1. Natalie Sapkarov
September 11, 2006
LIS 501 AL1/AD1
LaBarre/Taylor
Information Needs of English Children
Although children are often aptly nicknamed “little scientists” or “baby Einsteins” for
their inquisitive nature and exploration of the vast world around them, research about the
information needs of children has been scarce in the United States. In “Just What Do They
Want? What Do They Need? A Study of the Informational Needs of Children,” Andrew Kenneth
Shenton and Pat Dixon consider a British academy-funded Ph.D. research study that was
conducted in a small town of northeast England during the 1999-2000 school year. The study
took place in six neighborhood schools—two primary, two middle, and one high school. A total
of 188 students, representing a wide range of abilities, were randomly selected to participate in
this study, and, from those, 121 individual interviews were conducted. As Shenton and Dixon
delineate, “the typology was constructed by investigating the ideas of children as expressed by
them, and the understanding of need that was developed was based on their perspectives (37).”
In short, researchers were curious to find what children themselves identified as their own
information wants and needs by asking them directly about the last time that they felt they
needed to learn something.
After interviewing these students, researchers sorted their results into 13 types of
information needs as described by the sample children. These information needs include: advice,
response to problems, personal information, affective support, empathetic understanding, support
for skill development, school-related subject information, interest-driven information, consumer
information, self-development information, preparatory information, reinterpretations and

2. supplementations of information, and verificational information (37-39). For each category,
these information needs were not only described with specific examples but also correlated with
the type of student (primary, middle, high school) who responded with this need. In most cases,
the concerns of the primary students were different than those of high school students while the
middle school students were found, quite appropriately, in the middle. For example, in relation to
affective support, primary and middle school students expressed the need for information about
new experiences while middle and high school students were concerned about their self-images
(38). Therefore, information needs not only differ between adults and children but also within
age groups of children.
For Shenton and Dixon, these findings pose a starting point in discovering the
information needs of children, as these children are not a true representation of all children
worldwide but merely of their specific demographic. This study, however, can be useful for
American schools and libraries as it illuminates the variety of children’s informational needs.
Since much of children’s time is spent in school, it goes accordingly that many of their
informational needs will stem from school assignments and activities, a need that is unique to
this group. In order to facilitate the information retrieval process for children, libraries should use
kid-friendly online catalogs or offer bibliographical information for a topic that is known to be
studied in the schools at that time. In the school, librarians should also be teachers of the library
by explaining the organizational system, locating varied reference materials, directing research,
and being available to answer individual questions. Most importantly, librarians and designers of
information systems must recognize that the information needs of children are rather different
than those of adults and are just as valid.
Works Cited

3. Shenton, Andrew Kenneth, and Pat Dixon. "Just What Do They Want? What Do They
Need? A Study of the Informational Needs of Children." Children & Libraries 1.2 (2003):
36-42.