I'd like to tax you for my personal information infrastructure

My personal information infrastructure
“Taken together, these types of knowledge, skills, and attitudes compose our personal information infrastructure” (Marchionini p. 61). I thought it might be interesting to actually reflect on my own PII if you can forgive yet another acronym. I feel like so much of what we are reading stays in the abstract or feels so barren of real life that I have this continual urge to humanize the concepts that we cover. Formally I have knowledge and skills in English language and literature and I’m developing my knowledge and skills in library and information science. Do problem domains map out to the DDC subject headings or the LC subject headings? I have knowledge and skills for the search system and setting of our school library, the Gale databases, and the World Wide Web but they are still developing. My attitude is the strongest element of my personal information infrastructure. I’m very curious, I am no stranger to ambiguity and uncertainty, and I have a lot of confidence and tenacity when it comes to looking for information.

Studies of professional information seekers
“One approach is to use the various online searching patterns, strategies, and tactics identified in studies of professional online searchers to create systems that optimize thos activities.” (Marchionini p. 75) What struck me about this quote was the idea of doing studies of professional searchers. Reading Marchionini’s observation that journalists, librarians, and detectives are all engaged in the same general activity, stimulated me to wonder what it would be like to follow and observe information seeking professionals at work. I would love to shadow several different professionals as they engage an information problem. I imagine that at the “move” level of granularity there would be much difference between even individuals in the same field, but I also imagine that as we move up to the coarser levels we would see some of the same patterns showing up.

Recording my own information seeking process
In an attempt to understand this more I want to try to record my own moves, tactics, strategies and patterns as I encounter different information needs. I’m just not sure what the best way of doing this would be. I can see keeping a small tape recorder with me and then as a student asks me for help, or a teacher needs some information, or if I need to know something take the time to turn on the recorder and try to describe my thoughts as I go. I wonder what an information seeking diary would look like after just a week? Would the process of recording and reflecting on moves, tactics, strategies, and patterns change that very process? How many case-studies are already out there describing the processes that professional information seekers engage in?