Syros04 toraki

National Identities of engineers
Syros, July 2004
Exploring the information seeking and use habits of engineers in Greece:
a qualitative and quantitative approach
Katerina Toraki
Technical Chamber of Greece, Documentation and Information Unit
Ionian University, Department of Archives and Library Science
toraki@tee.gr
The information behaviour of engineers is found in several papers, either exploring their habits and
practices as a particular category of information users, or presenting them compared to other
categories of scientists. Some characteristics of that behaviour are associated with aspects, such as
library use, computers use, information literacy, ways of communication, librarians as intermediaries,
types of information resources and data, types of information services, quantity of data, speed of
service etc. An attempt to explore and describe the corresponding behaviour of engineers in Greece is
presented in this paper, taking into consideration three different sources of information: the use and
loan statistics at the Technical Chamber of Greece (TEE) Library, the interviews with engineers who
used the library at least once and bibliographic references included in papers published at the
scientific journal of TEE, Technika Chronika. The aim is to investigate the information needs of
engineers in Greece and the ways that they use to express and achieve those needs, paying particular
attention on remote services and on communication practices (personal and technical).
Introduction
Information seeking behavior has been the focus of investigations for more than forty
years, starting from use and user studies around collections and systems evaluation
and continuing to more user-centered approaches, which examine the particular
characteristics, habits and practices of various groups of information users. Some
characteristics of that behaviour are associated with aspects, such as library use,
computers use, information literacy, ways and means of communication, types of
information resources and data, types of information services, quantity of data, speed
of service etc.
The scientific progress of the last five decades and the vast amount of information
resulting from that and from the globalisation of all activities, simultaneously creates
an uncertainty to users who seek information. People involved in information
activities by profession, the so called information professionals – librarians,
information specialists, intermediaries etc – play an important role on the issue of
facilitating users to seek, search and locate the appropriate and adequate information
and data that they need just when they need it.
The information behaviour of engineers, as a special scientific and professional user
group, is described in several research papers. Such an important review article
presented by Pinelli some years ago the surveys conducted over the years on the
information seeking habits of engineers as well as the corresponding results (Pinelli,
1991). A thorough exploration has also been done by David Ellis, who identified eight
major characteristics in the information seeking patterns of engineers: surveying,
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Exploring the information seeking and use…/Katerina Toraki/Syros, July 2004
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chaining, monitoring, browsing, distinguishing, filtering, extracting, ending. (Ellis,
1997).
As it is found in most surveys, engineers have a particular information behavior,
compared to other scientists (Toraki, 2002). The most important issue is that they
have to solve a particular problem, so they have a specific question and they need a
specific (brief, if possible) answer, while they also have and need to keep updated
with their professional and sceintific matters (Veshosky, 1998). So, their information
needs and their information behavior are strongly connected with this.
They usually work within time constraints, they do not rely on the library first for
their problem but after they have not been satisfied from their personal collection or
the assistance from colleagues. They use standards, specifications, legislation, reports,
handbooks, plans, drawings and maps. Accessibility is the first factor they take into
account, so proximity to information and primary information sources is a much
crucial aspect – it means that they usually contact the library when other sources (like
personal files and colleagues) are not adequate or when the library manages to
approach them in the best way. Also, ease of use and/or ease of access are variables
connected to accessibility.
In any case, engineers follow the law of the least effort in order to achieve their goals.
Method
The purpose of this study is to explore how engineers in Greece seek and use
information. This presentation is part of an ongoing study devoted to the assessment
of engineers information behavior and is complementary to an earlier presentation on
remote users (Veshosky, 1998). The general objectives of the study are:
• To investigate the information literacy, information needs and information seeking
behavior of engineers in Greece
• To investigate and determine if and how similar or different they are to the
corresponding needs and behavior of engineers in other countries
• To identify possible difficulties and barriers to meeting those needs
• To identify if and how needs and behavior vary among various groups of
engineers, classified for example by age, professional age, professional specialty,
geographical place etc.
• To assess information behavior in relation to existing information services in
Greece and propose measures to improve the situation.
• To contribute to the debate on engineering history, education and learning issues
and show the relation of information studies area with them.
Quantitative and qualitative approaches are very often used to study the environment
in various situations. A long-standing debate exists on the usefulness and/or the role
of one or of the other. A widely accepted perception supports that “quantitative
research is confirmatory and deductive in nature”, while “qualitative research is
exploratory and inductive in nature”, although both “can be used to address almost
any kind of research question” (Trochim, 2004). In any case however, it is true that
each of these approaches cannot give reliable results on its own, and that, one the one
hand quantitative data need an interpretation more or less theoretical but also on the
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other hand, those who use qualitatitive approaches often produce tabular and other
similar data in order to extract more visible or tangible answers to particular issues.
Action research and ethnographic studies are qualitative explorations, which push to a
more thorough study of the user group and the interpretation of their behavior and
practices. The present study attempts to start following this approach, considering that
it can lead to reliable results and that it can contribute to the corresponding research
area for the engineering as well as for for the information science sector.
The information used to explore the situation as described above, is extracted from
data gathered at the Library of the Technical Chamber of Greece, a leading technical
library, mainly serving engineers. The Technical Chamber is the professional
organization of greek engineers, so the professional and scientific information needs
of its members are among its first priorities. The Library, established in 1920s soon
after the TEE was established, as well as the Data Bank which operates the last 10
years as a leading information portal for engineers in Greece, provide the best
indicators for the way that TEE acknowledges the engineering matters.
As already mentioned, this study continues one presented three years ago, where it
was attempted for the first time to investigate issues like the information literacy and
information practices of greek engineers and the need for developing remote services
for them. In that survey, data were gathered from a questionnaire sent to a random
sample of engineers, as well as from email and fax messages received at the Library
throughout the years 2000 to 2001. At that time, it was found that engineers used to
communicate remotely by fax, email or telephone, that they used fax more than email,
that age and professional experience had an impact on computer and information
literacy, that they did not know well about the library information services, that place
of living had an impact on the use of the library and they slightly preferred to use an
existing physical library than to communicate remotely and that a big problem
especially for those living remotely was that of acquiring primary sources. It was
more than apparent that engineers need remote, specialized information services.
Taking those conclusions into account and having already implemented “better” and
many more remote information services for engineers at the Library, but also in the
country in general (especially through the development of academic libraries), an
attempt is made now to explore in more depth the particular, if exist, characteristics
and needs of engineers in the present situation.
The aim here is to extract information on the information channels and information
sources they mostly use, on the criteria they have to cover their information needs, on
the need to use the library, on the services they need from the library and on their
relation with the library staff. Data were gathered from email messages sent to the
library in 2003, from loan and visit statistics for the same year and from email
interviews with 10 engineers who had already communicated by email with the
library.
Citation analysis is also used to investigate the sources used by engineers as authors
of scientific articles. The sources cited by authors do often provide the means to explore
their information use practices. A great amount of research studies have been carried out in
fields like bibliometrics, scientometrics, history of science and tehnology, sociology of
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science, after the historian of science Derek de Solla Price studied the scientific progress and
the information explosion at the beginning of 1960s, authoring the books “Science since
Babylon” and “Little Science, big science”. The scientific journal of the Technical
Chamber Technika Chronika was used for this purpose.
Email interviews
A random sample of 10 engineers, who had already communicated by email with the
Library, was taken for an email interview. Six of them were not from Athens and
eight were freelance engineers. Among them, an architect had graduated in 1979, 2
mechanical engineers in 1954 and 1996, 3 civil engineers in 1992, 2001 and 2002, 2
computer engineers in 1997 and 2002, 1 mineral resources engineer in 2002 and 1
surveyor in 1992. One of the computer engineers is a person with mobility problems.
At the question which information sources they use more, the aged engineer gave a
high priority to personal files and memory/experience but relatively low to colleagues.
The first priority was also given by the architect, who seemed to trust his colleagues
and friends as well, while he does not trust very much the Internet and the meetings.
Books and meetings cover the first places among the information sources that most of
the rest interviewed seemed to prefer, while memory and experience are classified
about in the middle of the scale.
Although however they trust their personal communication activities, they also
believe that the library can cover at least part of their scientific and professional
information needs. Two of them recommended that it should improve its collection
development policy, one reported that it is not user friendly and another one that it
would be useful if it could help her to finish her postgraduate dissertation.
When they were asked to reply how they prefer to communicate with the library, the
email communication possessed the first place for all, except for the aged engineer,
who prefers to visit the physical place of the library. Three of them want to use only
email, while the architect prefers email or visit. Only four of the interviewed said that
they want to use fax, but they gave it the third place. The telephone contact has the
second place for the same people. Email and telephone are the preferred ways of
communication of the handicapped person. Although however they mostly prefer the
electronic communication, the seven out of ten also believe that personalised
communication with library staff is very important, because the particular person
creates better service and trust. One however, said that particular contacts are not
necessary, if everybody does his job well.
Concerning the criteria they use to select the ways to cover their information needs,
giving them the alternatives cost, time, distance, type of information service, library
staff, subject, speed of service and quantity of data, time and speed of service occupy
the first positions, followed by distance, cost and type of information service.
Loan and usage statistics
There were 5700 visitors in the library for 2003, among whom about half of them (2840) were
engineers: 880 civil engineers, 680 architects, 485 mechanical engineers, 284 chemical
engineers, 270 electrical engineers, 115 surveyors, 60 mining and metallurgical engineers, 35
naval engineers, 30 electronic engineers.
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The following table shows the distribution of visitors by specialty as a percentage of total
engineers, as well as the corresponding distribution of Technical Chamber members.
Visitors TEE members
Civil engineers 30 25
Architects 24 16
Mechanical engineers 17 12
Electrical engineers 10 13
Chemical engineers 11 8
Surveyors 4 6
Mining & metallurgical engineers 2 2
Naval engineers 1 2
Electronic engineers 1 2
Regarding the loan statistics, 7713 regular loans have been recorded for 2003, among which
the 6660 were books. Sorting them by subject, it is found that 1718 are classified in
architecture, 1430 in civil engineering in general, 680 in mechanical engineering, 572 in
buildings, 560 in town planning, 543 in environmental issues, 412 in transportation, 358 in
computer science, 353 in materials science and technology, 244 in chemical engineering and
218 in management.
Architecture 1718
Civil engineering 1430
Mechanical engineering 680
Buildings 572
Town planning 560
Environment 543
Transportation 412
Computer science 358
Materials 353
Chemical engineering 244
Management 218
Email messages
Among the 260 email messages sent to the Library in 2003, 75 do not have a city indication,
43 come from Athens, 26 from Thessaloniki, and the rest from other parts of the country. 163
of them were loan requests, 77 were asking for information (a specific question or
bibliography etc) and 20 were asking for a specific piece of legislation.
As far as the specialty is concerned, only 100 of them had given it clearly and among them 42
are civil engineers, 19 are architects, 14 are mechanical engineers, 11 are electrical engineers,
5 are chemical engineers, 1 is surveyor and 9 are students.
It should be noted here that for the same year, fax messages from engineers to Athens
Library were 70 straight to the library and 103 through a regional library of TEE.
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Citation analysis
Technika Chronika is the scientific journal of the Technical Chamber and it is the peer-
reviewed journal for engineers in greek language. It is published in 5 series, corresponding to
engineering specialties: I for civil engineers and surveyors, II for architects, III for electrical,
electronic and computer engineers, IV for mechanical and naval engineers, V for chemical
engineers and for mining and metallurgical engineers. There were studied 5 recent articles for
each of them, that is 25 articles in total. The citations were counted as following: total
number, number of monographs (total monographs, monographs in greek, meetings), number
of journals (total number, greek journals, journals in greek libraries).
The distribution of cited sources in each article is depicted on the following table:
SeriesTotalMonographs
Greek
monographs
Meetings Journals
Greek
journals
Journals in
Greece
V 12 10 6 2 1 1
V 8 8 7
V 22 7 1 15 12
V 10 3 7 6
V 18 14 1 1 4 3
IV 15 8 2 7 6
IV 19 9 4 1 10 9
IV 11 8 5 3 1 2
IV 9 1 8 7
IV 9 3 3 6 4
III 11 6 1 2 5 5
III 14 10 1 6 4 1 1
III 20 15 5 5
III 14 7 7 1 5
III 15 11 1 4 1 5
II 15 15 2
II 46 24 19 22 21
II 22 15 4 7 1 6
II 17 17 5
II 21 8 6 13 2 13
I 17 11 3 6 4
I 35 10 1 25 1 23
I 26 13 2 13 2 13
I 21 12 7 9 2 8
I 30 11 2 19 18
As it is shown on the diagrams, monographs cover the majority of cited sources, most
of them in english language (engineers working on constructions, like civil engineers
and architects, are those who mostly cite greek books, while civil engineers are those
who cite monographs more than the others). Most of journals cited are in english
language, and almost all of them do exist in greek libraries. Greek sources are seldom
used, mostly monographs. Among english language journals, electrical engineers cite
IEEE journals and civil engineers cite ASCE journals. All of them exist in greek
libraries.
Conclusions
The data gathered and analyzed for this presentation cover a short time period, so one could
say that they cannot perhaps satisfy the need for reliable results, confirmed through a
longterm investigation of several factors. There will be however an attempt to draw some
results, showing at the same time the areas in which research should start and/or continue, by
utilizing more “scientific” means and methods.
The engineers look more familiarized with information and Internet technology compared to
the survey carried out three years ago. Email messages are used more now, especially for loan
requests. It would be interesting to collect data for telephone calls as well, because they are
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too many and there would be expressed more reliable conclusions on the ways and means that
engineers use to communicate with the library.
Among the particular engineers groups, civil engineers and architects are those more often
using the library, conclusion drawn from email messages as well as from visits statistics. One
could say that it happens, not only because they are the bigger groups among engineers, but
also they are those who work more as freelance professionals. This result could also be
combined with the Technical Chamber history through the years in order to explore issues
like role of various engineering groups and impact of TEE policies on professional,
educational, scientific, technological, industrial and political matters.
Regarding the information use, citation analysis provides an indication of engineers citation
practices, but a wider research should be necessary in order to draw correct, reliable results. It
is noteworthy that monographs cover a serious amount of cited sources, which conforms to
other researchers studies, providing similar results.
The language barrier is not an issue for engineers, but it should also be said that there are not
several specialized engineering publications in greek. Most of the researchers publish in
foreign scientific journals, so one could admit that articles in Technika Chronika is perhaps a
presentation of research work already or also presented, often in more depth, in international
journals. It should be noted here that most of the authors of the 25 articles are academics and
their information habits may present differences to those of freelance engineers, who are the
users, mostly using TEE Library. So, this is also an interesting area for investigation.
Making the comment that the present study is only indicative of the issues that could be
analyzed and putting a fullstop now, as an engineer myself with research as well as with
directly practical professional interests and experience, I should say that there is a huge need
for research work on information seeking and use habits of engineers in my country, with the
aim to contribute to and complement the research on engineering studies in Greece, to
improve the engineering education and literacy and of course to improve and/or develop new
modern information services for engineers.
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References
Ellis, D. (1997) Modelling the information seeking patterns of engineers and research
scientists in an industrial environment. Journal of Documentation, Vol. 53, No. 4, pp.
384-403.
Pinelli, T. (1991). The Information-Seeking Habits and Practices of Engineers,
Science & Technology Libraries, Vol. 11 No. 3, pp. 5-25.
Toraki, K. (2002). Remote users in the virtual library: need for diversification?. In: 4th
Libraries without walls Conference, Cerlim, Lesvos Greece, September 16, 2001.
edited by Peter Brophy, Shelagh Fisher, and Zoλ Clarke. London: Facet Publishing,
2002, pp. 208-216.
Trochim, B. (2004). The qualitative debate. [Available on the Internet:
http://www.socialresearchmethods.net/kb/qualdeb.htm, Accessed 1 July 2004]
Veshosky, D. (1998). Managing innovation information in engineering and
construction firms. Journal of management in engineering, Vol. 14, No. 1, pp. 58-66.
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