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Readers of scholarly text are frequently confronted with unfamiliar vocabulary. It is common for some of these readers to attach glossaries and other notes to printed text to focus their mind and remind them of the meaning of the words during their next reading [Olsen, 1994]. In this way, readers adapt texts to their own needs much as Bush [1945] described a memex user creating a personal trail by linking. An editable glossary tool would benefit these readers by simulating this functionality in electronic texts.
Edmonds et al. [2004] present another scenario in which a reader tries to make sense of complex medical information. That scenario is more detailed and includes a discussion of the role of trust.
A glossary tool could also be a particular benefit to readers who are new to a field or a particular topic but require information about a query in that area. It is reasonable to speculate that such users would often not be willing to take the time and effort required to familiarize themselves with all the specific terms pertaining to the field in question just to fulfill their information needs. They may, however, want or need to understand the meanings of terms directly related to their query in order to obtain a more complete answer to their question. If a glossary tool with entries for these terms were available, it would be useful to readers in this situation. The scenarios below are examples of such a situations.
With access to such a tool, the readers would find it easier and less disruptive to simply consult the glossary entries corresponding to the terms they need to understand rather than having to consult external sources or simply deciding to not understand the terms.
These scenarios should not be confused with the discount usability evaluation method of the same name (and related techniques such as cognitive walkthroughs [Lewis & Reiman, 1994] as criticized by Marshall [n.d.]. Rather they are in the spirit of Bush [1945].
Hypertext offers many non-traditional approaches to presenting texts. It also offers unique advantages in helping people to garner knowledge from texts.
Consider a mother (we will call her Alice
) who has just
been told by her family doctor that her young son has asthma.
She is naturally concerned about the implications of this and
would like to gather more information about the disease so that she
can better care for her son.
She decides to go online and search for articles that will help
explain to her the details of the condition.
She finds that she is getting frustrated by the medical jargon present in the articles she has retrieved through Internet search engines. Constantly having to refer to other websites in order to understand the information is becoming very time-consuming. In addition to this, with all the unfamiliar terms she encounters, it is becoming difficult for her to remember the meanings of terms she has already looked up.
In this situation, Alice would greatly benefit from a glossary tool integrated into the articles she reads. If she encounters any unfamiliar terms, she can click on them to retrieve their explanations. She can make her own notes for terms as well. So, if she encounters these terms again she can refer to her notes as well as any explanations they may already have. The presence of such a tool will remove a lot of the frustration and loss of time she would otherwise experience. Furthermore as she becomes more familiar with the technical jargon her information needs change: at some stage she will have a basic grasp of the pathological practicalities of the disease and may want to understand more about its aetiology.
Consider also the case of a somewhat naïve student (who we
will call Bob
).
Bob is studying a complex issue in a university course.
He has been reading some background to the issues he is studying
in books and on-line.
Now that he feels somewhat informed about various aspects of the
issue he begins to read newspaper editorial columns and listen to
interviews about the issue.
Suddenly while reading opinion pieces one after the other Bob
realizes that many of the most popular pundits are speaking in
rhetorical codewords: the columnists do not mean the same thing by
the terms family values
[Montgomery, 2000], in accord with the constitution
,
etc. although the words are the
same.
Furthermore when one pundit would say freedom fighter
another would be likely to use the term guerilla warrior
,
but the terms connote something different to our Bob.
If Bob were reading these terms in a hypertext, he could add the entries to his personal glossary with all of the multiplicity of definitions, make cross-references between them, and use them as examples in another term as examples of partisan rhetoric. (See the example nearby.) Note that Bob's glossary is not the same as an electronic notebook in which he can enter any text he wants [Brown & Brown, 2004]. There is a structure of terms, definitions, and other related materials.
Because of the few limitations and many possibilities this structure offers, it can become not only a place to list definitions of terms but also to create a network of concepts which will form the basis for an increased understanding of the world.
References for works cited in this text chunk appear below. References for all works cited are available in a separate chunk.
Article No. 237, 2004-02-03, 2004.
Article No. 243, 2004-05-12, 2004.
Hillary's family values. [Read excerpt.].
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