49. évfolyam, 2003. 1. szám

Archívum

The assessment of information as an ecological process 2.

BENEDIKTSSON Dániel

Part 1. of the study (see Könyvtári Figyelő 2002. 4.) dealt with the nature of the bibliographic entry and bibliographical information from the point of view of the evaluation of information. This part explains the role of authority. The primary aim of information retrieval is to provide the searcher with representations of textual means which can assist him to achieve his objective, i.e. to acquire information relevant as well as pertinent. Finding texts that represent authority in an area of interest expresses the main goal of the search. The study analyses elements of information which have the power to express cognitive authority, i.e. bibliographical information fields which consist of four groups: author, title, publication data, and other elements. The future usefulness of a document or a text discovered in the retrieval process may be evaluated according to how much authority certain components of a bibliographic entry can express. (The actual exploitation in turn depends on how much interpretative power or heuristic information the user brings to the search.) In the following, the author describes authority as it occurs in the natural and applied sciences, in the social sciences and in the arts and humanities. In the field of the natural sciences, the statement of responsibility, due to the communicational and research patterns of the area, has an almost exclusive importance from the point of view of cognitive authority. In the social sciences none of the four groups assumes substantial role, considered again from the point of view of authority. Instead, there has to be a coordination between various data fields selected according to the social context the particular entry stands for. In the arts and humanities content is influenced by form, and authority cannot be evaluated solely on the basis of bibliographical data groups singled out for this purpose alone.

Országos Széchényi Könyvtár Észrevételek