Compare methods

	Berrypicking Evaluation	Information Search Process Model
Field	Library Information Science	Library Information Science
Family	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Year of origin	1989	1991
Originator	Marcia J. Bates	Carol C. Kuhlthau
Type	Model and evaluative lens for evolving, non-linear online search	Stage model of the holistic information search experience
Seminal source	Bates, M. J. (1989). The design of browsing and berrypicking techniques for the online search interface. Online Review, 13(5), 407-424.	Kuhlthau, C. C. (1991). Inside the search process: Information seeking from the user's perspective. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 42(5), 361-371.
Aliases	Berrypicking Model, Evolving Search Model, Bates Berrypicking, Berry-Picking Search	ISP Model, Kuhlthau Information Search Process, Uncertainty Principle of Information Seeking, Six-Stage Search Process
Related	3	3
Summary	Marcia Bates's berrypicking model, introduced in her 1989 Online Review article 'The design of browsing and berrypicking techniques for the online search interface,' rejects the classic picture of information retrieval as a single query matched against a database to return one optimal set. Real searches, Bates argued, are evolving: the query shifts as the searcher learns, and useful information is gathered bit-at-a-time, like picking scattered berries, from many different sources using many different techniques. Used as an evaluative lens, the berrypicking model judges search systems and interfaces not by how well they answer one fixed query but by how well they support a continually changing need — letting searchers move fluidly among footnote chasing, citation searching, journal runs, area scans and subject searches as their understanding develops.	The Information Search Process (ISP) model, developed by Carol Kuhlthau and consolidated in her 1991 study 'Inside the Search Process,' describes information seeking as a holistic, extended experience in which feelings, thoughts and actions evolve together across six stages. Drawing on a series of longitudinal studies of students working on research papers, Kuhlthau showed that an information search is not a smooth, rational march to an answer but an emotional journey: uncertainty and anxiety are highest in the early, exploratory phase and only subside once the seeker forms a personal focus for the work. Her 'uncertainty principle' reframed information seeking as a process of construction in the sense of George Kelly's personal construct theory, and her notion of a 'zone of intervention' gave librarians and system designers a principled account of when and how to help.