This paper reports the results of an exploratory study that investigated the influence of technical uncertainty on the use of information and information sources by U.S. industry-affiliated aerospace engineers and scientists in completing or solving a project, task, or problem. Data were collected through a self-administered questionnaire. Survey participants were U.S. aerospace engineers and scientists whose names appeared on the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) mailing list. The results support the findings of previous research and the following study assumptions. Information and information-source use differ for projects, problems, and tasks with high and low technical uncertainty. As technical uncertainty increases, information-source use changes from internal to external and from informal to formal sources. As technical uncertainty increases, so too does the use of federally funded aerospace research and development (R&D). The use of formal information sources to learn about federally funded aerospace R&D differs for projects, problems, and tasks with high and low technical uncertainty.
NASA/DOD Aerospace Knowledge Diffusion Research Project. Paper 36: Technical Uncertainty as a Correlate of Information Use by US Industry-Affiliated Aerospace Engineers and Scientists
1994
10 pages
Report
No indication
English
Space Technology , Research Program Administration & Technology Transfer , Management Information Systems , Information Systems , Aerospace engineering , Engineers , Information dissemination , Information transfer , Research and development , Scientists , Information systems , Literature , NASA programs , Problem solving , Reports , Surveys
British Library Conference Proceedings | 1994
|British Library Conference Proceedings | 1994
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