This article reported the results of an investigation of the information seeking process from the perspectives of the users of information systems. The methodology employed in this research was to examine the findings of five other studies reported in the literature. The essential function of the research reported in this article appears to have been to describe the information search process employed by users of information retrieval systems. This description was presented in the article in the form of an information retrieval process model from the perspective of a user.
The analysis of the five articles from the literature permitted the author of this article to develop a six-stage model of the information search process from the perspective of the users of information systems. These stages were as follows:
1. Initiation. This stage was described as one of uncertainty and vagueness.
2. Selection. This stage was described as one of optimism and task identification.
3. Exploration. This stage was described as one of confusion, frustration, and doubt. To this reviewer, these characteristics of the exploration stage appear to invalidate the selection stage by indicating that user optimism was unreasonable.
4. Formulation. This stage was described as one of clarity and narrowed focus.
5. Collection. This stage was described as one of increased interest and effectiveness.
6. Presentation. This stage is described as one of relief and satisfaction for some users, while being described as one of disappointment for other users.
To the casual reader of this article, the information search process model described by the author of the article elicits an initial response of "so what?" because the model contains no surprises. The author of the article, however, concludes that the information contained in the model may be used by the designers of information retrieval systems to reduce the levels of us
...