INFORUM 2011

The Optimal Structure and the Content of Abstracts in Materials Science and in Information and Library Science

Author

Eliška Veselá, Charles University in Prague - Faculty of Arts - Institute of Information Studies and Librarianship, Czech Republic

Co-authors

Viktor Dobrovolný, Lenka Němečková, Charles University in Prague - Faculty of Arts - Institute of Information Studies and Librarianship, Czech Republic / Alenka Šauperl, University of Ljubljana - Faculty of Arts - Department of Library and Information Science and Book Studies, Slovenia

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Abstract

In our previous research into the contents and structure of abstracts in the area of materials studies and library and information science in Czech and Slovenian scientific journals we found that the analyzed journals have different content and structure, which may be attributed to 1) scientific disciplines, 2) national characteristics and 3) the role of the journal in the professional community. The analysis has also shown some similarities, which need to be exploited, if we want that the scientific work of researchers from smaller nations is internationally more visible. We therefore developed an optimal model of abstracts for both disciplines, nations and journals. We selected a number of original abstracts from Czech journals analyzed in the previous study and wrote abstracts according to our new model. We then recruited participants (professors and graduate students from Prague universities) from both disciplines and asked them to evaluate original and optimal abstracts. We expect that the optimal abstracts, which are richer in information, would be preferred by readers. This project is part of a larger project funded by the Czech Republic and Republic of Slovenia dealing with the presentation and evaluation of science performance.

Author's professional CV

Eliška VESELA is a master’s student at the Institute of Information Studies, Faculty of Philosophy, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic. Her main interests are the organization of visual media information.