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INFORMATION, COMMUNICATION AND TELECOMMUNICATIONS: A PILOT STUDY OF THE BEHAVIOUR OF CITIZENS
Abstract
Information, communication and telecommunications are all important to the lives of citizens. This paper reviews the literature on the information-seeking, communication and telecommunications behaviour of citizens and then reports on a pilot study to test empirical measures being developed by the Telecommunications Policy Research Group at RMIT As a result of the pilot study, an information-communication continuum is proposed to overcome the problems of definition of information and communication needs. There is also a suggestion that a distinction between purposeful information seeking and incidental information acquisition is required. The role of telecommunications in meeting information and communication needs is explored. Policy implications are included.
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NOTES AND REFERENCES
National Commission on Libraries and Information Science, Information for the 1980s: Final Report of the White House Conference on Library and Information Services, US Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 1979, cited by Ching-Chih Chen and Peter Hernon, Information Seeking, Neal-Schuman, New York, 1982, p.2.
See, e.g., PL. Berger and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality, Doubleday, New York, 1966; Karl Mannheim, Ideology and Utopia, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1936.
I. de Sola Pool (ed.), The Social Impact of the Telephone, MIT Press, Cambridge, 1977 (quoted Suzanne Keller, ‘The telephone in new communities and old’), cited by A. Moyal, ‘The feminine culture of the telephone: people, patterns and policy’, Prometheus, 7, 1, 1989, p.7.
The particular research referred to is the Basic Telecommunications Needs (BTN) Project, the principal aim of which is to develop a methodology for identifying information and communication needs and the role of telecommunications in meeting those needs. The Telecommunications Policy Research Group has received $240,000 funding from the Australian and Overseas Telecommunications Corporation for the project. For further discussion of the BTN Project, see M. Balnaves, P. Caputi and K. Williamson, ‘A methodology for assessing telecommunications needs: preliminary steps towards an index of information and communication poverty’, Australian Journal of Communication, 18(3), 1991, pp.99–118; M. Balnaves, P. Caputi and K. Williamson, ‘Basis telecommunications needs model: a methodology for assessing information and communication poverty’, Proceedings of the Pacific Telecommunications Council 14th Annual Conference, January 12th-15th, 1992, PTC, Honolulu, Hawaii, 1992, pp.472–479.
Kirsty Williamson, who is an investigator for the BTN Project, is also the doctoral student referred to. Her study will focus on older adults (aged 60 and over) --- a group whose numbers, together with economic and political importance, are growing rapidly in Australia as in all developed countries. A comparison with a younger age group (20-30 years) --- the older adults of the future --- will be included. The principal research questions to be addressed are: (1) What are the principal information and communications needs of older and younger adults? (2) What are the sources used to meet those needs? (3) What methods (including telecommunications) are used to contact those sources? (4) What sources and methods of contact are perceived as essential? (5) What problems do people face in their information seeking and in their attempts at communication?
Brenda Dervin and Nilan M.. 1986. . ‘Information needs and uses’. . Annual Review of Information Science and Technology . , Vol. 21:: 3––33. .
Kunz W., Rittel H. W.J. and Schwuchow W.. 1976. . Methods of Analysis and Evaluation of Information Needs: a critical review . , Munchen : : Verlag Dokumentation. .
Kirsty Williamson, Information Seeking by Users of a Citizens Advice Bureau (M. Lib. thesis, Graduate School of Librarianship, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, 1984).
S.G. Faibisoff and D.P. Ely, Information and Information Needs, commissioned paper under the Commissioned Paper Project, Teachers College, Columbia University, Division of Library Programs, US Office of Education, 1974, (ED 10031), p.6, cited by Major R. Owens, ‘The development of the information function: a theoretical basis for the development of information networks and centres’, Drexel Library Quarterly, 12, 1-2, 1976, p.8.
Dervin and Nilan, op. cit., p. ll.
The most interesting and useful was E.S. Warner et al., Information Needs of Urban Residents: Final Report From the Regional Planning Council of Baltimore and Westat Inc. of Rockville, Md. to the US Department of Health, Education and Welfare, Office of Education, Division of Library Programs under Contract No. OEC-0-71-455, (ED 88464).
Brenda Dervin et al., The Development of Strategies for Dealing with the Information Needs of Residents, Phase I --- Citizen Study, Final report on project L0035 JA, Grant No. OEG-0-74-7308 to the Office of Education, (ED 125640), School of Communication, University of Washington, 1976.
Dervin and Nilan, op. cit., p.16. For a further discussion of the traditional versus alternative paradigm, see Brenda Dervin, ‘Users as research inventions: how research categories perpetuate inequities’, Journal of Communication, 39, 3, 1989.
Williamson, op. cit.
Derr R. L.. 1983. . ‘A conceptual analysis of information need’. . Information Processing & Management . , Vol. 19((3)): 273––8. .
Moyal, op. cit.
Aronson S. H.. ‘The sociology of the telephone’. . International Journal of Comparative Sociology . , Vol. 12:153––67. .
Claisse G. and Rowe R.. 1987. . ‘The telephone in question: questions on communication’. . Computer Networks and ISDN Systems . , Vol. 14((2-5)): 210
See, e.g., Claire Lipsman, The Disadvantaged and Library Effectiveness, ALA, Chicago, 1972; Warner et al., op. cit.; Chen and Hernon, op. cit.; Williamson, op. cit.
Everett Rogers M.. 1983. . Diffusion of Innovations . , p. 18––19. . New York : : The Free Press. .
Brenda Dervin. . 1976. . “‘The everyday information needs of the average citizen: a taxonomy for analysis’. ”. In Information for the Community . , Edited by: Manfred Kochen and Joseph Donahue C.. p. 30 Chicago : : ALA. .
See, e.g., Brenda Dervin and B.S. Greenberg, ‘The communication environment of the urban poor’, in Gerald Kline and Philip Tichenor (eds), Current Perspectives in Mass Communication, Sage Communication Research Annals, 1, Beverly Hills, California, 1972; Chen and Hernon, op. cit. Typically research findings, e.g., Warner, op. cit., have shown that it was users of print, rather than electronic media, who possessed accurate knowledge for decision making.
Patrick Wilson, Public Knowledge, Private Ignorance, Greenwood Press, Westport, Connecticut, 1977, p.36.
Chen and Hernon, op. cit., p.63.
Claisse and Rowe, op. cit.
Ibid.
Moyal, op. cit., p.12–4.
Ibid., p.10.
Mark Balnaves, Communication and Information: An Analysis of Concepts (PhD thesis, Department of Social Science, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, 1990).
This has been based on the approach of T. D. Wilson that: “The problem seems to lie not so much with the lack of a ‘single’ definition as a failure to use a definition appropriate to the level and purpose of the investigation” (‘On user studies and information needs’, Journal of Documentation, 37, 1, 1981, pp.3–15).
Dervin, Brenda et al., op. cit.
See, e.g., Warner, op. cit.
Aronson, op. cit.
These instruments are for the doctoral study.
Moyal, op. cit., p.10.
Warner et al, op. cit., Chen and Hernon, op. cit.
Dervin et al. op. cit.
P. Wilson, op. cit.
Chen and Hernon, op. cit.
This is to be included on the suggestion of Trevor Barr, radio commentator and Principal Lecturer in Media Studies at Swinburne University, Victoria.
Patrick Wilson, op. cit.
Moyal, op. cit.