[Web4lib] Federated search products and Full Text/PeerReview limiting

[David Walker]

>> Encouraging this behavior would encourage the 
>> students to ignore anything that is not easily available

I understand your concern here, Karen.  I think libraries need to seek
out opportunities to encourage students to look for the best resources,
rather than just those that are easiest to get.  That's important to
good research.

But I think Ross and Roy are entirely right here.  Forcing users to
click on a link resolver button for each search result just to determine
that item's availability does little or nothing to encourage users to
look for the most appropriate resources.  It simply frustrates them.

Likewise, we have to view each interaction with the library as an
opportunity to win-over our users.  If our systems are not easy-to-use,
our users have an increasing number of other places they can go.

We need to meet students where they are, and design metasearch and other
systems to better meet their goals and behavior.  Once we've got them
hooked on using the library, we can, through instructional sessions and
in reference encounters, encourage them to get beyond immediate
full-text only.

But it has to be a carrot rather than a stick.

--Dave


 

-----Original Message-----
From: web4lib-bounces at webjunction.org
[mailto:web4lib-bounces at webjunction.org] On Behalf Of Karen Harker
Sent: Tuesday, April 18, 2006 11:43 AM
To: web4lib at webjunction.org
Subject: Re: [Web4lib] Federated search products and Full
Text/PeerReview limiting

However, using such visual cues as the appearance (or non-appearance) of
the link resolver button/link could only further the reliance on
full-text. Encouraging this behavior would encourage the students to
ignore anything that is not easily available, causing them to miss a
still rather large segment of literature and information.
 
 
 
Karen R. Harker, MLS
UT Southwestern Medical Library
5323 Harry Hines Blvd.
Dallas, TX  75390-9049
214-648-8946
http://www.utsouthwestern.edu/library/

>>> Roy Tennant <roy.tennant at ucop.edu> 4/18/2006 1:24 PM >>>

On Apr 18, 2006, at 9:52 AM, Dale Askey wrote:

> Besides, if you have a good link resolver, why limit to full text  
> results? Just slap a link resolver button on each result, and that  
> problem is largely solved.

I disagree strongly with this position. Slapping a link resolver  
button on each search result does little to help the user focus on  
only content that is available in full-text. Expecting the user to  
successively click on a link resolver button for each and every  
result, not knowing what they can expect, strikes me as particularly  
user-hostile. Realizing this, places like the University of  
Rochester, CSU San Marcos, and now soon us at the California Digital  
Library, are developing services that will do a lookup to the OpenURL  
resolver _before_ putting the search results up, so we can depict  
whether an item is available in full-text or not (with a link direct  
to the source).

Even better would be to have the ability to limit search results to  
full-text resources, but as has been said here that is still  
difficult and often out of our hands (vendors need to support it). So  
no, the problem is far from solved, at least from the perspective of  
good user service.
Roy
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