Social tagging, facets, and social spacesLouise SpiteriSchool of Information ManagementDalhousie University

ASIST 2011

Research area 1: Faceted navigation of social tagging applications To what extent can facets be used to facilitate the

organization, display, and retrieval of tags in social tagging applications? Includes “traditional” tags, as well as hashtags, geotags,

etc.

ASIST 2011

ASIST 2011

Facets in Wine.com

ASIST 2011

Research area 2: The catalogue as a social space. New social discovery tools allow for user-generated

metadata, such as tags, reviews, and ratings. These features can allow clients to share reading, viewing, and listening interests and to allow library staff to build resources that reflect these needs.

ASIST 2011

Social discovery tools: Observations User-generated content is not being used extensively or

significantly in many social discovery systems.

List creation predominates user-generated content. Ratings, reviews, and tags rank significantly lower.

ASIST 2011

Research area 3: Motivation for using social tagging applications Research on tagging behaviour has focused primarily on

the types and frequency of tags assigned. My interest is in exploring what motivates people to use social tagging applications. This question is particularly important to research question 2, given that the social features of many social discovery tools are being underused.

ASIST 2011

Research area 4: Social tags to leverage cultural warrant How can library catalogue records be designed to meet

the different cultural needs of communities?

When users add metadata to existing catalogue records in the form of tags, ratings, or reviews, they are given the opportunity to express both their needs and their cultural points-of-view.