Measuring the Interdisciplinary Degree of Information Behavior Research

Abstract

This article explores the interdisciplinarity of this field using co-word analysis and diversity measures based on 5299 publications related to information behavior research. Findings show that information behavior research is becoming more interdisciplinary in recent ten years. The interdisciplinary collaborations mostly exist in neighboring disciplines, while collaborations between different disciplines are relatively few. In addition, the strength of interdisciplinary collaborations needs to be enhanced in the future. Suggestions are made to promote interdisciplinary collaborations of this field, which is beneficial for researchers of digital library to provide personalized service to meet user need.