Encyclopedia of Library and Information Sciences, …

1 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLEThis article was downloaded by: [Saracevic, Tefko]On: 30 March 2010 Access details: Access Details: [subscription number 920512503]Publisher Taylor & FrancisInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UKEncyclopedia of Library and Information sciences , Third EditionPublication details, including instructions for authors and subscription Information : ~content=t917508581 Information ScienceTefko Saracevic aa School of Communication and Information , Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey, publication date: 09 December 2009To cite this Article Saracevic, Tefko(2010) ' Information Science', Encyclopedia of Library and Information sciences , ThirdEdition, 1: 1, 2570 2585 Full terms and conditions of use: article may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial orsystematic reproduction, re-distribution, re-selling, loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply ordistribution in any form to anyone is expressly publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contentswill be complete or accurate or up to date.

2 The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug dosesshould be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss,actions, claims, proceedings, demand or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directlyor indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this ScienceTefko SaracevicSchool of Communication and Information , Rutgers University, New Brunswick,New Jersey, purpose of this entry is to provide an overview of Information science as a field or discipline,including a historical perspective to illustrate the events and forces that shaped it. Information science isa field of professional practice and scientific inquiry dealing with effective communication of informationand Information objects, particularly knowledge records, among humans in the context of social, organi-zational, and individual need for and use of Information . Information science emerged in the aftermath ofthe Second World War, as did a number of other fields, addressing the problem of Information explosionand using technology as a solution.

3 Presently, Information science deals with the same problems in theWeb and digital environments. This entry covers problems addressed by Information science, the intellec-tual structure of the field, and the description of main areas Information retrieval, human informationbehavior, metric studies, and digital libraries. This entry also includes an account of education related toinformation science and conclusions about major purpose of this entry is to provide an overview ofinformation science as a field or discipline, includinga historical perspective to illustrate the events and forcesthat shaped science is the science and practice dealingwith the effective collection, storage, retrieval, and useof Information . It is concerned with recordable informationand knowledge, and the technologies and related servicesthat facilitate their management and use. More specifically, Information science is a field of professional practice andscientific inquiry addressing the effective communication ofinformation and Information objects, particularly knowledgerecords, among humans in the context of social, organiza-tional, and individual need for and use of Information .

4 [1]The domain of Information science is the transmission ofthe universe of human knowledge in recorded form, center-ing on manipulation (representation, organization, and re-trieval) of Information , rather than knowing Information .[2]There are two key orientations: toward the human andsocial need for and use of Information pertaining toknowledge records, on the one hand, and toward specificinformation techniques, systems, and technologies (cov-ered under the name ofinformation retrieval) to satisfythat need and provide for effective organization and re-trieval of Information , on the other hand. From the outset, Information science had these two orientations: one thatdeals with Information need, or more broadly human in-formation behavior, and the other that deals with informa-tion retrieval techniques and science is a field that emerged in the after-math of the Second World War, along with a number ofnew fields, with computer science being but one developments and activities associated with infor-mation science already started by the end of 1940s, thevery term Information science came into full use onlyat the start of the 1960s.

5 A significant impetus for thecoalescence of the field was theInternational Conferenceon Scientific Information , held in Washington, ,November 16 21, 1958, sponsored by the ( ) NationalScience Foundation, the National Academy of sciences National Research Council, and the American Docu-mentation Institute, and attended by some 1000 delegatesfrom 25 countries. The conference was meticulouslyplanned for over 3 years and attracted wide internationalattention. The 75 papers and lively discussions that fol-lowed, all recorded in theProceedingsof over 1600pages, affected the direction of research, development,and professional practice in the field for at least a decadeif not longer.[3]It also affected the internationalization ofthe field and the approaches used. They became entry covers problems addressed by informationscience, the intellectual structure of the field, and thefurther description of main areas Information retrieval,human Information behavior studies, metric studies, anddigital libraries.

6 At the end, the entry includes an accountof education related to Information science and conclu-sions about major ADDRESSEDTo understand Information science, as with any otherfield, a description of problems addressed and methodsused in their solution is crucial. Generally, informationEncyclopedia of Library and Information sciences , Third EditionDOI: #2010 by Taylor & Francis. All rights Scattering Information SystemsDownloaded By: [Saracevic, Tefko] At: 13:44 30 March 2010science addressed the problem of Information explosionand used Information technology as a rapid pace of scientific and technical advances thatwere accumulating since the start of the twentieth centuryproduced by mid-century a scientific and technical revo-lution. A most visible manifestation of this revolution wasthe phenomenon of Information explosion, referring tothe unabated, exponential growth of scientific and tech-nical publications and Information records of all term Information explosion is a metaphor (as is population explosion ) because nothing really explodedbut just grew at a high rate, even exponentially at put, Information explosion is Information and in-formation objects piling up at a high rate.

7 The problemthis presents is getting to the right Information as neededat a given number of scientists documented this growth, butnone better and more vividly than Derek de Solla Price(1922 1983, British and American physicist, historianof science and Information scientist), recognized as thefather of scientometrics. In his seminal works, Sciencesince Babylonfollowed byLittle Science, Big Science,Price documented the exponential and logistical growthof scientific publications linking them with the growthof the number of scientists. The logistical growth startedslow right after the appearance of the first scientific jour-nals in the seventeenth century, accelerated by the startof the twentieth century and became explosive after theSecond World War.[4,5]The impetus for the development of informationscience, and even for its very origin and agenda, can betraced to a 1945 article, As We May Think by VannevarBush (1890 1974), a respected MIT scientist and, evenmore importantly, the head of the scientific effortduring World War II.

8 [6]In this influential article, Bushdid two things: a) he succinctly defined the critical andstrategic problem of Information explosion in scienceand technology that was on the minds of many, andb) proposed a solution that was a technological fix, and thus in tune with the spirit of the time. Both hadwide appeal. Bush was neither the first nor the onlyone that addressed these issues, but he was listened tobecause of his stature. He defined the problem in al-most poetic terms as The summation of human experi-ence is being expanded at a prodigious rate, and themeans we use for threading through the consequentmaze to the momentarily important item is the same aswas used in the days of square-rigged ships. In otherwords, Bush addressed the problem of Information ex-plosion and the associated methods for finding a solution, Bush proposed a machine, dubbedMemex, incorporating (in his words) a capability for asso-ciation of ideas, and the duplication of mental processesartificially.

9 A prescient anticipation of Information scienceand artificial intelligence is evident. Memex, needless tosay, was never built, but to this day is considered an ideal,a wish list, an agenda, and, some think, a utopia. Info-rmation science is still challenged by the ever-worseningproblem of Information explosion, now universal and in avariety of digital formats, and the field is still trying to fixthings number of scientists and professionals in many fieldsaround the globe listened and took up Bush s importantly, governments listened, as well, and pro-vided funding. The reasoning went something like this:Because science and technology are strategically importantfor society, efforts that help them, Information activitiesin particular, are also important and need support. In theUnited States, the United Kingdom, and other countries,this led to the support of research and development relatedto Information problems and solutions. By the end of the1940s Information science was well on its also participated in the establishment of theNational Science Foundation (NSF) in the United National Science Foundation Act of 1950 ( ) provided a number of mandates, among them to foster the interchange of scientific Information amongscientists in the and foreign countries [Section3(a)3] and to further the full dissemination of [scientificand technical] Information of scientific value consistentwith the national interest [Section 11(g)].

10 The 1958 National Defense Education Act ( 85-864) (the Sputnik act ) enlarged the mandate: The NationalScience Foundation shall [among others].undertake pro-grams to develop new or improved methods, includingmechanized systems, for making scientific informationavailable (Title IX, Section 901). By those mandates, anNSF division, which after a number of name and directionchanges is now called the Division of Information andIntelligent Systems (IIS), has supported research in theseareas since the 1950s. Information science evolution, atleast in the United States., was greatly affected by thesupport of the government. In this respect it was notan exception. For instance, artificial intelligence, amongothers, was for decades supported by the governmentstarting in the 1950s and ending by the , one force affecting government support ofinformation science, as of many other fields in the UnitedStates and a number of European countries, had to do withthe cold war.