Knowledge structure and subject access

Authors:
Kay A. Flowers;Nancy J. Cooke
Affiliations:
Rice University, Houston, Tx;Rice University, Houston, Tx
Venue:
CHI '92 Posters and Short Talks of the 1992 SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
Year:
1992

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Abstract

Previous studies of library on-line catalogs [5], have identified subject searching as both the most popular method of access as well as the most problematic. These findings have stimulated a large amount of research on subject or topical access, most focusing on the vocabulary of the subject headings list and ways to improve its richness (e.g. [4]) There have been fewer explorations of the problems inherent in the structure of the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) and how this structure combined with user's knowledge structure contributes to the subject searching problem. Because knowledge structure has been shown to differentiate between novices and experts [2], and because expertise affects success in searching online catalogs [1], knowledge structure may play a role in subject searching. Results from a previous field study have confirmed these expectations. Therefore, to further test this hypothesis, this study examines how the knowledge structures of experts and novices in a given field differ from the structures of librarians and the LCSH for that field.