Second to last week,,,,

For the last two weeks, I have been chugging away at the comparative paper on reference services between Penrose and Waltz. However, I really only hit my stride this week, especially becuse of some articles on the research habits of musicians that I missed the first time out on my searches of LIS databases. The paper really focuses on the impact of the community each serves on the delivery of reference services, especially the reference interview. To me, part of why the setting of the library is so important is because it answers a lot of the taboo question "why do you need this information?"

The reference interview (of which I am a certified practioner of the Effective Reference Performance program at Jefferson County) is an extremely useful tool, but a large part of its' focus is on finding a thing. Also, they tend to emphasize the librarian's knowledge over the patron's/student's/whomever's. A lot of the "alternative" therories of reference do have somewhat of a touchy-feelyness about them, but I appreciate their attemps to make the reference interview more of a "meeting of the minds." Another part of what draws my interest is the fact that they get away from the flowcharting of human behavior and decision-making, and focus more on broader theories that can be applied more liberally, and run into fewer exceptions.

There is something Aristotalian about using flowcharts to describe the way that people seek information, with branches coming off of branches as new information is processed, as the search moves forward. Instead, some of the alternative theories of reference help guide the librarian in understanding the user without trying to impose a specific model on them.

Paper Outline!

Here is the outline for my paper comparing reference services and the potential uses/impacts of reference theory at the Penrose and Waltz libraries:

Introduction:

-Setting of the Penrose Library

-Setting of the Waltz Library

Reference theory:

-Traditional reference model (Bopp/Smith, Katz)

-Reference by the numbers (Saxton/Richardson)

-Reference narrative(hermeneutics)/dialogue (Doherty, Murphy)

-“reference/instruction dichotomy”-cross purposes, different tools.

Discussion of Libqual+ (CU & DU Libqual+ surveys)

-Which questions are notable?

-Library expectations always higher than results.

Trends:

General Trends

-Decline in frequency of questions (DU research, IU IC, anecdotal)

-Increase in length of interactions

-More online sources

-Increased use of the internet first (ACRL? OCLC environmental scan?)

-Millennials/User self-sufficiency

-Emphasis on instruction

-Humanities (browsing) vs. Sciences (searching) (Survey of History Professors, Mann)

Contributions to Trends:

Penrose

-Non-subject specialized, can be more reliant on traditional reference techniques

-Instruction

-Deep integration of web resources

-Library user groups (sciences, business) need currency (Libqual+)

Waltz

-Subject specialization, takes the mystery out of “what,” emphasis on why. (Doherty, Murphy)

-Performance vs. Research-uses and users

-Need for speed

-Course reserves (Anecdotal)

-Library user groups (professors, TA’s, students) (Libqual+, Student Stats)

Conclusion

-“Reference interview” as a tool, not as a theory

-Failings of functionalism/”Stat Life” (Doherty, Murphy, Barzun)

-Importance of the “why” question. (B/S 56, Murphy)

-Reference as art.

shifting around

Since I am not able to make the MLA-Mountains-Plains meeting, I will be submitting my comparison between Penrose and Waltz as a paper. I think that I have finally come to a clear exposition on the subject. My stated goal was to write a paper that compares the way reference is provided at a general reference desk as opposed to a subject-specific one.

I started my research looking at the specifics of the reference interview, mostly because I feel that there is a shift away from it, especially in academic libraries. This doesn't stem as much from the fact that I don't think it is worthwhile. I fully stand behind using open-ended and "neutral" questions to help understand a searcher's needs. Instead, I think this is valuable as a technique, but not as a central part of reference. As we use more electronic resources, which have a much greater breadth of availability, there has been a shift away from reference towards instruction. The reference interview does not give any way to take into account the idea that searchers either want to or are more self-sufficient.

If you couple this with the trend in reference services evaluation that user satisfaction is more important than the results of a librarian-assisted searches(reference transactions), it seems that an interview practice that is dependent on the librarian's ability of find stuff as an end result is somewhat off the mark. Once again, not advocating for the "give 'em instruction and cut 'em loose" approach, but I'm weary of the model currently being taught.

Really this is a jumping off point for the paper, which also tries to assess how patrons, students, etc. ask their questions, how the enviorment effects the questions they ask, and how the respective reference staffs handle them.