THE RELATIONSHIP OF BIBLIOGRAPHIC DATABASE DESIGN TO THE STRUCTURE OF INFORMATION: A CASE STUDY IN EDUCATION
| Pages | 36-44 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb026924 |
| Date | 01 January 1994 |
| Published date | 01 January 1994 |
| Author | KEITH PICKENS |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management,Library & information science |
THE RELATIONSHIP OF BIBLIOGRAPHIC DATABASE DESIGN TO
THE STRUCTURE OF INFORMATION: A CASE STUDY IN
EDUCATION*
KEITH PICKENS
New Zealand Council for Educational Research, PO Box 3237
Wellington 6000, New Zealand
Bibliographical databases employing a controlled vocabulary and a
Boolean logic approach to retrieval remain the norm. The record
structures for databases of this kind need to be designed in a way
that reflects the underlying nature of the particular information they
contain. Using education as a case study, a basic record structure is
described. Possible extensions to this structure are discussed.
Professionals in small special libraries, working in a
PC
environment
and with time and resource constraints, are the intended audience.
1.
INTRODUCTION
THE INFORMATION found in the fields of a bibliographical database
generally belongs to one of three different data types. To begin with, there are
always fields holding descriptive, factual information about each document: the
title and year of publication, for example. Secondly, there may be fields giving
information about document availability, for example, the location of a copy.
Finally, there will always be a field or fields containing descriptors or keywords
of one kind or another, that describe or help identify the contents of the
document, what it is about, in both the broad and narrow senses of the word
'about'.
2.
MULTI-MODAL INDEXING
In the late 1970s, Swift and his colleagues
[1,
2] argued that before fields of this
very important third kind could be defined, the general structure of the
information peculiar to a database had to be analysed, and a list of its
individual dimensions or facets generated. For example, analysis of a sample of
sociology of education documents, during development work on the Sociology
*This note derives from work done on the development and maintenance of a
bibliographical database by the Information Service, New Zealand Council for
Educational Research (NZCER). This work was carried on between the late 1970s and
1992,
when funding cuts terminated the project.
Journal
of
Documentation,
vol. 50, no. 1, March 1994, pp. 36-44
36
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