Introduction

Research is generally regarded as the creation of new knowledge; more specifically, as the creation of knowledge which is new to everyone, not just to the researcher, in a form which can be communicated through objective information, and which builds on existing knowledge. Communication to the wider community is the vital final stage of research, through the processes of scholarly communication and further dissemination discussed in Chapter 13.

Research is often described in terms of major discoveries by brilliant individuals. But it is usually more realistic to think of it as the creation of new knowledge within a discipline by an evolutionary and impersonal process, with contributions by many individuals, most of whom will never be credited with a major advance (Scerri, 2016).

For a discipline with an associated professional activity, such as information science, research has two purposes: academic, to improve the discipline's knowledge base; and professional, to improve practice. Information research may be carried out by university researchers, advanced students, research institutes and consultancies, government agencies, system and service designers and suppliers and practitioners. Research has been an important aspect of information science since the discipline's beginnings.

In this chapter we will consider first the somewhat troubled research/practice interaction, then consider information research and methods and finally mention research ethics. There are several textbooks for this area, and the coverage here will not be detailed.

Research and the practitioner

Interaction between academics and researchers on the one hand, and practitioners on the other, is as desirable in the information disciplines as in any other academic area with an associated professional discipline.