scholarly journals Personal Information Management Practices and Behaviors of Social Sciences’ Students

2016 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 12-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kanwal Ameen

This study reports the personal information management (PIM) behavior of university students under the backdrop of development of information and digital technology infrastructure in Pakistan. The PIM field has been explored through various perspectives in the developed world, but hardly any studies from the developing countries, specifically from the South Asian Region were found. The present, first study from Pakistan , adopted quantitative research design based on a pretested questionnaire to collect data from a sample of 221 students of master programs who were studying in their final semesters in five social sciences disciplines under Faculty of Economics and Management Sciences at the University of the Punjab (PU), Pakistan. The key findings revealed that most frequently used tools for relocating information once found are downloads on personal computers, self-created digital document (e.g. MSWord, Excel, Google Docs, etc.), URLs and hyperlinks. URLs are the most commonly used elements to save online information for future use. The revelation of their practices establishes that they need appropriate training regarding their personal information management.

2011 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 53-77 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathleen Fear

This study explores how researchers at a major Midwestern university are managing their data, as well as the factors that have shaped their practices and those that motivate or inhibit changes to that practice. A combination of survey (n=363) and interview data (n=15) yielded both qualitative and quantitative results bearing on my central research question: In what types of data management activities do researchers at this institution engage? Corollary to that, I also explored the following questions: What do researchers feel could be improved about their data management practices? Which services might be of interest to them? How do they feel those services could most effectively be implemented?In this paper, I situate researchers’ data management practices within a theory of personal information management. I present a view of data management and preservation needs from researchers’ perspectives across a range of domains. Additionally, I discuss the implications that understanding research data management as personal information management has for introducing services to support and improve data management practice.


2021 ◽  
pp. 136787792110479
Author(s):  
Rowan Wilken ◽  
Jenny Kennedy

In this article, we present a deeper understanding of everyday data cultures in regards to personal information management practices. We draw on a study involving 14 in-depth interviews with users of portable hard drives and USB portable flash drives in Melbourne, Australia, to examine participants’ reflections on their management of personal information on USB portable devices. In examining participant use of these devices, we consider how they kept (stored) and organized (arranged) information on these devices. We also examined device and data sharing. We conclude by thinking about their increased use within cross-tool information management, including the nexus of portable hard drive/USB use and cloud storage. The argument of this article is that portable hard drives and USBs, due to their miniaturization, ease of portability, affordability and storage capacity, add considerable complexity to established understandings of personal information management practices.


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