Reading Library Catalogues and Indexes

Abstract

This paper gives a brief description of some of the work undertaken by the Centre for Catalogue Research at the University of Bath. Some of the Centre’s research is concerned with visual factors affecting the design and performance of library catalogues and indexes. The involvement of computers in the generation of catalogues has enabled people’s performance to be studied with alternative catalogue displays. One of the critical factors is the number of entries which can be scanned per page, the more entries the shorter the search time. Another critical factor is the way keyboards in a title are displayed in relation to the context both of the other words in the title and the other entries in the catalogue. It is shown that major improvements are possible to the visual display of the information on some of the catalogue systems currently in use.