Reviews the goals and methods of research and development in documentation, stressing research which aims to improve the communication between the information user and source. Research is discussed within the context of the documentation system rather than by specific results. (JVP)

Discussion of the systems development life cycle (SDLC) that supports operational and managerial planning of automation projects covers challenges of library automation, evolution and scope of SDLC, lack of dissemination of SDLC literature within library and information science community, and corrective measures to meet library automation demands.…

Presents an overview of nonbibliographic computerized databases in business and economics, science and technology, and the social sciences, and discusses some major issues in the field. (FM)

Discusses the process of converting scientific knowledge into productive social forces. Information is presented on system-structured technology, technical processes, labor and plant productivity, and the life cycle of technological systems. (DB)

Presents a new model of searching in online and other information systems, and reviews the literature of manual information seeking behavior for suggestions of capabilities users might like in online systems. Based on the model--called "berrypicking"--and research, suggestions are made for how new search capabilities could be implemented…

Discussion of instructional systems development (ISD) focuses on recent developments in cognitive task analysis and describes the Integrated Task Analysis Model, a framework for integrating cognitive and behavioral task analysis methods within the ISD model. Three components of expertise are analyzed: skills, knowledge, and mental models. (96…

Analyzes developments in the study of user needs to determine areas of consensus in the field, particularly areas of greatest value to practicing librarians. Topics discussed include the user; conceptual frameworks for information and knowledge; information seeking; the use of information and knowledge; system design; and future research needs.…

American indicator systems of educational accountability generally focus on student outcomes. The next generation of indicator systems must address wider issues, such as social context and values, curriculum assessment, structure of schooling, and individual student differences. Administrative, technical, political, and financial issues in…

Educational change is a process occurring through time, a systemic and dynamic phenomenon in which every action leads to reactions in related areas of the system, and a multidimensional phenomenon requiring examination from the perspective of several disciplines. The success of an innovation depends on how the change process is managed, how the…

Describes the inability of traditional subject index terms to represent relational information among concepts, and the development of frame based knowledge representation methods that provide relational semantic representations of documents and user queries. The discussion covers research in user interfaces and automatic document classifications,…

Lays the foundation for other articles in this special issue by providing an overview of managed health care as it now operates. Children are increasingly being enrolled in such plans even though there is little information about the effects of managed health care on this population. (SLD)

Discusses difficulties within higher education management in achieving expected outcomes because of problematic elements in: artificial internal structures, funding formulae, the relative importance of system parameters versus system structure, and the significance of time scales and delays in influencing system behavior. Suggests that university…

Increasingly, machine learning is entertained as a mechanism for improving the efficiency of planning systems. Research in this area has generated an impressive battery of techniques and a growing body of empirical successes. Unfortunately the formal properties of these systems are not well understood. This is highlighted by a growing corpus of…

Discusses the inability of the standard Boolean logic model of information retrieval to deal effectively with the inherent fallibility of retrieval decisions. Recent advances in information retrieval research are reviewed, and their practical potential for overcoming the deficiencies of the Boolean model is examined. (45 references) (Author/CLB)

Reviews books considered to advance methodological and conceptual issues pertinent to comparative and historical educational research. (Author/DB)