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An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles within the issue on topics including the ethical implications of artificial intelligence (AI) and related technologies, the representation of library activities in national AI plans, and a review of curricula in Australia to identify the framing of digital technologies.

This paper describes the human information behaviours of long-time users of voice assistants or chatbot software that focuses on voice interaction to retrieve information, and which operate on technologies that use artificial intelligence to understand and act upon the information requests of the user through a conversational interface. The paper reports on a case study based on 10 interviews with adult participants who have used voice assistants in their homes for at least six months. Interviews were semi-structured and focused on connecting to the users' and their family's experiences of using voice assistants in their daily lives. Insights from our findings focus on two areas, how the humanness of voice assistants and their perceived personality affect information retrieval, and secondly, the difficulties in transitioning from text-based information seeking to speech-based interactions. This paper makes a case for expanding human information behaviour studies to include interactive conversational information retrieval devices such as voice assistants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The final paper is Research-in-Practice paper and explores the B I Use of social media by academic libraries in Australia i b . Finally, there is also a Research-in-Practice paper describing the use of social media by academic libraries in Australia. We kick off 2023 with a rich issue consisting of diverse research papers that cover many aspects of Library and Information Science, including library history, library accessibility, library research and LIS education, and also a paper by a researcher and user of academic libraries detailing a complicated project about compiling sociology PhDs in Australia, which involved expert help from some amazing academic libraries and librarians. [Extracted from the article]

This paper reviews different types of conversational agents used in health care for chronic conditions, examining their underlying communication technology, evaluation measures, and AI methods. A systematic search was performed in February 2021 on PubMed Medline, EMBASE, PsycINFO, CINAHL, Web of Science, and ACM Digital Library. Studies were included if they focused on consumers, caregivers, or healthcare professionals in the prevention, treatment, or rehabilitation of chronic diseases, involved conversational agents, and tested the system with human users. The search retrieved 1087 articles. Twenty-six studies met the inclusion criteria. Out of 26 conversational agents (CAs), 16 were chatbots, seven were embodied conversational agents (ECA), one was a conversational agent in a robot, and another was a relational agent. One agent was not specified. Based on this review, the overall acceptance of CAs by users for the self-management of their chronic conditions is promising. Users' feedback shows helpfulness, satisfaction, and ease of use in more than half of included studies. Although many users in the studies appear to feel more comfortable with CAs, there is still a lack of reliable and comparable evidence to determine the efficacy of AI-enabled CAs for chronic health conditions due to the insufficient reporting of technical implementation details. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the use of wearable health and fitness trackers in everyday life, and users' motivations and their understanding and use of the data derived from devices, and understand the results using the lens of information behaviours. Design/methodology/approach: The study used a qualitative, constructionist approach, based on 21 interviews with users of a range of wearable activity trackers used for health and fitness. Findings: Findings show that the lifelogging devices have become companion tools that enable users to take information from their bodily indicators and make some decisions about their health and fitness, and also track the results when they act on it, thus giving them a sense of gratification and a sense of control over their own health. Practical implications: The findings have implications on how health professionals can talk to their lifelogging patients about how to deal with and understand the information provided by their activity-tracking devices. Some participants in the study already discuss these data regularly with their health professionals. Originality/value: As the self-tracking practices attract wide range research interests from human–computer interaction, information systems, digital sociology, health informatics and marketing among others. This study provides important everyday information-seeking perspective that contributes to the understanding of the practices of how people make sense of the data, how the data improves their wellbeing, i.e. physical health improvement or fitness, and implications to users health behaviour. Additionally the study adds to the lifelogging literature through a constructionist, qualitative approach rather than a technological deterministic approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Twitter acts as an information gateway as it provides a place where professionals network and share their knowledge. Twitter has increasingly influenced the way people use and share information. However, limited research demonstrates IT professionals' information experience on Twitter impacts the way they use it for professional purposes. The study aimed to understand how such information experiences impact on the way IT professionals use Twitter for professional purposes. Eleven IT professionals were recruited for this study to understand the participants' information experience through their own individual perspective, with the data analysed using constructive grounded theory. This study revealed that IT professionals' information experience plays a vital role in creating professional networking and knowledge sharing in online spaces. These lived experiences influence the way IT professionals use Twitter for professional purposes. Thus, the findings of this study contribute to theoretical perspectives in the understanding of information experience perspectives within Twitter, along with a foundational understanding of the ways in which microblogging is used for professional purposes. The findings can help organisations understand and provide for this emerging channel of professional information sharing for its staff and stakeholders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses empirical research conducted in 2016 with seven Australian authors of OwnVoices young adult fiction who publicly identified as one or more of the following: Indigenous Australian, a person of colour, or a member of queer or disabled communities. Interview data was analyzed using critical discourse analysis to understand authors' professional journeys as publicly identifying marginalized creators within the Australian publishing industry and wider literary community. The study found that all seven authors directly or indirectly invoked the concept of education or learning through their books, with their books functioning as a "window" to readers from communities different from their own, per Bishop's 1990 metaphor. Five authors positively acknowledged this educational potential, while two did from a negative perspective. This research contributes to our understanding of the additional pressures and expectations placed on authors from marginalized communities, while inserting the voices of Australian authors into broader discussions about equity in children's and young adult fiction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the potential of using chatbots to improve the academic research experience for university students with a literature-based discussion reflecting on a prototype being developed at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS). The paper proposes that information professionals need to adapt emerging technologies such as chatbots to innovate, improve and support library services. Designing a positive experience for the user is essential to ensure that such technological solutions are sustainable. In this exploratory paper, we argue that it is important that librarians engage with the conversational design of the library chatbot in collaboration with the technology developers in order to make it useful, friendly, trustworthy, and customisable for university students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on the topics including tribute to Edward A. Parr, an influential librarian and educator; and discussion on textbook affordability to open educational practices.

Based on a study of Australian young adult (YA) fiction authors, this paper argues that it is necessary for publishers, booksellers, and YA librarians to pay attention to the global movement towards diversity: diversity within their own organisations, diversity among authors they publish, stock, or collect, and representations of diversity within YA fiction. The mainstream attention to diversity has particularly focused on media for young people, with advocates stating that children and teenagers from traditionally marginalised communities deserve to see their own experiences reflected and validated in the media they consume. This paper looks at diversity in writing and traditional publishing through interviews with Australian YA authors (conducted in 2016) from traditionally marginalised or unacknowledged communities, especially as it relates to their transition from reader to writer, and their experience of the publishing journey. A critical discourse analysis of the interviews point to a need for more diversity representations in YA fiction, and also the need for a change in industry practices to enable this, including publishing, bookselling, and library practices. Abbreviations: YA - Young Adult Fiction WNDB - We Need Diverse Books CDA - Critical Discourse Analysis [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including the effect of the Covid 19 pandemic on public libraries; the Western Australia's involvement with news on social media; and community archives in Australia.

An introduction to the journal is presented in which the editor discusses several topics within the issue including influence of humanoid robots in public libraries, how university libraries manage change in public sector university libraries, and hospital libraries to achieve accreditation.

Introduction. The purpose of this study was to understand how social structures and social relations facilitate the flow of knowledge within the world of Kente, the traditional cloth of Ghana. Method. A case study method was adopted wherein data was collected using semi-structured interviews with fourteen participants who each had expert knowledge about Kente from a specific perspective through their role as weavers, sellers, fashion designers, tailors, and consumers. Analysis. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the interview data, using social capital theory as a lens to understand knowledge flow. Results. Knowledge about Kente flows from the family, mostly from the elders in the family. It is part of the socialisation process of individuals in the community and tied up with their identity as Ghanaians. Some formal education, apprenticeships, and tourism helped in transferring knowledge about Kente to young people in the community and other people in Ghana and abroad. Conclusion. Social capital is central to the flow of Kente related knowledge. Elements of social structures and social relations, such as socialisation, family, social technologies and social interactions are the loci of knowledge flow. Social media and online social interactions are also increasingly important now in this knowledge flow, even within traditional societies such as in Ghana. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction. This paper presents the issues and challenges faced by a university library in encouraging academics and researchers to adopt open access, specifically with respect to depositing publications in the institutional repository Method. Interviews were conducted with academics and researchers about their awareness of open access and their use of the university repository. An action research approach was used to address issues on a continual basis, and redesign the repository based on the findings. Analysis. The interview data were analysed using thematic content analysis, and the repository data were analysed using heuristic evaluation Results. Results show that researchers lack awareness of open access and its value, and that there is also confusion about publishers' copyright policies and researcher reputation. The lack of visibility and usability of the library-managed institutional repository was found to be an issue, as well as the need for subject repositories. The results informed a redesign of the repository and informed the library's strategies to promote scholarly communication literacy. Conclusion. Whilst librarians have been advocates of open access, researchers' understanding of it is still limited? they have other pressures in regard to their publishing outputs, which also limits their adoption of open access practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction. We report on a research study that uses the vaccination debate as a case to understand the information worlds of conspiracy theories. We pay specific attention to the information behaviour of the believers of anti-vaccination theories through self-reports of people who have since converted to pro-vaccination and examine the circumstances under which this belief revision occurred. Method. We used publicly available data, mainly from a curated portal for personal blogs where converts from anti-vaccination to pro-vaccination post the stories of their information journeys. Analysis. Text from blog posts about the personal experiences from twelve different individuals on the topic were manually coded and analysed by two researchers using content analysis, and informed by a constructive grounded theory approach. Results. All twelve individuals moved from a paradigm of passionate belief in anti-vaccination, primarily based on online and social media information, and toward a more informed understanding, only when the issue affected them in a very personal manner. This prompted them to seek authoritative information from a healthcare professional, after which they shed their fears and reservations about vaccines, and proceeded to vaccinate their children. Conclusion. People trust their primary health care professionals, but they do not often hear such trusted and authoritative voices on social media and the Internet, which has become the first point of information seeking for many. Social media and many other open online forums often bring the polarised voices on both sides of the debate to the forefront, drowning out any other voices. Hence, we argue that there is a need for first-line healthcare professionals, such as doctors and nurses, who are trained to address patients' concerns, to engage with social media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction. Social media have changed the way we conceptualise the boundaries of space and time as well as how we interact with, exchange and respond to information. As a result, information behaviour is evolving alongside digital social media technologies. Increasingly, individuals and organisations are turning to social media to find as well as to disseminate information. This includes the homeless and underprivileged members of our societies. This paper reports on a case study of social media use, in the form of microblogging and blogging by an individual spanning a time of both homelessness and after obtaining housing. Method. The exploratory study used a case study approach along with information behaviour theories such as information grounds, information needs, and sensemaking as lenses to understand how the homeless use social media in their everyday lives. Analysis. The first phase analysed homelessness-related posts on Twitter over a period of two years, identified by following various hashtags and handles related to the topic. The second phase involved a content analysis of all blog posts by one individual identified through Twitter who also links to their own much longer blog posts during their time of homelessness. Results. Results show that social media provide an avenue for both social inclusion and social participation for the homeless while also helping them develop and maintain social ties and stave away their sense of alienation from society. Conclusion. Based on the findings, this paper argues that for those living on the margins of society, social media in the form of blogging and microblogging has potential not just as a source of information seeking and information sharing, but also as a medium that facilitates social participation, and helps create and sustain social ties, and even develop social capital, which in turn can help them overcome homelessness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information grounds are social settings where information, people, and place come together to create information flow within a physical environment (Karen E. Pettigrew, 1998). Information grounds also facilitate the opportunistic discovery of information within social settings created temporarily by people gathered for some purpose other than seeking information, but the social environment stimulates spontaneous information sharing (K. E. Pettigrew, 1999), such as in hair salons, doctor's waiting rooms and other public places. Professional and scholarly use of social media is a rapidly emerging area of research. In this regard, qualitative analysis of data gathered from Twitter is a relatively unexplored area of Library and Information Science (LIS) research. This paper details the results of a qualitative study of Twitter using digital ethnography, in order to investigate the use of Twitter by IT professionals in forming communities of practice. This study is relevant to Library and Information Science (LIS) research as LIS professionals are part of the IT community of practice. This study used information grounds theory (K. E. Fisher, 2005) to explore Twitter as an online information ground. The research used online observation - conceptualised here as online ethnography or digital ethnography - and interviews to collect data. The online observations helped the researcher to understand the norms and culture of the participants along with patterns of behaviour. Interviews were used to understand the information grounds of the virtual environment through the participants' individual perspectives and their information experiences. A total of eleven participants were interviewed after a total of 734 tweets from these same participants were downloaded and analysed. Both interview and Twitter data were analysed using constructivist grounded theory (Charmaz, 2006). The findings highlight a variety of information sharing types, the role of information sharing in professional contexts, and the influences of Twitter on communication and social engagement, including a counterintuitive finding that professionals use Twitter not so much to seek or share information as much as to seek out a network of like-minded people. The significance of this study is in providing a fundamental understanding of the ways in which social media is used for professional reasons. It also proposes a systematic, qualitative data collection and data analysis approach to future research around Twitter and social media in general. This contribution not only helps LIS researchers, but can also help information professionals in the use of social media for professional purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article is a research essay based on a thematic interdisciplinary literature-review that examines social media using the lens of selected theories and concepts in information science and allied disciplines such as communication and media ecology. The specific focus of the article is how social media has altered our notion of cyberspace from being an abstract information space to being perceived as an actual place, for social media more than any other digital media before it, embodies cyberspace and reifies it as a real place, both in our everyday lives and in our public spheres. Anything can happen in this dynamic and heterogeneous place, just as it can in a real place, including protests and revolutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An editorial is presented on cognitive processes of users of library institutions. Topics include periodical's guest editors including Drs Noah Lenstra and Kiersten Latham; and introduction about Dr Kiersten F. Latham who is the Director of Arts & Cultural Management and Museum Studies, and Associate Professor in the Department of Art, Art History, and Design at Michigan State University.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles presented in the fifteenth Australasian Conference on Research Applications in Information and Library Studies (RAILS) in the issue on topics including research applications.

The article presents a study aimed to understand information technology professionals co-experience and how it influences professional activities on Twitter. Topics discussed include online observations and interview to clarify the ways in which information technology professionals experience Twitter for professional purposes; role of social interaction to initiate co-experience; and use of Twitter for user-generated content, communication, and engagement.

The June 2024 issue of the Journal of the Australian Library and Information Association (JALIA) features two research papers, two research-in-practice papers, an information-in-practice paper, an obituary, and ten book reviews. One research paper examines the challenges and prospects of public library services in rural Australia, highlighting their value to communities. Another research paper focuses on codesigning public library spaces and the challenges in achieving genuine codesign. A research-in-practice paper discusses cataloguing Indigenous knowledge and the need for more accurate representations of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. Another research-in-practice paper explores the views and experiences of opera librarians. An information-in-practice paper presents a unique approach to a community literacy project in Kerala, India. The issue also includes an obituary for a dedicated librarian and various book reviews covering a range of topics. [Extracted from the article]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including women's participation in scholarship, use of social media technologies, and concept of trust and the role it plays in knowledge sharing.

An introduction to the June 2022 edition of the scholarly periodical the "Journal of the Australian Library and Information Association" (JALIA) in which the authors briefly discuss articles in the journal about topics including the writing of Croatian immigrants in Australia, the role of public libraries, and academic integrity in Australian higher education.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including library anxiety, libraries in Australia, and immigrants and social inclusion.

The Journal of the Australian Library & Information Association's first issue of 2024 includes a variety of research papers, research-in-practice papers, an information-in-practice paper, and an obituary. One research paper explores how teacher librarians can teach with and about generative artificial intelligence (GAI), emphasizing the role of teacher librarians in fostering critical and ethical use of these tools. Another research paper presents the results of a national survey indicating that library and information practitioners are confident in their research abilities. The research-in-practice papers discuss topics such as transitioning to a team approach in library services, perceptions of artificial intelligence among Filipino academic librarians, and a proposed knowledge organization system for Laos ethnic groups. An information-in-practice paper examines the implementation of a proactive chat widget at the University of Wollongong Library, which proved valuable during the COVID-19 pandemic. The issue also includes an obituary for Professor Michael J. Ramsden, a significant figure in the library and information professions. Additionally, the issue features book reviews covering various themes, including online instruction, cataloguing, and the internationalization of academic libraries. [Extracted from the article]

The author introduces the issue which is a special issue devoted to articles about the experience of disaster and crisis management and introduces guest editors Liz Walkley Hall, Jane Garner, and Simon Wakeling.

An introduction to the journal is presented which discusses various reports within the issue on topics including public library developments in Australia, the communication of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine information by public librarians, and embedded librarianship.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including social and cultural life; academic libraries and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTIQ) users; and library literature.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including Jean Arnot Fellowship; role of school librarians; and social inclusion.

An introduction is presented which discusses articles in the first issue of the journal in 2022 on topics including the National Library of Australia's oral history collection, a library student work placement program, and read-aloud programs for cancer patients.

An introduction to the journal is presented which includes articles on topics including how public libraries can work with universities to support rural, regional, and remote low-socioeconomic students, and why many university students prefer to read print over digital course materials.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including paper on history of bibliographic policy discussion in Australia, Emotional Intelligence, Library Use and Academic achievement of University Students.

An introduction is presented of articles published in the journal including a paper on the potential of the Australian Indigenous language database AUSTLANG to enhance Australian Indigenous language identification, prestige in scholarly book publishing and its impact in publications in the humanities and social sciences, and Australian universities efforts to provide remote access for poor college students in rural and remote communities.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including public libraries, cultural diversity, and library collections.