What do you want to know about digital reference sessions?

[Sloan, Bernie]

I am ready to start a project that will involve analyzing transcripts of
chat-based digital reference sessions.

Before I begin, I thought I'd ask what people might like to know about
digital reference sessions.

Here are a few examples of what I'll be looking for:

1. Type of question, e.g., ready reference, research, directional, etc. I
will also look for commonly occuring questions that might be handled by
FAQs.

2. Type of answer, e.g., actual answer provided during session, referral to
online resource, referral to print source, referral to library, etc.

3. Length of session, both in terms of time and the number of interactions
between librarian and user.

4. How do sessions compare to model reference interviews?

5. How many actual digital reference questions can be answered using freely
available Web resources? In other words, no matter what the librarian did to
answer the question, could that question have been answered with a digital
resource?

If any of you have any burning questions about how digfital reference really
works, I'm open to suggestions.

Thanks!

Bernie Sloan
Senior Library Information Systems Consultant
University of Illinois Office for Planning and Budgeting
338 Henry Administration Building
506 S. Wright Street
Urbana, IL  61801
Phone: (217) 333-4895
Fax:     (217) 265-0454
E-mail: bernies at uillinois.edu