Desperately seeking citations: Uncovering faculty assumptions about the undergraduate research process

Desperately Seeking Citations: Uncovering Faculty Assumptions about the Undergraduate Research Process by Gloria J. Leckie

This article discusses information-seeking problems which the typical research paper assignment creates. The problem is divided into four components. Faculty must assume more responsibility for teaching information-retrieval skills in their courses, and the article illustrates how this could be accomplished through a stratified methodology.

Gloria J. Leckie is Assistant Professor, Graduate School of Library and Information Science, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada, N6C 7H7 .

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verworked reference librarians in college and university libraries have all too often described the following scenario: A first year student timidly approaches the reference desk with a question-where would you find information about abortion? Further probing by the librarian reveals (thankfully) that this question has nothing to do with the student’s personal situation, but is a topic the student has chosen for a research paper in a first-year sociology course. The librarian asks what particular aspects of abortion the student is interested in, and in response, the student silently shows the librarian the handout she received in class about the research paper. For their paper, the students must choose any controversial topic of current interest to society, discuss why the topic is controversial, and consider the societal implications of different courses of action with respect to the issue. On the handout, examples of controversial topics are suggested, including gay rights, abortion, ordination of women, and banning the seal hunt. The paper is due by the end of term, and must demonstrate the use of both books and journals. By the end of the students have several more day, approached the desk about their topics for this paper. By the end of the week, about 200 students have asked for help on this assignment. More are still likely to come, many with only days left until the paper is due. All are desperately seeking citations. What do these typical kinds of interactions mean for those involved? For the librarian, the desire to assist the patron may be overwhelmed at times by the sheer number of students to be helped with this single assignment, resulting in frustration, annoyance, and possibly even anger at a situation not of their making and beyond their control. For the student, the interaction may be fraught with trepidation, anx-

iety, and confusion, only overridden by an intense need to “fix” this problematic assignment as quickly and easily as possible. While the end result may be that some how, somewhere, students will produce some sort of research paper, the process is flawed from beginning to end. Many students are doomed to failure under this scenario, and reference librarians often feel helpless to redirect what has just transpired in any significant way. While various sorts of interventions (talking to the faculty member, giving in-class presentations, preparing handouts, or giving workshops) may alleviate the problem with respect to this single course (until a new instructor takes over), the situation is definitely bound to arise again, perhaps tomorrow, or next week.

DESPERATELYSEEKING CITATIONS: THEPROBLEM For academic librarians, the questions of importance here are: (1) Why does the above situation arise so frequently?, and (2) What can be done about it? These are not idle questions; they are absolutely central to the role and daily work of reference and bibliographic instruction (BI) librarians in academic libraries, and have immense implications for the working conditions for individual librarians (regarding stress, burnout, and satisfaction), for the general allocation of public services staff time, and ultimately for the meaningful participation of librarians in the educational experience of students. Accordingly, this article will attempt to provide some insights into these two very important questions. In doing this, it draws upon the author’s teaching experiences and the vast literatures concerning information seeking, the scholarly research process, and BI. To understand exactly why students are desperately seeking citations, why the pro-

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cess is so frustrating for all involved, and why it so often goes wrong, the central problem (i.e., doing the research assignment) has to be broken into its component parts. Essentially there are four distinct components to the problem, which, taken together, can create a situation where the outcome will be far from satisfactory or satisfying. These components, to be examined in the following discussion, are: Faculty model;

and the “expert

The research paper students’ limitations; Identifying

researcher”

assignment

faculty assumptions;

and and

The in-class experience.

FACULTYANDTHEIRRESEARCH Faculty members are hired by universities to teach and conduct research. Although there are some institutions where teaching is emphasized more, most faculty members have to do both, so developing a research program will be a major preoccupation. Research is what they have been trained to do. In North American universities, the number of faculty with a Ph.D. has increased steadily even since the mid-1970s and continues to increase.’ The Ph.D. degree, as a measure of research competence, is no longer optional for a faculty position in most disciplines. Obtaining a Ph.D. is a subtle process of both technical and social acculturation into a discipline or area of study. The purpose of doctoral research is to make an original contribution to an established body of knowledge, or to develop a new body of knowledge. The key point is that the contribution must be judged to be original or new in some way. Thus, the question looming before the doctoral candidate is “How can I be sure that my contribution is original?” Being sure that one’s contribution is original requires a thorough knowledge of the conceptual and theoretical dimensions of the chosen field of study, and a strong sense of the various research paradigms evident in the discipline. The latter in particular will have a great influence on the way in which research questions are formulated and on the methodologies used to investigate those questions. The nature of the discipline will also have an impact on the researcher’s own research process, including how she or he seeks and uses information in the course of a research project. The acculturation to these modes of thinking and doing research is, in part,

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gained through the doctoral degree and is carried over into a career as a faculty member. The conduct of research, and the way in which information is sought in the process, vary considerably. Studies of the information-seeking behavior of faculty in the humanities, the social sciences, and the sciences reveal some distinct differences. Humanities scholars are the most likely to work alone, and rely heavily on librarybased resources for their research.’ In the social sciences, research often requires the collection of data through fieldwork, surveys, interviews, etc. Information seeking in the library, therefore, provides context and academic support for the research direction or findings.’ Information seeking in the sciences may be somewhat different. Since the sciences are becoming fragmented into increasingly specialized research areas, scientists often rely heavily on their own personal collections and contacts for information.’ For some scientists, the act of information seeking in the library is a relatively rare occurrence. Thus, faculty in different disciplines can have quite different views of the usefulness of the library in relation to their research.

“They are used to sophisticated discussions about research with colleagues and graduate students, and in this environment, it is all too easy to make assumptions about the level of understanding possessed by undergraduates.” Despite these different patterns, faculty across the disciplinary spectrum also display some striking similarities in information seeking. With both teaching and research responsibilities, they are chronically pressed for time, and find it convenient to maintain their own subscriptions of key journals. They spend a considerable amount of time per week reading and browsing the literature.” Because they know their area of research relatively well, they are very familiar with who is writing on particular topics, so following a citation trail (rather than doing a literature search) may be the preferred method of developing a research idea. They are relatively sophisticated and independent library users, who fully expect that they

may have to make several passes through the literature as their ideas firm up. However, depending on the project, they may have little need to use the library, and many view librarians as unable to help them with their research. Undoubtedly, some faculty could use assistance with certain new technologies, but this may not actually hamper their research noticeably. Evidence suggests that even without assistance from librarians, considerable numbers of faculty learn how to use electronic information resources on their own.’

THE "EXPERT RESEARCHER” MODEL Within the university, faculty are considered the experts in their chosen fields, and so the characteristics of faculty research as described above can be thought of as the “expert researcher” model. The model requires a long process of acculturation, an in-depth knowledge of the discipline, awareness of important scholars working in particular areas, participation in a system of informal scholarly communication, and a view of research as a non-sequential, non-linear process with a large degree of ambiguity and serendipity. The expert researcher is relatively independent, and has developed his or her own personal information-seeking strategies (e.g., a heavy reliance on personal contacts and citation trails). Libraries may or may not play a large part in these strategies, and librarians are rarely thought of as key people in the research process. Unfortunately, this expert model does not work well when applied to novices (i.e., undergraduates), who most often have none of these characteristics. Undergraduates, particularly in the lower years, are exposed to certain disciplines for the first time. This exposure frequently con sists of a textbook, reserve materials, and lectures. The students have no sense of who might be important in a particular field, and find it difficult to build and follow a citation trail. They do not have the benefit of knowing anyone who actually does research in the discipline (except for their professor) and so do not have a notion of something as intangible as the informal scholarly network. They have never attended a scholarly conference. Because of their level of cognitive development, ambiguity and non-linearity may be quite threatening.7 They do not think in terms of an information-seeking strategy, but rather in terms of a coping strategy. Research is conceptualized as a fuzzy

library-based activity which is required of them to complete their coursework. In other words, the novice is very far from the expert model. This presents a dilemma. Faculty members, no matter how concerned they are about their students, have not been undergraduates for a long time. Simply because of the passage of time, they have often forgotten what their own undergraduate educational experience was like. They are used to sophisticated discussions about research with colleagues and graduate students, and in this environment, it is all too easy to make assumptions about the level of understanding possessed by undergraduates. Furthermore, the context is rapidly changing. Students are much more diverse today-they may be older, come from a broader range of ethnic and linguistic groups, have certain disabilities, be working on their degree part-time, and be commuting. There are more information resources available, but also more technologies to master. It is now harder to say that in any given class there will be a uniform skill level in using the complex and varied resources of academic libraries to produce a research paper. All of this suggests that there is likely to be a large disjuncture between the expectations of the faculty member as the expert researcher, and the capabilities of novice the undergraduate as the researcher. This disjuncture is most often revealed in the research paper assignment, so it is to this problem that I will now turn. Although the following remarks are most applicable to courses in the arts, humanities, and social sciences, there are also instances where the same problems arise in the sciences, most notably biology. THE RESEARCH PAPER ASSIGNMENT AND THE STUDENT’S LIMITATIONS Within any discipline, the primary way in which the foundations of the discipline are imparted to students in the contemporary university is through courses. Courses reflect a curriculum, which is considered by those who construct it to be a reflection of the essential knowledge of the discipline. Thus, when the faculty member enters the classroom, the goal for the term or year is to “cover the material” and to expose students adequately to that particular se ment of knowledge in their discipline. 4 However, every discipline has too much material to cover. Every course is crammed full of an ever-expanding knowledge-base, so the faculty member

must use a variety of devices to impart this knowledge. The most common device is the formal, structured lecture to cover key concepts. Another device is to develop tutorials and labs to help students in understanding the material covered in lectures. Finally, another mechanism is to turn students loose to see what further understanding they can achieve by struggling with the material on their own to produce a research paper. It is not the purpose of this discussion to debate whether or not the process of doing a research paper actually advances an individual’s understanding of a discipline (though that certainly could be debated).’ What is more important is that numerous faculty members believe that it does serve this function in some manner, and, thus, continue to assign research papers as part of the requirements for their courses. However, given the faculty member’s propensity to operate in the expert researcher mode, a number of problematic assumptions may become embedded in the design and wording of the assignment. An example of a real-life research paper assignment (taken from geography, the discipline of my own doctoral research) illustrates these assumptions quite well.

“Given the faculty member’s propensity to operate in the expert researcher mode, a number of problematic assumptions may become embedded in the design and wording of the assignment.” A second year resource geography course gives the following research paper assignment: Choose one of the following l

topics:

Biodiversity;

l

Ocean pollution;

l

Transportation

l

Desertification;

l

The Tropical rainforest.

of hazardous wastes; or

In your paper, discuss: 1. The nature of the issue; 2. Its natural/biophysical

aspects

3. What has been done on the issue since 1980?

4. What is being done on the issue currently? As an interesting aside, when I have shown academic librarians this assignment, most of them shake their heads and express great sympathy for the student. They have this reaction because instinctively they know what the faculty member may not have thought about-that this is a complex assignment requiring a fairly high level of sophistication to address it even adequately, let alone well. However, it may not be so obvious that what makes it complex are the expert researcher assumptions lurking behind the deceptively straightforward surface of the assignment. Assumptions about Process and Authority First, the topics are extremely large and open-ended. The expert assumptions here are that: (1) through general introductory reading about a large topic, students will gain some feeling for the dimensions of the entire issue, which they need before they can speak with any authority; and (2) they will be able to focus on specific questions of interest. This is akin to the kind of widespread background reading that graduate students do in preparation for formulating a research question and writing a thesis proposal, or that faculty members do when engaging in a new project. However, this kind of approach requires patience and faith-individuals must read widely and patiently, from a variety of sources, without knowing exactly what will come out of all the reading, and they must have faith that at some stage in the process, there will come a point of saturation when the same concepts or issues begin to recur. At this point of saturation, the individuals may begin to evolve some ideas of their own about the topic they have been exploring, and can narrow in on specific concerns (that may in turn require further reading). A further related expert assumption here is that, of course, one would want to be able to speak with some authority about the issue, and so one would see this process through. A growing body of evidence about how students seek information in the library suggests that undergraduates do not conceive of research in this way, do not have a very high tolerance for the patience and faith aspects of the process, and are not likely to feel very authoritative even after having gone through the process. Fister has shown that undergraduates typically have a hard time getting started on their research papers primarily because they do

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not know how to narrow either their reading or the topic.” Similarly, participants in a study by Kulthau et al. had great difficulty narrowing their topics, were intolerant of the uncertainty inherent in the process, and often did not have confidence in their own abilities to complete their research projects.” In addition, these factors are compounded by the library anxiety faced by many undergraduates, who see the academic library and its resources as imposing and intimidating, and are anxious about how they will manage in such an environment.12 Keefer suggests that this anxiety is often strong enough to jeopardize students’ ability to complete their paper at all. Assumptions about Scholarly Literature The various sub-components of the assignment (items l-4) require a good understanding of the way that the scholarly literature works. The expert assumption here is that undergraduates are aware of the role of different kinds of scholarly sources and can use them appropriately. For example, to gain a general sense of a topic such as desertification, one might have to peruse a dictionary, an encyclopedia, and/or a textbook (perhaps even from another discipline such as biology or geology). To read about the “its natural/biophysical aspects,” other more specific geography and science monographs may have to be consulted. Finally, to determine what has been done about the issue over time may require the use of not only standard monographs, but also bibliographies, periodicals, newspapers, government documents, and monographic series (such as the Worldwatch Institute series). The expert model further assumes that while all of these types of publications may play a role in developing a picture of the topic, some are more authoritative than others and would be more citable. Do undergraduates have a good understanding of how scholarly sources are produced, and for what purpose? Do they understand why a textbook may not be considered an appropriate source for a research paper? Are they aware of where all those encyclopedia articles come from, and when one might best use them? Do they realize that the person who writes in Newsweek and one who writes in the Annals of the Association of American Geographers are two very different types of authors, writing for different audiences and purposes? Evidence is mounting that undergraduates have, at best, only a vague awareness

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of the answers to these questions, and have great difficulty judging the difference between types of sources, particularly early in their university education. Ironically, technology has revealed this very clearly. Nash and Wilson discovered that undergraduates had great difficulty simply reading the different types of citations they found from CD-ROM searches.13 Furthermore, they often rejected the very citations that might have been appropriate for their paper because they did not understand the nature of the citation source (e.g., a scholarly versus a popular journal), or because the words in the title did not match the words they were using to describe their topic. In addition to these types of problems, other studies found that undergraduates could not choose a database which would: (1) adequately cover their topic, or (2) contain the type of publications they would need for their project.14 Given these findings, the expert assumptions about undergraduates’ understanding of different types of sources, and how one might translate that understanding into the reality of a database search seem all the more implausible. Assumptions about Scholars, Research and Critical Thinking The requirement to compare what has been done since 1980 with what is being done currently also contains some expert assumptions about scholars and their research. Faculty members know very well how research proceeds: scholars identify a research problem and begin to work on it, they are part of an invisible college of other scholars also working on the issue, they frequently disagree with each other about what should be done, and they all know who they are because they are publishing in the journals that they all read anyway. With respect to the assignment, therefore, the expert assumptions about scholars are that: (1) a number of researchers around the world are working on the issue, (2) they have left a record of their research which is readily accessible, (3) it is possible to find out who they are, and (4) it is important to find out who they are. In addition, there are two further assumptions about research: first, there has been research activity on the topic since at least 1980, and, second, the character of that research (and the attendant results) may have changed over time because scholars do not always agree and are frequently critical of one another’s approach or findings. Over time, this discussion may prompt new ideas about the problem.

Is any of this obvious to a 19 year old? Not likely! First, it is safe to say that undergraduates do not possess a vision of a scholarly network, and they do not have a sense of a significant mass of research findings appearing in certain journals over time, nor how to tap into that research. That there are multiple scholars working on the issue just makes the prospect of finding them even worse. Should not one be enough? Second, this part of the assignment, whether it is articulated or not, involves some critical thinking. The expert approach here would be to evaluate all (or a good portion of) the relevant research and look for areas of agreement or disagreement. Why do scholars agree or disagree? What does disagreement mean? How does this affect real-world solutions to these biophysical problems? Experts realize that there may be no single answer, but that this in itself is worth discussing, probably at length. Undergraduates often do not realize this, because, as developmental psychologists point out, young adults may not have yet achieved a level of cognitive development to cope with alternate views.” A colleague of mine (trained both as a psychologist and a librarian) commented that she had observed undergraduates who were in such a dilemma about disagreements they had uncovered in the literature that they simply chose to ignore alternate views in their research papers in favor of what they thought was the “right” perspective. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to be what their professor is looking for if she or he is evaluating their paper from the expert’s vantage point. Assumptions about Scholarly Information-Seeking Strategies Following on the previous point, a fourth cluster of assumptions embedded in this assignment have to do with information seeking. One obvious expert assumption here is that students already have some sort of scholarly personal information-seeking strategy, or that if they do not, they will begin to develop one as they proceed Obviously, once one has done some general background reading, and has begun to identify a few scholars whose names keep cropping up in the literature, an effective strategy would be simply to read their work, and see whom they cited, and follow up some of those citations. If students do not have this strategy in their arsenal, an alternative strategy would be to fall back on the more formal literature search and proceed along those lines, gen-

erating a list of citations that could then be examined and evaluated for suitability. Finally, if all else fails, the strategy that graduate students often use when looking for material is to ask their professor. In reality, however, studies suggest that undergraduates may have none of these expert model strategies at their disposal, and they do not necessarily develop them without assistance, as a Johns Hopkins study clearly shows.16 The citation trail strategy depends, first and foremost, on being able to identify at least one important scholar working on the topic, and second, requires students to realize that following a citation trail is not cheating in some way (neither of which I would expect lower year undergraduates to know). The literature search strategy depends heavily on a fairly well developed understanding of the scholarly literature. The final strategy-asking one’s professor-is one that many undergraduates are the most reluctant to use, even though it might save them an incredible amount of time, because they either believe it is inappropriate, or are too intimidated to initiate such a request.17 I am not suggesting that undergraduates do not have a personal informationseeking strategy; they certainly do. But it is not organized along the lines of the expert scholarly model. Studies show that when doing a research paper, undergraduates start by gathering information as they have done for projects in the past, including using the library (both academic and public), asking friends, family, and classmates, and asking people in the community. l8 They are also likely to use whatever sources are most familiar first (e.g., encyclopedias and newspapers) and sometimes continue to use those sources for subsequent projects even if they are not appropriate. While this strategy makes sense to them, it is quite likely that they will miss large portions of the scholarly literature this way. Assumptions about Information-Seeking Skills A closely related set of expert assumptions about information seeking involve the mechanics of the information-gathering process. The expert scholar anticipates the knowledge one will gain from information gathering and tends to regard the mechanics as inconsequential. All scholars would realize that there are multiple avenues for information retrieval (OPACs, CD-ROM, paper indexes and microfilm), that each has its own peculiar search requirements, and some are easier to use

than others. These retrieval avenues primarily organize material either by author or by topic, so how one searches depends on what is needed. The expert assumption, then, is that one need not worry too much about the mechanics of the search strategy: it will be obvious what one should do, given what one needs. A further expert assumption, particularly in the social sciences, is that the OPAC is likely going to be fairly useless for a narrow topic, so do not bother with it-go straight to the journal literature.

“Unlike faculty, undergraduates do not know what they want for their research paper.” These assumptions are all terribly problematic for undergraduates, even if they are openly stated. First, even sophisticated students are unlikely to have a macro view of the entire retrieval universe at their disposal, so they will not be able to discard mentally certain options as less helpful because they have no experience in using all of those options. Second, judging from the numerous studies of OPAC transaction logs and CD-ROM searches,” undergraduates have enough difficulty successfully using even one retrieval mechanism! Having mastered one somewhat, they may stick mainly with that avenue even when they are not able to retrieve much that is terribly relevant. Third, unlike faculty, undergraduates do not know what they want for their research paper, except to complete it in a way that satisfies the professor. How can they search by author when they do not know any of the authors? They will need to search using subjects, which is the most difficult way for a novice to begin researching a new topic. No self-respecting faculty members would persist with a subject search on a topic as large as the tropical rainforest-they would know that it would be simply a lesson in frustration. This approach would be abandoned very quickly in favor of key authors, narrower topics, or even browsing the shelves. Yet, undergraduates, in response to the kind of assignment under discussion here, often have no other option given their level of disciplinary knowledge. A subject search presents a number of unique difficulties. Students have to be able to articulate the topic, preferably with some alternative words (an act which even graduate students have difficulty perform-

ing). Students must also decide between the keyword or controlled vocabulary approach, undoubtedly with very little understanding of the difference. Finally, undergraduates confuse the search requirements of different products. For instance, research clearly shows that it is not always evident to them that one would use a different retrieval vocabulary for a CD-ROM index than for the local 0PAC,20 and that the results of the search would be affected by the choice of an incorrect vocabulary. (While faculty mem bers may not realize this either, they are sophisticated enough to know how to get around this inconvenience). Assumptions about Librarians Finally, these kinds of open-ended research assignments carry huge expert assumptions about librarians. The expert model assumes that: (1) librarians are generally nice people who are there to help, particularly with technical questions about how various kinds of retrieval processes work, but (2) researchers probably will not need them very much because they already have an idea of what kinds of material they need to find; however, (3) librarians are there if researchers run into trouble. Academic librarians may be upset at reading these assumptions, but despite calls in the literature for librarians to be partners in research with the faculty,*’ there is very little evidence that this is happening, or ever will happen. The vast majority of my faculty colleagues from a variety of disciplines do hold these assumptions. I see this as neither bad nor good, but simply as a fact of scholarly life; the ultimate responsiblity for research is with the scholar. Despite this, faculty members know that students will have some difficulties with their research papers and so the expert view of the librarian is embedded within the design of the assignment; librarians are there if you need them. This perspective, however, is not necessarily shared by undergraduates. Many of my own students, particularly those from other countries, have told me that it was years before they understood what librarians did in the library, and that they would never have considered asking one for assistance. This is confirmed in the literature by numerous studies that have noted some students’ reluctance to approach librarians.22 The flip side of this assumption is that although librarians are there, most students probably will not need very much help anyway. Revealing this assumption

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actually explains why the kind of interaction illustrated in the introduction of this article continues to happen in academic libraries all over North America. The expert researcher simply cannot imagine (or refuses to think about) the continuum of problems that undergraduates have in using even a moderately-sized academic library. The fact is that all students could likely use a considerable amount of help from academic librarians in producing their research papers, particularly if they have not done very many, or if the topics are large and diffuse. Thus, while some students are reluctant to approach a librarian, many others want librarians to help them in narrowing their topic, finding citations, evaluating those citations, and even fetching the relevant material! THE IN-CLASS EXPERIENCE Given the hidden assumptions I have just uncovered, and placing these within the context of the limited experience and understanding of students, it is no wonder that the research paper assignment causes so much grief (without even addressing the difficulties with writing grammati tally correct English!). The next major question, then, is what can be done about it? Academic librarians, in the literature and in person, often feel that the solution to this problem rests primarily with them. If they could just devise better methodologies for delivering BI, or for liaising with faculty, they could begin to alleviate this recurring situation. This is an understandable, but somewhat misplaced response. As a teacher, my perspective is that since faculty members have created this situation, it is primarily their responsibility to solve it. Unfortunately, many do not realize that even with minimal effort, faculty intervention can make an incredible amount of difference to the outcome of the research paper process. It should be remembered that faculty members are preoccupied with getting across the disciplinary content of their courses, and simply may not be thinking about the skills-related issues that affect how students uncover that disciplinary content outside the classroom. Some faculty members already do intervene in this process considerably, and see that the inclass experience and the in-library experience both need to be directed in a meaningful way.” However, since these problematic assignments continue to appear, obviously not all faculty realize this.

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Taking the example of the geography assignment, what could be done in the classroom to make this assignment a better learning experience for second year students? Without even changing the wording of the assignment, and without consuming huge amounts of precious class time, my personal preference would be to integrate information-seeking and evaluative skills into the course content, using a stratified methodology. Instead of handing out the assignment and saying only that it is due by the end of term with no further guidance, a stratified approach structures the research paper process so that the students all work on a specific component of the assignment at once, preferably for a portion of the term paper grade. The specifics of how stratification is accomplished vary depending upon the content of the assignment and the level of faculty/librarian intervention desired. For the geography assignment under consideration, the overall objective of the stratification is to reveal and deal explicitly with the expert researcher assumptions lurking at each stage of the term paper process. From this general objective flow six stages of stratification, including: (1) narrowing the topic, (2) understanding and using the popular literature, (3) demystifying scholarly research, (4) finding and using the scholarly literature, (5) understanding legitimate shortcuts, and (6) developing a strategy for the completion of the research paper. Throughout the early part of the course, students work through these stages en masse, guided by the faculty member, who is able to provide the required disciplinary context. Short assigments are developed to enable the students to gain experience with each stage as they being to research a chosen topic. Follow-up discussions in class bring out interesting material or findings that the students have uncovered after each assignment. Students will then be able to take the cumulated results of their assignments and apply them directly to the final research paper. course-integrated The stratified approach may appear to be more work for the instructor, but having used variations of it with my own classes, I can attest that it need not be. True, it will result in more marking, and this in itself may put off some faculty. It will also mean that some class time will have to be devoted to the process, thus not covering other material. However, I would much rather look at 40 research papers that were relatively well done than 40 that were awful, so I would

consider the time spent on research skills as a good investment from a pedagogical point of view. However, this version of the stratified approach is really only feasible for smaller classes-50 or less. For extremely large classes, it would have to be modified, either by using only certain parts of it, or involving tutorial instructors, thus complicating delivery somewhat. ROLE OF ACADEMIC LIBRARIANS Can most faculty members actually carry out the kind of stratified approach suggested here? They can, and they ought to be encouraged to do more of it than they have in the past. Many faculty are keen to do something with respect to their students’ library and research skills, but they neither know exactly what they ought to do, nor how. Studies confirm that: (1) many faculty do not have a clear idea of the problems students face in using the library, or (2) they do not know how to go about improving the situation for their students.‘4

“They need to be more vocal and active facilitators of a curriculum-integrated approach in teaching students how to do library-based research, helping faculty to see their own responsibilities in this regard.” Academic librarians have long been aware that the lack of understanding just described can create very real problems for the students who are doing a research paper and for the librarians who are assisting them in that endeavor. Such awareness, however, has not generated a consensus regarding what should be done to ameliorate the situation. Although even a cursory review of the literature suggests that many academic librarians believe that a more sophisticated form of BI (blending critical thinking into traditional librarybased research skills) is part of the answer, there are others who view this approach as a futile exercise. Nevertheless, most academic libraians would undoubtedly agree that at some point in the student’s educational experience, there must be a convergence of both information and disciplinary literacy if true learning is to be facilitated. It seems clear, therefore, that both aca-

demic librarians and faculty have to be actively involved in this process together. This brings us back to the desperately seeking citations scenario described at the beginning of this article. Obviously, the continual reoccurrence of this situation indiciates that the faculty-librarian partnership in teaching library-based research skills frequently does not work very well. Academic librarians seem to be taking on an inordinate amount of the work load. Perhaps, then, they need to be more vocal and active facilitators of a curriculumintegrated approach in teaching students how to do library-based research, helping faculty to see their own responsibilities in this regard. This is certainly not a new idea, and numerous examples can be found in the literature urging the curriculum-integrated approach. However, it is also true that this approach is still not widely adopted. There are still too few faculty who see the necessity of a curriculum-integrated approach and too many who remain resistant to teaching library skills in their courses.2s The result is that despite the excellent efforts of instructional and public services librarians, the need for BI is overwhelmingly great. Although there are likely some institutions where BI reaches the majority of undergraduates, it may be unrealistic to assume that, in an era of tight resources, all-encompassing BI programs can continue to keep pace with the increasing need of students to understand both the complexities of the information retrieval universe and the knowledge-base of academic disciplines. In light of this, academic librarians may want to rethink their relationship with the faculty and to be more proactive in shifting the emphasis in BI from a perspective of “I can do that for you,” to “I can help you accomplish that in your course.” It would seem to be a better strategy for academic librarians to make a more concerted effort to resituate 1-irmly some of the responsibility for teaching library-based research skills with the faculty. In the stratified methodology, the responsibility for at least introductory bibliographic instruction in a discipline is deliberately shifted to the faculty member, who is then able to put it into the context of the course content. The librarian can be supportive, by providing examples, suggestions, outlines of what needs to be discussed, and/or coming into class for certain parts of the process (e.g., a talk about Reader5 Guide). In a way, academic librarians then would become bibliographic instruction

mentors, assisting and encouraging faculty with respect to integrating information literacy into their courses. Academic librarians could also shift the emphasis in faculty liaison sessions. Instead of going to a departmental meeting and discussing only the latest CD-ROM products, librarians should be addressing equally the dilemmas of the “expert versus novice” models of information seeking, and how faculty can incorporate information retrieval skills for the novice (i.e. the undergraduate) into their own discipline and courses. Furthermore, academic librarians should be visible participants in annual teaching workshops which many universities offer for faculty. For example, at my university, such sessions are always well attended, yet, to my knowledge, academic librarians have not been included on the program. What will an interventionist, curriculum-integrated approach on the part of the faculty mean in the library? Will it mean that students will no longer be desperately seeking citations? Probably not. There will always be those students for whom the process is a total mystery no matter how much they are exposed to, and there will always be faculty who do not buy into the idea that the development of research skills needs to be strongly articulated in the classroom. However, hopefully a curriculum-integrated approach will mean that there is a little less desperation. Evidence from case studies reported in the literature indicates that a curriculumintegrated approach is usually very successful,26 particularly in helping students to realize that learning how to find and utilize relevant information is an essential part of their education. In the long run, a strong curriculumintegrated approach would relieve academic librarians of the types of tedious and frustrating interactions described in the introduction of this article and would allow them to get on with helping students in depth. By this I mean assisting students by giving advice and wise counsel about the most appropriate routes to discovery for particular topics, and by helping them specifically with (1) planning their information-seeking strategies, (2) developing more effective search techniques, (3) evaluating sources and citations, and (4) navigating through the technological options. Librarians would also have more time to spend on tailored, in-depth BI for individuals and specific groups of students, both undergraduates and graduates. Finally, librarians would be able to concentrate on

developing their working relationships with the faculty, fostering an environment where the skills and knowledge of both groups can be harmonized to better benefit students and enhance the institution. NOTES ANDREFERENCES 1. Herbert Morton & Ann Price, The ACLS Survey of Scholars: Final Report (Washington,

D.C.: American Council of Learned Societies, 1989), p. 17; see also Council of Ontario Universities, Renewal of the Professoriate (Toronto: The Council, 1992), pp. 15-27. 2. Sue Stone, “Humanities Scholars: Information Needs and Uses,” Journal of Documentation 38 (1982): 3.58-365; Rebecca Watson-Boone, “The Information Needs and Habits of Humanities Scholars,” RQ 34 (1994): 203-216. 3. Constance Gould & M. Handler, Information Needs in the Social Sciences (Mountain View, CO: Research Libraries Group, 1989). 4. Constance Gould & Karla Pearch, Information Needs in the Sciences (Mountain View, CO: Research Libraries Group, 1991); Julia Bichteler & D. Ward, “Informationseeking Behavior of Geoscientists,” Special Libraries 80 (1989): 169-178. 5. Morton & Price, ACLS Survey, pp. 21-25. 6. Ibid., pp 33-43. 7. See Chapter 8 “Adolescence” in The Process of Human Development, by Clara Shaw Schuster and Shirley Smith Ashburn. (Boston: Little Brown, 1986); Barbara Newman & Philip Newman, Development through Life (Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole Pub., 1991), pp. 377-378. 8. The discussion of this issue by Abigail Loomis & Patricia Herrling, “CourseIntegrated Honors Instruction-Pros and Cons,” in What Is Good Instruction Now? Library Instruction for the 9Os, edited by Linda Shirato (Ann Arbor: Pierian Press, 1993), pp. 83-102. 9. See, for instance Evan Farber, “Alternative to the Term Paper, ” in Bibliographic Instruction in Practice, edited by L. Hardesty, J. Hastreiter & D. Henderson (Ann Arbor: Pierian Press, 1993) pp. 89-96. 10. Barbara Fister, “The Research Process of Undergraduates,” Journal of Academic Librarianship 18 (1992): 163-169. 11. Carol Kulthau, Betty Turok, Mary W. George, and Robert J. Belvin, “Valdiating a Model of the Search Process: A Comparison of Academic, Public and School Library Users,” Library & Information Science Research 12 (1990): 5-31. 12. Jane Keefer, “The Rats Hungry Syndrome: Library Anxiety, Information Literacy and the Academic Reference Process,” RQ 32 (1993): 333-339; Constance Mellon, “Library Anxiety: A Grounded Theory and its Development,” College & Research Libraries 47 (March 1986): 160-165. 13. Stan Nash & M.C. Wilson, “Value-added Bibliographic Instruction: Teaching Students

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to Find the Right Citations,” Reference Services Review 19 (Spring 199 1): 87-92. 14. Gillian Allen, “Database Selection by Patrons Using CD-ROM,” College & Research Libraries 51 (January 1990): 69-75; Lucy Anne Wozny, “College Students as End User Searchers: One University’s Experience,” RQ 28 (Fall 1988): 54-61. 15. Newman, Development through Life; Schuster, Process of Human Development: Richard Lemer, Concepts and Theories of Human Development (New York: Random House, 1986) pp. 256-261. 16. Jill Coupe, “Undergraduate Library Skills: Two Surveys at Johns Hopkins University,” Research Strategies 11 (Fall 1993): 188-201. 17. Jane Keefer & Stuart Karabenick, “Helpseeking and the Library Reference/Instruction Setting,” in What Is Good Instruction NOM,.? pp. 63-72; Barbara Valentine, “Undergraduate Research Behaviour: Using Focus Groups to

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Journal of Academic Generate Theory,” Librarianship 19 (1993): 300-304. 18. Valentine. “Undergraduate Research;” Fister, “Research Processes.” 19. Patricia Wallace, “How Do Patrons Search the Online Catalog When No-one’s Looking‘?” RQ 33 (Winter 1993): 239-252; Lawrence Reed, “Locally Loaded Databases and Undergraduate Bibliographic Instruction,” RQ 33 (Winter 1993): 266-273; Allen, “Database Selection.” 20. Wallace, “How Do Patrons Search.” 21. Harry Llull, “Meeting the Academic and Research Information Needs of Scientsts and Engineers in the University Environment,” Science & Technology Libraries 11 (Spring 1991): 83-90. 22. Keefer, “Hungry Rats;” Valentine, “Undergraduate Research.” 23. Two examples are S.J. Penhale & W.J. in Stratton, “Online Searching Assignments the Chemistry Course for Nonscience Majors.”

Journal of Chemical Education 71 (1994): 227-229; Gordon Thompson, ‘Sequenced Research Assignments for the Undergraduate Literature Student,” Bibliographic in Instruction in Practice, pp. 41-50; Larry Hardesty. Facula): and the Library: The Undergraduate Experience (Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1991). pp. 46-47. 24. Anita Cannon, “Faculty Survey on Library Research Instruction,” RQ 33 (1994): 524-542; see also discussion of faculty culture in Hardesty, Faculty and the Library, pp. 84-105. 25. Gordon Thompson, “Faculty Recalcitrance about Bibliographic Instruction.” in Biblographic Instruction in Practice, pp. 103106; Hardesty, Faculty and the Library, pp. 40-4 1. 26. A good example is detailed by Rochelle Minchow, Kathryn Pudlock. & Barbara Lucas, ‘Breaking New Ground in Curriculum Integrated Instruction,” Medical Reference Senices Quarterly 12 (Summer 1993): l-18.