Compare methods

	Information Horizons Mapping	Everyday Life Information Seeking
Field	Library Information Science	Library Information Science
Family	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Year of origin	2001	1995
Originator	Diane H. Sonnenwald (with Barbara Wildemuth & Glenn Harmon)	Reijo Savolainen
Type	Elicitation method using participant-drawn maps of information sources within a context	Socio-cultural model of non-work, everyday information seeking
Seminal source	Sonnenwald, D. H., Wildemuth, B. M., & Harmon, G. L. (2001). A research method to investigate information seeking using the concept of information horizons: An example from a study of lower socio-economic students' information seeking behavior. The New Review of Information Behaviour Research, 2, 65-86.	Savolainen, R. (1995). Everyday life information seeking: Approaching information seeking in the context of 'way of life'. Library & Information Science Research, 17(3), 259-294.
Aliases	Information Horizon Maps, Sonnenwald Information Horizons, Information Source Horizon Method, Horizon Mapping Interview	ELIS, Savolainen ELIS Model, Way of Life and Mastery of Life Model, Non-Work Information Seeking
Related	3	3
Summary	Information Horizons Mapping is a research method developed by Diane Sonnenwald and colleagues, formalized in their 2001 paper in The New Review of Information Behaviour Research, for studying how people seek information within a specific context. Grounded in Sonnenwald's theory of information horizons — the idea that, in any given situation, an individual perceives a 'horizon' of information resources (people, documents, tools, systems) that they may consult — the method asks participants to draw a map of those sources for a particular information need and to explain it. By analyzing which sources appear, how close or central they are placed, how they relate to one another, and why some are included or excluded, researchers gain a situated, participant-centered picture of information-seeking behaviour that goes beyond simple source-use surveys.	Everyday Life Information Seeking (ELIS), introduced by Reijo Savolainen in his 1995 article in Library & Information Science Research, shifts the study of information behaviour away from work and professional tasks toward the ordinary, non-work information practices of daily life. Savolainen explains these practices through two linked concepts borrowed in part from Bourdieu: 'way of life,' the taken-for-granted order of things that structures how a person spends time, money and attention, and 'mastery of life,' the active effort to keep that order coherent and to restore it when disrupted. Both are shaped by habitus and social class, which mold a person's source preferences and problem-solving styles. ELIS thus situates everyday seeking within a socio-cultural and value framework rather than treating it as isolated, task-driven retrieval.