. Last, several of the most commonly used terms and definitions are introduced: corresponding works for these terms are summarised and a firm ground for the observation and participation in collaborative information‐seeking (CIS) research is established.

Part 2 focuses on different frameworks for CIS research and development. The discussion starts with the most common framework, which has time and space as its primary dimensions. Thereafter, the discussion moves to more complex and comprehensive frameworks of group activities and eventually extends the space‐time framework by adding users as an additional dimension. Issues of control, communication and awareness in CIS environments then receive much‐needed attention. Chapter 5 shows how a model for CIS can be developed. Shah uses Khulthau's information search process (ISP) model for this purpose. Based on data from a user study, he then shows the successes and shortcomings of this approach.

The final part reviews some of the fundamental challenges of designing CIS systems. The reviews are grouped into two categories: system‐mediated collaboration and user‐mediated collaboration. A framework for CIS evaluation is presented, and several of the relevant assessments employed for information retrieval/information seeking/collaborative information seeking works are outlined. A comprehensive list of measures, along with suitable methods for deploying them for empirical evaluations, then follows.

The final chapter wraps up the discussion with a look to the future by highlighting some of the interesting questions that have not yet been addressed in the field of CIS. Shah also makes some suggestions on the extension of the work he has discussed throughout the book.

Four appendices and an index conclude the book. The purpose of the appendices is to present the concept of collaboration in various contexts, provide brief overviews of computer‐supported cooperative work (CSCW), computer‐supported collaborative learning (CSCL), and computer‐mediated communication (CMC).

Collaborative Information Seeking is essential reading for collaborative information seeking scholars. It reads easily, is well organised and provides both a framework for thinking about and studying collaborative information seeking. I can only agree with Marchionini (p. viii) when he notes that the book provides a roadmap for building systems that improve both effectiveness and efficiency.