Lisa Given

• PhD
• Director Social Change Enabling Capability Platform & Professor of Information Sciences at RMIT University

Introduction. Increasingly, universities rely on casualised labour for teaching and research activities. Previous research demonstrates that the information practices of academics working in these conditions are significantly compromised, making their information work more difficult. This paper further explores the context in which contract academi...

Introduction. This paper explores the information behaviour of researchers engaging with industry, community and government stakeholders. It examines the interplay between information sharing, seeking, encountering and use, and the role of reciprocity in social exchange. Research design. This qualitative study involved semi-structured interviews wi...

The value of research to library and information science (LIS) practice and the need to build a culture of research within the profession are well documented. Research informs decision-making, supports strategy and planning, and ensures that LIS services remain relevant to changing community needs. Yet a vibrant research culture is present in only...

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools that appear to perform with care and empathy can quickly gain users’ trust. For this reason, GenAI tools that attempt to replicate human responses have heightened potential to misinform and deceive people. This paper examines how three GenAI tools, within divergent contexts, mimic credible emotional...

This paper presents results of a survey of library and information science (LIS) practitioners, which explored their research activities and the support needed from employers for research collaborations and dissemination of results. Findings show that while LIS practitioners are actively engaged in research, there are significant gaps in the availa...

This study uses the concepts of information practices and care as theoretical lenses to explore the information practices of casual academic staff, who experience complex information contexts. Semi‐structured online interviews followed by thematic qualitative data analysis revealed that, while these academics care deeply about their contributions t...

Digital video collections of dance, theatre, and other performances can provide unprecedented access to these ephemeral art forms. Making these collections searchable requires understanding of users' needs, necessitating collaboration among subject matter, metadata, and information behavior experts. Focusing on the example of Circus Oz, a prominent...

Creating international collaborative teams is common to address complex research problems in low‐income countries. Teams involve experts from low‐ and high‐income countries who must share information and communicate across interpersonal, organizational, and national contingencies and geographic and temporal borders. Effective information sharing be...

Universities now focus on the societal impact of research, yet there is a disconnect between the information environment and the needs of academics undertaking impact‐related work. While universities acknowledge that undertaking research designed for societal impact requires changes to research culture and practices, the information and support pro...

An increasing number of academics working in higher education in Canada work on short-term contracts. The casualization of university work and the insecure nature of these contracts increases the difficulty that contract academic staff (CAS) experience, including often not receiving the information they need to carry out their work. While research...

Introduction. This paper examines academics’ information behaviour in undertaking research for societal impact. It explores how researcher-stakeholder relationships provide sites of information exchange where academics develop skills and knowledge needed to undertake impact work. Method. This qualitative study involved semi-structured interviews wi...

Introduction. Universities rely increasingly on contract academic staff for teaching and research activities; yet, working in precarious conditions, these staff face significant challenges in finding relevant workplace information, in engaging with colleagues, and in building their careers. This study examines contract academic staff perceptions of...

Introduction. Information behaviour research must be methodologically and conceptually sophisticated to generate knowledge reflecting the complexities of information engagement in people’s lives. Information behaviour research can be enriched by the concept of transdisciplinarity — a collaborative approach addressing complex societal problems, with...

While technology affords creation of digital collections, and promises access to all, the reality is that many cultural data collections exist in a precarious ecosystem, where erratic funding, fragmented support, and disconnected expertise threaten their continued existence. As a significant branch of the broader information ecosystem, cultural dat...

There is increasing recognition of the challenges academics working on short‐term contracts experience, as well as universities' increasing reliance on their labor. While discussions of these issues have expanded, there is a lack of empirical research around the information experiences of contract academic staff. This poster reports on initial find...

Failure in research is an underexplored topic in the information science literature. Many instances of research failure go unreported due to the success‐oriented nature of academic culture, and academic publishing in particular. In not discussing, or failing to enable the discussion and reporting of research failures, important learning opportuniti...

Translational research converts research knowledge into practical wisdom for a community (What is Translational Research, n.d.). Storytelling for translational research means that the researcher knows the audience, crafts a narrative, sticks to the plot, and imparts wisdom in a meaningful way – all elements of a good story from a good storyteller....

Multinational agricultural research teams operating in low-income countries must overcome communication challenges to address agricultural problems and rural poverty. Collaborations between dispersed team members rely on information and computer technologies (ICTs) to facilitate communication and share knowledge and expertise. These collaborations...

As crises of biodiversity loss and climate change have intensified, so too have efforts to promote human behaviours that ameliorate these global stressors. Leveraging people's connectedness with nature is proposed as a means of inspiring pro-nature behaviours at a personal and societal scale. However, it is only recently that studies have begun to...

Information behavior scholars are increasingly exploring information creation; however, these studies focus primarily on individuals' processes. The Melbourne Korean War Memorial (MKWM) used an interdisciplinary co-creation process, combining expertise in architecture, industrial design, engineering, and history. Over a two-year period, the MKWM re...

People who regard nature as important and personally meaningful are often compelled to conserve it. This compulsion is increasingly vital in a world where global climate and biodiversity crises are worsening, with younger generations set to bear most of the resulting ecological burden. By understanding why children and adolescents value nature, we...

Supporting academics and practitioners to collaborate is critical to advance innovations in research and practice. The Research Assistance and Development for Australian Researchers (RADAR) program was designed to: 1) provide funding to teams to implement co-designed, practice-informed research projects; and 2) to document academics and practitione...

In recent years, ecologists have embraced the human dimensions of their discipline and expanded their remit to explore issues traditionally addressed by the social sciences and environmental humanities. This expansion offers opportunities to engage with diverse methodologies, some of which challenge the orthodoxies of conservation research; however...

The term ‘impact’ is everywhere. Organizations and individuals want to fund projects for impact, measure impact, and showcase the impact of effort, expertise and financial investment, but clear definitions and understandings of what having an impact really means for people and institutions appear lacking or ad-hoc. This paper explores ‘impact’ in t...

Many researchers in library and information science have claimed that studies that are holistic are critical to understanding various phenomena. On closer examination, however, the term “holistic” is used mainly as a rhetorical device in the literature, rather than as one that embraces the epistemological tenets of a holistic paradigm, and applies...

Affect plays an important role in the information behavior of early career academics. While there is a recognition of the importance of affect to information behavior in the information science literature, there has been a lack of empirical research that details its influence. Using a constructivist grounded theory methodology, early career academi...

The panel will explore the challenges and opportunities for bridging the library and information science (LIS) research practice gap in Australia. The panel brings together participants from the Research Assistance and Development for Australian Researchers (RADAR) Grant, an initiative of the Library and Information Science Research Australia (LISR...

Welfare agencies are increasingly turning to technology to facilitate information-sharing and communication with users. However, while the administrative, governmental and material effects of technological advances have been examined, research has yet to explore how welfare users could make use of technology for their benefit. In this article, we e...

Agricultural research in developing countries often involves collaboration between dispersed multicultural teams of scientists from developed and developing countries. The teams use information and computing technologies (ICTs) to communicate between team members, who originate from different cultures using different languages. This paper investiga...

Within library and information studies (LIS), there is growing awareness of the role ofthe body and its surroundings in people’s information and knowledge experiences.Predominant data collection methods, such as the sit-down interview, should bereexamined in light of this awareness. This paper examines interview methodstheoretically and empirically...

This chapter examines a young child’s use of digital technologies to search the Web at home and at preschool. Conversation analysis of social interactions that occurred during the Web searching informs our consideration of similarities and differences evident between the child’s digital activities in the two settings. The comparison establishes tha...

Digital tools offer new affordances and methodologies to humanities scholars' research. This study used a constructivist grounded theory approach to examine humanities scholars' research practices, including their use of a wide range of resources and digital technologies. Using in-depth study, several themes emerged from the research relating to th...

Qualitative data analysis, used by researchers to make sense of their data, comes in a variety of approaches which tend to be aligned with particular conceptual frameworks and methods. This chapter focusses on three approaches: thematic analysis and category coding, qualitative content analysis, and discourse analysis. With thematic analysis and ca...

This chapter is unusual in that it departs somewhat from the pattern of authorship and content in the rest of this book. The editors begin the chapter with a re-examination of some of the key themes of the book, for example, the focus on methodology as the entire framework or design of research: the choice of paradigm, methods and tools or techniqu...

This panel will explore how information associations can maintain engagement and relevance at a time when academic disciplines are evolving, when institutional and personal budgets face increasing pressures, and as we strive to connect across a broad global footprint. The panel brings together the leaders of three information science associations –...

Collaborative research teams working in developing countries rely on information and computer technologies (ICTs), both hardware and software, to overcome barriers to information sharing including, language, distance, time, economic development and politics. However, studies have shown impediments to information sharing between team members from di...

Wine scientists and industry organisations are increasingly creating mobile web applications (apps) to support vineyard management and monitoring. While such tools are intended to improve wine industry practices, embedding user testing and user experience design in app development has not been implemented. User-focused design is essential for deter...

Social media platforms are espoused as helpful for overcoming geographic isolation for rural people and businesses; connecting them with local, national and global communities. Yet, little research has been conducted to document social media use by rural residents. This paper explores the social media experiences of 62 rural Australians, gathered t...

Purpose This paper aims to present findings from a study conducted with non-profit organizations (NPOs) in Canada and Australia, focusing on the use of tools and technologies for knowledge management (KM). NPOs of different sizes and operating in different sectors were studied in two large-scale national surveys. The paper is useful to both practit...

Objectives: To determine national pediatric information needs, seeking behaviours, and preferences of health care professionals working in general EDs. Methods: An electronic cross-sectional survey was conducted with health care professionals in 32 Canadian general EDs. Data were collected in the EDs using the iPad and in-person data collectors....

Many publications, institutional policies, and resources focus on the professional development of doctoral students and junior faculty while professional development needs and resources available to mid-career faculty receive limited attention. The proposed panel aims to facilitate a discussion on issues faced by mid-career faculty in the informati...

Information behavior research has typically explored individual-level practices, even within studies of groups and group activities. Although collaborative information seeking has emerged in recent years to explore how people search for and share information, much of this research also focuses on individual-level experiences. Collectivist approache...

Research on how young children use information to orient themselves in daily life and to solve problems (known as everyday life information seeking or ELIS) has not been conducted, in-depth, in information science. This exploratory observation study examines how 15 Australian preschool children (aged three to five) used information technologies in...

This research examined the information behavior of parents (including legal guardians) during an emergent health situation with a child. Although many studies examine health-related information behaviors, very few explore health consumers' information practices during moments of health crisis. This study explored parents' information needs, source...

This paper presents results of a nation-wide online survey of Canadian Non-Profit Organizations (NPOs) on their knowledge sharing approaches when engaging with the general public, including volunteers and other community stakeholders. The findings presented in this paper are based on qualitative and quantitative data analyses of over 1200 responses...

This paper explores results of a survey that documented tools and technologies used to manage knowledge in Canadian non-profit organizations (NPOs). Findings demonstrate that NPOs, across various types of organizations, use both non-computer (e.g., print documents) and computer-based solutions to manage knowledge. Examples of tools/technologies use...

Current perspectives on young children?s use of digital technology suggest that preschool teachers need to provide more effective guidance for children. There is still little research, however, to inform how guidance might be understood and practiced during interactions with digital technology. This article employs an ethnomethodological perspectiv...

This poster presents key emerging findings from theonline survey which was conducted with a largenumber of Australian non-profit sector units to getinsight into the use of knowledge management (KM)practices as well as the use of social media such asFacebook, YouTube and Twitter, particularly in KMpractices. The findings from the data collected duri...

Background: Translating Emergency Knowledge for Kids was established to bridge the research-practice gap in pediatric emergency care by bringing the best evidence to Canadian general emergency departments (EDs). The first step in this process was to conduct a national needs assessment to determine the information needs and preferences of health pr...

Presents results from qualitative focus groups with rural educators concerning information needs of sexual and gender minority (SGM) students. Observations on messaging in the physical environment, curricular materials, and internet filtering are provided. The findings document the importance of schools being responsive to, and accountable for, SGM...

Welcome from the CAIS/ACSI & LRI/IRB Conference Co-Chairs

This poster presents key outcomes and emerging findings from ongoing research examining the role of social technologies such as blogs, wikis, and social networks (e.g., Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn) for creating, sharing, gathering and managing knowledge in non-profit organizations (NPOs). Mixed methods research including qualitative interviews with...

This paper presents emerging results of a national online survey of Canadian Non-Profit Organizations (NPOs) on their perception and use of social media, and their role for the purpose of Knowledge Management (KM). Based on results from the first 320 respondents spanning across local and provincial boundaries, these findings provide insight into wh...

This study examined the theme of collaboration associated with independent pharmacist prescribing in Alberta, Canada by analyzing 59 professional documents using a discourse analysis approach. Our analysis highlights the existence of multiple realities, possibility of utilitarian and emancipatory discourses, tensions between independent and collabo...

This research paper explores how ‘social knowledge’, as an emergent category of organizational knowledge, flows through non-profit organizations (NPOs). Examining findings from qualitative interviews with 16 individual from Canadian NPOs on their use of social media for Knowledge Management (KM), the paper builds on KM theories and epistemologies t...

This article discusses the use of observational video recordings to document young children’s use of technology in their homes. Although observational research practices have been used for decades, often with video-based techniques, the participant group in this study (i.e., very young children) and the setting (i.e., private homes) provide a rich...

EDITOR'S SUMMARY Special Interest Group/Information Needs, Seeking and Use (SIG/USE) convened at the 2015 ASIS&T Annual Meeting to explore the links between theory and practice in information behavior. In his keynote address, Ross Todd urged the audience to go beyond models and aim for synthesis and meta‐analysis, focusing on the user. Lightning ta...

Purpose – This paper aims to present findings from a study of non-profit organizations (NPOs), including a model of knowledge needs that can be applied by practitioners and scholars to further develop the NPO sector. Design/methodology/approach – A survey was conducted with NPOs operating in Canada and Australia. An analysis of survey responses id...

This paper reports on the findings of a study that explores the ways in which civil society organizations use new media to engage in campaigns of political action. Focusing on campaigning by the environmental movement in Tasmania around the protection of native forest, the study investigates how stakeholders on this issue utilize the functionality...

The visual traffic sweeps (VTS) approach combines traditional observational methods for assessing library space with geographic information system (GIS) visualization techniques. This unique approach to spatial analysis can be used across library and information settings (or in other spaces with large amounts of human traffic) to map patterns in us...

Australian preschool teachers’ use of Web-searching in their classroom practice was examined (N = 131). Availability of Internet-enabled digital technology and the contribution of teacher demographic characteristics, comfort with digital technologies and beliefs about their use were assessed. Internet-enabled technologies were available in 53% (n =...

EDITOR'S SUMMARY ASIS&T's Special Interest Group/Information Needs, Seeking and Use (SIG/USE) met during the 2014 Annual Meeting for the group's 14th Annual Research Symposium, focusing on Context in Information Behavior Research . Keynote speaker J. David Johnson set the tone as he encouraged research into the context of information activities out...

Compiled by world- class leaders in the field of collaborative information retrieval and search (CIS), this book centres on the notion that information seeking is not always a solitary activity and working in collaboration to perform information-seeking tasks should be studied and supported. Covering aspects of theories, models, and applications th...

Despite a rise in collaborative research, resulting in complex collaborative information seeking (CIS), few studies have explored the CIS experiences of academics in the humanities. This research explores the CIS activities of digital humanities scholars within the broader context of their collaborative research practices. Data from qualitative sem...

Academics are increasingly being asked to demonstrate the impact of their research beyond the walls of the academy. Societal impact measures were introduced as part of the Research Excellence Framework exercise in the UK in 2014 with a number of other countries, including Australia, considering similar assessments. As societal impact measures conti...

Background. Whilst designing and implementing optimal Web information structures contributes to Organisational goals and success, the size and structure of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) make Web information architecture (IA) a challenging task. At the same time, the attitudes and the capabilities of SMEs for online participation are crucial t...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to report on the findings of an audit of community information (CI) portals to provide an overview of how CI is being organised and presented on the web by aggregating services, and how CI is being shaped and shared in community networks. It also investigates the role that public libraries play in online CI pr...

Introduction. This paper presents a qualitative exploration of university students' experience of searching an online public access catalogue. The study investigated how students conceptualise their searching process, as well as how students understand themselves as seekers of information. Method. Following a search task, thirty-eight university st...

MUCH OF WHAT IS WRITTEN about digital technologies in preschool contexts focuses on young children’s acquisition of skills rather than their meaning-making during use of technologies. In this paper, we consider how the viewing of aYouTube video was used by a teacher and children to produce shared understandings about it. Conversation analysis of ta...

Purpose – This paper aims first to identify key interorganisational partnership types among non-profit organisations (NPOs) and second to determine how knowledge sharing takes place within each type of partnership. Results explore the value of social media specifically in facilitating external relationships between NPOs, firms and the communities t...

This study examined the theme of collaboration associated with independent pharmacist prescribing in Alberta, Canada by analyzing 59 professional documents using a discourse analysis approach. Our analysis highlights the existence of multiple realities, possibility of utilitarian and emancipatory discourses, tensions between independent and collabo...

Presents results from qualitative interviews with individuals working in non-profit organizations near Edmonton, Alberta. The findings point to the importance of stories as information sources used within the organizations, with social media playing a key role in capturing those stories and engaging with the community.Seront présentés les derniers...

Practice narratives of web information architecture (IA) in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are investigated. Although web-based information delivery is ubiquitous, research and practice remains focused on larger organisations. This research attends to SMEs, revealing that the dominant voice in practice belongs to the communications and marketi...

This paper reports research findings on how agricultural scientists working on research and development topics in South east Asia communicate with each other. Successful communication between scientists was shown to be vital between team members. However, this contention has not been tested for international research teams from developed and develo...

The development of mobile technology and wearable activity monitors, making it possible for people to retrieve data about their daily activities, is presenting aspects of information seeking behaviour not covered well by previous research. The main objective of this paper is to consider how the new information seeking contexts evident in the use of...

Internet-connected tablets and smart phones are being used increasingly by young children. Little is known, however, about their social interactions with family members when engaged with these technologies. This article examines video-recorded interactions between a father and his two young children, one aged 18 months using an iPhone and one aged...

The not-for-profit sector is an important area for research, since the organizations operating in this domain contribute in many ways to our society (e.g., social value and GDP). Non-profit organizations (NPOs) are highly knowledge-oriented units. Knowledge management (KM) has been researched in breadth and depth in FPOs, where it has been demonstr...

In Information Science (IS), as well as other disciplines, discourse analysis has been used to extend the range of contextual data gathered using other research approaches. This form of textual analysis can enrich our understanding of complex information practices and contexts, particularly in relation to the ways that society and individuals const...

While there has been much interest in children's use of different technologies, research is often done with school‐age children in their classrooms. This exploratory research study looks at fifteen preschool children (aged three to five) in Queensland, Australia and their use of different technologies in their own homes. This paper examines data fr...

It is important for all types of organisations including non-profit organisations (NPOs) to manage knowledge for effective and efficient utilisation of resources. Technology is considered as one of the key enablers of knowledge management (KM) practices but it can be costly to develop and implement in an organisation. With the advent of social medi...

Presents qualitative interview data exploring academic librarians’ perceptions of undergraduates and the role of information resources, design of physical space, and information literacy programs in facilitating academic success. Findings point to information access problems given the university’s socio-political context, varied definitions of succ...