A brief study of Brazilian literature on informational behavior

Abstract

Several analysis about the set of international studies in the domain of information behavior have been carried out to evaluate the theoretical and methodological trends in the area. These assessments provide a critical analysis of the research that steer future work by scholars in the field. However, equivalent studies on Brazilian research are few and not comprehensive. The present work analyzed the national literature on information behavior to: (1) compare if the main international trends in research on information behavior are also occurring in Brazil; (2) conduct an analysis of the research in the field and guide future work. After a literature review and synthesis of the main tendencies of this area indicated in the international works, a bibliographic portfolio was compiled using the Proknow-C methodology to select 233 national studies on human information behavior, dating from 2000 to 2017. The 233 papers selected were analyzed for the type of research, research objective and conceptual basis. Data analysis through descriptive statistics showed that Brazilian research follows most of the international trends as national studies focus more on people than on systems; use of more than one data collection procedure; there is a predominance of qualitative methods as a research approach; and the questionnaire and interview are the predominant methods of data collection. This work provides a starting point for verifying the characteristics and direction of Brazilian research on information behaviour.