IRiX Projects
Task-embedded information seeking and retrieval
Ontology-based information retrieval
Cross-language information retrieval
Learning, Information Literacy & Web
Sami Serola
Task complexity, information needs and use of information resources in city planning
The aim of the study is to find out how 17 planners from the City of
Tampere in Finland are using Net resources in their everyday work. The
use of Net resources is studied in the context of perceived work tasks,
perceived types of the information sought, and the use of information
resources in general. Each participant was interviewed and observed in
three stages. First, a pre-interview was conducted in order to find out
what are the participants’ work tasks and information-seeking habits in
general. Next, the participants were asked to log their Internet
browser’s search history log during one month. After that followed the
post-interview where the participants were asked to recall what tasks
and information needs they had had during the last 2 to 4 weeks in
relation to the search history.
The analysis is based on the model of task complexity, information
types and sources presented by Byström (JASIST 53(7)). The work tasks
are classified into main tasks typical for city planners. Information
resources are classified based on the location of the person or
organization that provides the access to the channel or data. In this
study the aim is to find out how task complexity and task type affect
on the information types needed and the choice of information
resources.
The study was started in the autumn 2002. The interviews and
observation were carried out in autumn 2003. The results will be
reported in Ph. D. thesis in spring 2007. (Supervisors are prof. Pertti
Vakkari and prof. Eero Sormunen)
Feza Baskaya, Kalervo Järvelin, Sari Suomela, Jaana Kekäläinen
QUCCOO - ontology-based interactive IR interface
The QUCCOO project develops an interactive Search Ontology Editor
(ShOE for CIRI) and an ontology based tool QUCCOO (for Query Construction based on Ontologies) for interactive query construction and expansion. Software
development is done by M.Eng. Feza Baskaya (supervisor prof. Kal
Jarvelin). User testing has by M.Soc.Sci Sari Suomela and M.Soc.Sci Anne Kakkonen (supervisor prof.
Jaana Kekäläinen).
The project has partial external funding from TEKES under the FENIX Project Consortium.
Heikki Keskustalo, Raija Lehtokangas, Kalervo Järvelin
Relevance Feedback in Dictianay-based CLIR
The project has found that dictionary-based CLIR systems, while
providing acceptable output by normal evaluation standards, may miss
higly relevant documents. It therefore seeks to establish relevance
feedback methods that would improve the retrieval of highly-relevant
documents. Both pseudo-relevance feedback, based on best ranking
initial documents, and simulated user-based feedback, based on
simulated user's relevance feedback decisions, are investigated. The
researchers are Heikki Keskustalo and Raija Lehtokangas (supervisor
prof. Kal Jarvelin).
Eija Airio
MLIR - multilingual CLIR applications
CLIR has been studied a lot in laboratory environments: test
collections have been used in most of the studies instead of real life
environment, like Web, and there are rarely any user tests. The goal of
this research is to perform CLIR user tests in Web to see the whether
CLIR systems are applicable in real life. More: http://www.info.uta.fi/tutkimus/fire/projects/mlir.php#usertests
Preben Hansen
Task-based IR in the Patent Domain
The project examines, based on a qualitative data set, the patent
application process and associated individual and collaborative
information seeking and retrieval at the Swedish Patent Office. The
rich data set was collected by using interviews, observation, and
online diaries. M.Bib.Sci Preben Hansen is the principal researcher
(supervisor prof. Kal Jarvelin).
Sanna Talja, Pertti Vakkari
Characteristics of scholarly domains and patterns of searching and using literature provided by FinElib
Project description updated: 2005
The aim of this project is to explore the characteristics of
disciplines that underpin differences in scholarly communities'
information practices, especially the methods of searching and
accessing networked information. Whitley's (1984) theory is extended to
develop hypotheses concerning the relations between a field's research
culture and its communication system, nature of information resources,
and patterns of literature use. Among the aspects explored are field
interdependency, work patterns/group membership, and scattering of
relevant resources. The data used in this study come from FinElib user
questionnaires. Researchers in this project are Dr Pertti Vakkari and
Dr Sanna Talja.
Pertti Vakkari
Enhancing conceptually structured terminological support for searchers of health information
The aim of ontologies is to support human actors to find expressions
of their information needs for searching and browsing in information
systems. Typically they have been build on some domain specific
principles not necessarily taking into account users' ways of
conceptualizing and expressing things. It is an open question to which
degree the expressions in a health ontology correspond to the
expressions of users. The utility of the ontology to its users in
expressing their information needs depends to a great extent to the
degree of this match.
The aim of the project is to analyze citizens’ information needs and
searching in central areas of health matters for generating ideas how
to improve health ontology for citizens’ health portal initiated by
National Public Health Institute (KTL). It is studied to which degree
the expressions of concepts in citizens’ information problems in
central areas of health are covered by the expressions of concepts in
FinMeSH and YSA (General Finnish Thesaurus). The vocabulary and search
tactics used in health web queries of various citizen groups is also
analyzed. The core vocabularies of these groups are compared with the
vocabularies of FinnMeSH and YSA. Conclusions of the enrichment of the
ontology are drawn based on the results.
Eero Sormunen , Mikko Tanni, Kai Halttunen
Web-tiedonhaku, informaatiolukutaito ja oppiminen –Web-SeaL
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Oppimisen tutkimus korostaa oppijan aktiivista roolia oppimiseen
liittyvässä tiedonhankinnassa (knowledge acquisition). Internetin
vakiinnuttaessa asemaansa jokapäiväisenä ja laajalti käytettynä
informaation etsinnän (information searching) kanavana, se on saanut
entistä näkyvämmän sijan myös oppimiseen liittyvässä tiedonhankinnassa.
Informaatiolukutaidosta (information literacy) on tämän kehityksen
seurauksena tullut kriittinen taito niin yleissivistävässä,
ammatillisessa kuin yliopistollisessakin koulutuksessa. Internetin
informaatioresurssien laajempaan hyödyntämiseen liittyy monien etujen
lisäksi olennaisia riskejä. Informaation etsinnän laaja soveltaminen
oppimistehtävissä altistaa oppijat mekaanisen kopioinnin ja
pintaoppimisen houkutuksille. Oppimistulokset voivat jäädä
vaatimattomiksi, jos oppimistehtävien suunnittelussa
informaatiolukutaidon luonnetta sekä sen yhteyttä tiedonhankintaan ja
tiedon soveltamiseen ei ymmärretä riittävän selkeästi.
Tutkimuksen tavoitteena on selvittää informaatiolukutaidon ja oppimisen
vuorovaikutussuhdetta webin dominoimassa informaatioympäristössä.
Ilmiötä tutkitaan kahdessa koulutuksen kontekstissa: yleissivistävässä
ja korkeanasteen koulutuksessa. Tutkimus fokusoituu kahden
tutkimuskysymyksen ympärille:
1. Kuinka oppijat etsivät, arvioivat ja käyttävät informaatiota essee- ja projektityyppisissä oppimistehtävissä?
2. Kuinka informaatiolukutaitoa voidaan kehittää integroimalla
informaatiolukutaidon oppimisen ohjaus osaksi yleistä oppimisprosessia?
Ensimmäinen tutkimuskysymys pyrkii avaamaan informaation etsinnän,
tiedonhankinnan ja oppimisen välisiä vuorovaikutuksia. Toinen
tutkimuskysymys pyrkii löytämään keinoja informaatiolukutaidon
oppimiseen.
Projekti on tieteidenvälinen, informaatiotutkimuksen ja
kasvatustieteiden osaamisen yhdistämiseen perustuva yritys ratkaista
haastava ja toistaiseksi vähän tutkittu ongelma. Tutkimuksella on
mahdollisuus tuottaa olennaisesti uutta teoreettista ja empiiristä
tietoa informaation etsinnän ja oppimiseen liittyvän tiedonhankinnan
yhteyksistä sekä kehittää jäsentyneempi viitekehys
informaatiolukutaidon kehittymiseen edettäessä koulutustasolta toiselle.
Lisätietoja projektin kotisivuilta: https://www11.uta.fi/blog/webseal/
Mikko Tanni
Teacher trainees' reflective information
behavior in lesson planning
The adoption of the Internet has
transformed the information environment available for education. Information
literacy standards have emerged to ensure that students would have the skills
to exploit the new information resources. Information literacy education has
been premised on the assumption that teachers' are information literate in the
new information environment. This project examines teacher trainees' practices
and conceptions of information seeking and use with regards to their potential
capability to deliver information literacy education. The project focuses on
teacher trainees' information behavior in lesson planning.
The project is carried out in co-operation
with the University of Tampere department of subject teacher education, which
maintains that teacher’s professional skills develop from experience, in
reflection with novel pedagogical theories, into didactic theories applicable
in practice. Digital portfolios and mobile devices are utilized in subject
teacher training as facilitators of the trainees’ reflective learning
activities.
The project is funded as a part of
Web-Seal project https://www11.uta.fi/blog/webseal
Katja Hilska-Keinänen
Affordances of organizational wikis for
internal communication and knowledge sharing
The study explores the affordances of
wiki-based intranets for internal communication, knowledge sharing and
knowledge creation in an organization. The data is collected using a
compilation of a survey, theme interviews and wiki log analysis. The study
focuses on health researchers working in a public sector research institute.
The research teams are selected from different fields of expertise and
different geographical locations. The study will reveal if, and how, the
wiki-intranet has changed the internal communication, information and knowledge
sharing and knowledge creation practices within these teams. It will also
discuss the possibilities of developing the wiki-intranet further as a group
work tool supporting collaborative information work and knowledge sharing.
The study was started in the autumn 2007.
The survey and interviews are carried out in the spring 2008. The results will
be reported in international seminars and in Ph. D. Thesis. Supervisors are
Prof. Sanna Talja and Prof. Reijo Savolainen. The project has partial funding
from the University of Tampere Foundation and the Finnish Cultural Foundation.
Patricia Souto
Improving support to knowledge creation by
adapting the information retrieval interaction according to a
sense-making-situational user modeling
The research is about improving knowledge
workers intellectual access to inputs(information resources, people) by
designing and applying a different kind of user modeling to their information
retrieval interaction. The user modeling process and system explored by this
research is designed with basis on knowledge workers’ sense-making practices
(Dervin?s Sense-Making Methodology) within knowledge creating activities, in
the business context (in knowledge-intensive organizations).
The focus of the research is on the knowledge
about users (i.e. on the user model and on the user modeling) that should drive
and support how inputs can be selected in information retrieval interaction.
Pertti Vakkari, Saila Huuskonen
Institutional practices and information systems in the production and
use of information in child protection processes
The aim of
the project is to explore how the variation of institutional practices and of
client information systems is associated with the acquisition, recording and
use of information and clients’ narrative knowledge by social workers in the child
protection process, and how clients contribute to this knowledge production
process.
The study
is realized and the data are collected in the offices for child protection in
the cities of Hämeenlinna, Pori and Tampere.
The
research team consists of researchers from the Department of Information
Studies (Prof. Pertti Vakkari, Doctoral Students Saila Huuskonen and Sami
Serola) and from the Department of Social Policy and Social Work (Prof. Tarja
Pösö, Ass. Prof. Aino Ritala-Koskinen, Doctoral Student Johanna Korpinen). The centre
for excellence on social welfare in Pirkanmaa (Pikassos) and Stakes (National
Research and Development Centre for Welfare and Health) are also involved in the
project. It is funded
by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health between 10.2007-11.2008.
Elina Late
Cultural
shaping of scholarly communication in research institutes
Scholarly communication has established to its modern form to contain for example journals, monographs, conferences, and
raports. Communication practices vary between disciplines
and even between neighbour fields. Different specialist fields have developed their own
cultures with distinct ways to communicate. Studies about scholarly
communication have usually focused on researchers who work at universities.
However, there is some evidence that work organization, disciplinary cultures
and funding patterns have impact on scholarly communication.
The aim of my research is to study scholarly communication in two major
Finnish research institutes.
Research questions concern cultural shaping of scholarly communication in
research institutes. Becher's (1989) and Whitley's (2000) theories about
scientific cultures are used as a theoretical background. Both qualitative and
quantitative methdos will be exploited. Expected outcomes will offer formative
aspects of scholarly communication in specialists fields in research
institutes. Topic is interesting from universities point of view as well when
universities dependence of the goverments budget funds will to some extend
decrease. Because of that research culture in universities is likely to become
more similar with culture in research institutes.
The study was started in spring 2008. Sanna Talja and Pertti Vakkari are
supervisors of the project.
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