Introduction: Colon cancer incidence and mortality rates in Canada are among the highest worldwide. If detected early colon cancer is highly curable and regular screening can significantly decrease risk of colon cancer mortality. Despite this, screening rates in Canada are consistently low and immigrant and senior populations are particularly vulnerable due to low health literacy and language barriers. This research consists of three studies that were designed to explore the cancer prevention experiences of older English-as-a-Second Language (ESL) Chinese immigrant women in Canada. This includes an investigation of colon and breast cancer screening utilization, health literacy skills and comprehension of colon cancer prevention information, and experiences and preferences when seeking cancer information by these immigrant women. Methods: A convenience sample of 110 Mandarin and Cantonese-speaking ESL immigrant women were recruited from two Southern Ontario communities. For study inclusion participants were required to: (1) be 50 years of age or older, (2) have immigrated to Canada, (3) have Cantonese or Mandarin as their first language and English as their second language, and (4) be able to read in English. Participants were excluded if they or their spouse had been previously diagnosed with any type of cancer. Participants completed a battery of questionnaires assessing demographic characteristics, use of breast and colon cancer screening, acculturation, self-efficacy, health beliefs and health literacy. Health literacy was assessed using the Short Test of Functional Health Literacy in Adults (S-TOFHLA) and comprehension of a colon cancer prevention information sheet from Cancer Care Ontario was assessed using the cloze procedure. Participants participated in a semi-structured interview to explore cancer information seeking preferences and experiences, and their understanding of cancer prevention information. Multivariate logistic regression was used to identify predictors of colon and breast cancer screening. To identify variables significantly associated with performance on the S-TOFHLA and cloze test regression analyses were performed. Directed content analysis was used to identify themes associated with barriers to cancer information seeking and understanding that emerged from the interviews. Results: Study #1: There was high self-reported screening for breast and colon cancer. Eighty-five percent of the women were current mammography screeners and 75% were current colon cancer screeners. Recommendation from a physician (OR=.140; 95% CI= .044, -.448), having a female physician (OR=.141; 95% CI= .033, .591), and high or moderate proficiency in English (OR=.283; 95% CI= .089, .902) significantly predicted mammography screening. Physician recommendation (OR=.103; 95% CI= .031, .349), first language (OR= 1.85; 95% CI= .055, .628) and higher self-efficacy (OR= 3.613; 95% CI= 1.179, 11.070) predicted use of colon cancer screening. Other important predictors included greater health literacy and longer residency in Canada. Study #2: Only 38.7% of the women had adequate health literacy on S-TOFHLA and 54.3% had adequate comprehension of the colon cancer information. Comprehension of the colon cancer information was significantly lower among women who received the information in English, compared to those who received the information in Chinese (p<0.01). Age, acculturation, self-reported proficiency reading English, and education were significant predictors of health literacy but varied depending on the measure (S-TOFHLA, cloze) and language of information (English, Chinese). Study #3: There were unique health information seeking preferences among the older Chinese immigrant women including a strong preference for interpersonal and interactive cancer information from their physician and trusted others, such as friends and family. Barriers to cancer information seeking included language difficulties and limited time with physicians. Differences in health literacy did not distinguish the women on any of the major themes. Conclusion: Language, culture, health literacy and the role of the physician emerged across all three studies examining the cancer prevention experiences of older Chinese immigrant women. While language concordant educational materials may improve understanding of cancer information, the results from this study suggest that it is important to consider factors other than language alone and to address important cultural issues that play a role in the access, use, and understanding of cancer information.

The purpose of this paper was to study the information behaviour of players in an online computer game, namely the MMORPG1 World of Warcraft. To this end a survey was constructed to gather empirical data about the habits of players. In the survey the respondent was presented with four different scenarios and asked to first rank these by complexity and then answering which path they usually take to satisfy the informational need. The complexity was introduced as a possible contributing factor influencing the path taken. A study of different principles relevant to information behaviour was completed and in addition to the main theory, theory regarding social capital and information gatekeepers was included. Some background to what kind of different online games there are and what an MMORPG is. A total of 58 responses was collected and although the data wasn't deemed descriptive of the population as a whole, it showed quite clearly that within the context of World of Warcraft the most common way to fulfil an information need is by visiting a third-party website to obtain the needed information. Out of 229 possible responses spread over the four different scenarios, a staggering 177 answered that they visit a third-party website. This however resonates well with the principle of least effort, where a seeker always aim to use the path that over time results in the least effort.

The Relationship between Organizational Socialization, Information Seeking Behavior, and Organizational Commitment of New High-tech Professionals Abstract Due to the rapid growth of high-tech industry in Taiwan, there is an increasing need for high-tech professionals. Therefore, it is easy for high-tech professionals to switch jobs frequently. This phenomenon causes high-tech companies to spend a lot of money and time on the management of newcomers every year, so it is important to understand how newcomers adjust to the new environment and increase their commitment to the organization. Organizational socialization is generally defined as the process whereby newcomers learn the behaviors and attitudes for assuming roles in an organization. Research on socialization has focused on the socialization tactics used by organizations and tends to portray newcomers as passive in the socialization process. However, relatively is known about how newcomers obtain the information they need. Hence, this study was designed to examine the relationship between organizational socialization, information seeking behavior and organizational commitment of high-tech professionals. Besides, this research also examined the mediating effects of socialization content on the relationship between organization socialization and organizational commitment and the relationship between information seeking behavior and organizational commitment. Surveys were given to 99 new professionals six and twelve months into their jobs. The results of the research indicate that: 1. High-tech companies tend to use institutionalized socialization tactics; new professionals tend to use overt, third party and observing tactics to obtain the information . 2. Collect, sequential, fixed and serial socialization tactics are associated with high socialization content; overt and observing information seeking tactics are associated with high socialization content. 3. Sequential fixed and serial socialization tactics are associated with high organizational commitment; observing information seeking tactic and high socialization content are associated with high organizational commitment. 4. The mediating effects of socialization content on the relationship between organization socialization and organizational commitment and the relationship between information seeking behavior and organizational commitment are not obvious. Key words: organizational socialization, information seeking behavior, socialization commitment, high-tech company, newcomer

This study aims to explore the socialization issues of new-coming professional engineers. Based on theory socialization, social learning theory and social information processing approach, this study attempts to introduce work group socialization (group level) and self socialization (individual level), i.e., information seeking behavior, to the research model simultaneously. It is to improve the inconsistency between theories and empirical studies, and further to provide integral perspective on newcomer¡¦s socialization issues. Therefore, this study applies cross-level research design to explore and analyze relationships among socialization tactics at group and individual level, role breath self-efficacy and role performance. Collecting data from 91 groups, which include 91 immediate supervisors and 384 new-coming professional engineers, the research draws conclusion in two dimensions: (1) information seeking behavior, role breath self-efficacy, and role performance relationships at individual level; (2) socialization tactics, role breath self-efficacy and role performance relationships at cross-level. At the individual level, the results show that (1) when individuals apply overt, third party, and observation as the information seeking behaviors, there is a positive effect on role performance; when apply indirect and test as the information seeking behaviors, there is a negative effect on role performance. (2) When individuals apply ¡§overt¡¨, ¡§third party¡¨, and ¡§observation¡¨ as the information seeking behaviors, there is a positive effect on role breath self-efficacy; when apply ¡§indirect¡¨ and ¡§test¡¨ as the information seeking behaviors, there is a negative effect on role breath self-efficacy. (3) When individuals have high level of role breath self-efficacy, they are more willing to undertake tasks beyond work requirement, and thus have significant increase in role performance. (4) Role breath self-efficacy has full mediating effect on the relationship between overt, indirect, third party, test and role performance, and it has partial mediating effect on the relationship between observation and role performance. At the cross-level, it is found that (1) when the groups adopt ¡§investiture¡¨ and ¡§sequential¡¨ socialization tactics, the individual¡¦s role performance is positively increased; when the groups adopt ¡§collective¡¨, ¡§formal¡¨, ¡§serial¡¨ and ¡§fixed¡¨ socialization tactics, there is no significant influence on individual¡¦s role performance. (2) The level of groups¡¦ ¡§collective tactic¡¨ has negative moderating effect on the relationship between individual¡¦s ¡§third party¡¨ information seeking behavior and role breadth self-efficacy; ¡§sequential tactic¡¨ has positive moderating effects on the relationship between third-party information seeking behavior and role breadth self-efficacy; ¡§formal tactic¡¨ has negative moderating effect on the relationship between ¡§testing¡¨ information seeking behavior and role breadth self-efficacy; sequential tactic and fixed tactic have negative moderating effect on the relationship between observation information seeking behavior and role breadth self-efficacy; and serial tactic have positive moderating effect on the relationship between observation information seeking behavior and role breadth self-efficacy. (3) Each socialization tactic does not have direct contextual effect on role breath self-efficacy, while role breath self-efficacy also does not have mediating effect on the relationship between socialization tactics and role performance.

The primary goal of the current study is to develop a more advanced model of information-seeking behaviors. For achieving this goal, it paid attention to two social phenomena characterizing contemporary society: informationalization and globalization. First, focusing on these two influential phenomena, this study investigated how individual-level factors—information overload, information ambiguity, and goal orientations—affected information-seeking behaviors among employees in a multinational corporation. Next, in addition to these individual predictors of information-seeking behaviors, this study explored the effects of two team-level factors—team task interdependence and team tenure—on the relationships between the main predictors and information-seeking behaviors. Last, paying more attention to the multicultural context, this study investigated how these employees in a multinational corporation seek task and feedback information from two culturally different sources: American direct advisors and Korean expatriates. In order to more thoroughly investigate the roles of the cultural backgrounds of information sources, this study explored how American employees perceived the cultural backgrounds of the two culturally different sources and how such perceptions influenced those employees’ information-seeking behaviors. / text

This dissertation augmented Kahlor’s (2010) planned risk information seeking model (PRISM). According to the PRISM, people’s intentions to seek risk information hinge on their attitudes toward seeking, seeking-related subjective norms, perceived control over seeking, affective response to the perceived risk, and information need. As well, this dissertation examined the role of self-identity as an information seeker, independent self-construal, past risk information seeking, involvement, and motivation orientation in people’s intention to seek risk information about radon and poor indoor air quality. In a pilot study of a convenience sample (N = 59), I derived an information-seeking self-identity scale and a novel instrument for measuring information need. The main study of a national probability sample (N = 602) evaluated the proposed structural model, tested several hypotheses, and explored several research questions. Both the pilot and main study gathered data via online surveys. Results supported the proposed model (R2 = .62) and several hypotheses. Notably, information-seeking self-identity and past risk information seeking positively predicted seeking intention. Also, the effects of attitudes and norms on seeking intention were stronger among more independent respondents. Finally, in a series of multiple regression analyses, I detailed the roles of involvement and various motivation orientations in each model component. An unexpected finding was that perceived control over seeking did not significantly predict seeking intention. Post-hoc analysis revealed that the strength of the control-intention relationship was—at least with the current sample—inversely related to socioeconomic status (SES), where at higher levels of SES, the importance of perceived control over seeking diminished. / text

This is an ALISE juried paper presented on Thursday, January 13, 2005 in Session 5.3, LIS Course Content & Instructional Issues (Juried Papers), of the 2005 ALISE Conference, Boston, MA. The goal of this study was to gain an understanding of the literature used in generalist search education in LIS programs.

This paper reports on part of a study of academic researchers' use of Internet information and communication technologies (IICTs) to support information-seeking activities. The goal of this research is to gain insight into disciplinary and cultural differences of information seeking in the Internet Era. The project is ongoing to include more participants from different cultures.

SIPP ACCESS represents an innovation in providing services for statistical data. A computer-based, integrated information system incorporates both the data and information about the data. SIPP ACCESS systematically links the technologies of laser disk, mainframe computer, microcomputer, and electronic networks and applies relational technology to create great efficiencies and lower the costs of storing, managing, retrieving, and transmitting data and information about complex statistical data collections. This information system has been applied to national longitudinal panel surveys. The article describes the reasons why SIPP ACCESS was created to improve access to these complex surveys and provides examples of tools that facilitate access to information about the contents of these large data sets.

This paper revises David Ellis's information-seeking behavior model of social scientists, which includes six generic features: starting, chaining, browsing, differentiating, monitoring, and extracting. The paper uses social science faculty researching stateless nations as the study population. The description and analysis of the information-seeking behavior of this group of scholars is based on data collected through structured and semistructured electronic mail interviews. Sixty faculty members from 14 different countries were interviewed by e-mail. For reality check purposes, face-to-face interviews with five faculty members were also conducted. Although the study confirmed Ellis's model, it found that a fuller description of the information-seeking process of social scientists studying stateless nations should include four additional features besides those identified by Ellis. These new features are: accessing, networking, verifying, and information managing. In view of that, the study develops a new model, which, unlike Ellis's, groups all the features into four interrelated stages: searching, accessing, processing, and ending. This new model is fully described and its implications on research and practice are discussed. How and why scholars studied here are different than other academic social scientists is also discussed.