Chapter 1: Information Behavior: An Introduction

Information behavior research has a long history within the discipline of information science. Although some would identify the publication of Dervin and Nilan's (1986) work as a turning point to a focus on people's information needs, and the uses they made of the information they found, the precursors of this focus date back over several decades. One of the complicating factors in this discussion is that the discipline of information science continues to debate what to call this area of research – whether information behavior, information practice, information experience, or similar terms. However, our research is connected by a common thread; our focus is on people and how their lives intersect with the information world. We care, for example, about how people perceive the world, how they locate and apply information in decision-making, and how technologies facilitate finding and using information. We explore the contexts, situations, feelings, physicality, and meanings of people's information landscapes, from their points of view. We are interested in people's active information seeking processes, their serendipitous encountering of useful information, as well as their decisions not to look for information or to ignore the information they find. Information behavior researchers document, describe, explain, critique, and unravel the complexities of people's engagement with information. We follow people into all corners of their lives, to learn about preschoolers' use of mobile devices, to understand how pregnant women make vaccination decisions, and to document small business owners' social media practices. In short, we care about how people engage with information in all corners of their lives. We use “information behavior” as a broad overarching term that encompasses all types of information experiences, in diverse circumstances and settings, and across various personal activities and outcomes.