Time-line interviews and inductive content analysis: their effectiveness for exploring cognitive behaviors

In studies of information usersʹ cognitive behaviors, it is widely recognized that usersʹ perceptions of their information problem situations play a major role. Time-line interviewing and inductive content analysis are two research methods that, used together, have proven extremely useful for exploring and describing usersʹ perceptions in various situational contexts. This article describes advantages and disadvantages of the methods using examples from a study of usersʹ criteria for evaluation in a multimedia context.