The use of online electronic information resources in scientific research: The case of neuroscience

This study explored the bibliographic and documentary information-seeking behavior of high-level research scientists in the context of ever-developing online bibliographic and documentary information (BDI) resources. Descriptive data were obtained from a nationwide sample of French neuroscience researchers using individual questionnaires, followed by semistructured interviews. French neuroscientists often use online BDI resources instead of indexes and other print resources for bibliographic and documentary searches. The most popular online BDI resources among neuroscientists are the PubMed database and the Google™ search engine, which neuroscience experts described as essential for their work. The participants used them with a wide variety of objectives, such as acquiring new knowledge, finding out about experimental techniques, monitoring publications in their field, looking for information to fuel scientific debate, or retrieving teaching resources. Time constraints appear to be a decisive factor when it comes to determining the usefulness of a BDI resource. This study suggests that when research scientists can access efficient and exhaustive online BDI resources, those resources quickly become their preferred way of getting work-related information. Hence, direct collaboration of scientists and scholars with librarians and information specialists to put together online BDI resources that include convenient databases and search engines appears essential. On the other hand, formal training on those specialized online information resources should be introduced in graduate courses. In addition, introducing easily accessible, online tutorials that can adapt themselves to the needs of individual users might alleviate the difficulties users encountered with these systems.