Interpersonal Information Processing

Abstract

In the past, librarians have made a number of attempts to characterize, estimate and explain the behavior of human beings who seek out their services and products. While these contributions may have been creatively original among librarians of the past, practitioners today have generally eschewed the psychological advances of other fields. Those inhibitions against an information processing psychology which are often cited in the field include: (1) the "inapplicability' of such theoretical knowledge," (2) the apparent "denial" of any singular treatment for individuals; and (3) the "irrelevance" of measured behavior as an indication of human motives. Following the lead of those research priorities for the 1980s, as identified by professional leaders, this article presents a case for the psychological measurement of information processing behavior. In addition, suggestions are offered for the use of carefully controlled experimental and analytical investigations that probe the human use of information as distinct from the commonly descriptive library use studies of the past. On the basis of such a changed research direction, the practitioner's largely intuitive inferencing can be enriched by the predictive power of controlled research findings.