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Indexing systems have traditionally been geared to cater for search requests of the form ‘documents about…’. It is far from clear what is meant by the notion ‘about’, but the model that guides indexing is built around it. The procedure is:

Semiotics studies systems of signs. It regards all sign systems as the product of a single human faculty for creating order. The distinction it provides, of signifier, sign and signified, can give a more sophisticated and incisive way of differentiating aspects of the sign than can be derived from any other known source. Information science would seem to have some unnoticed affinities with semiotics in its concerns with the retrieval and transmission of material products of the semiotic faculty and with meaning to concept relations. The alignment of information science with the physical sciences and technology has been criticised and its disciplinary identity questioned. Information science would seem to derive what identity it has from a widely shared concern with computer based retrieval of documentary information. However, a unifying principle for the document and the computer has not been enunciated. For semiotics, written language, and computer programs can be comprehended within the analytical category of the signifier. Automata theory regards the computer as a universal information machine and replaces ideas of energy and motion by logical operations. At the level of discourse of logical operations, there is no distinction between a written expression, or program, and the particular information machine specified by that written expression. Elements in linguistics, not registered in the literature of information science, have departed from the received position that written language is simply a representation of speech and have preferred to regard it as an autonomous system of signs. A specific unifying principle for the document and the computer is then the presence of writing. Revealing such a unifying principle indicates that semiotics can clarify significant issues within the established domains of information science.

A behavioural approach to information retrieval system design is outlined based on the derivation of a behavioural model of the information seeking patterns of academic social scientists. The information seeking patterns of a variety of academic social scientists were broken down into six characteristics: starting, chaining, browsing, differentiating, monitoring, and extracting. These characteristics constitute the principal generic features of the different individual patterns, and together provide a flexible behavioural model for information retrieval system design. The extent to which these characteristics are available on existing systems is considered, and the requirements for implementing the features on an experimental system are set out.

A rule‐governed derivation of an indexing phrase from the text of a document is, in Wittgenstein's sense, a practice, rather than a mental operation explained by reference to internally represented and tacitly known rules. Some mentalistic proposals for theory in information retrieval are criticised in light of Wittgenstein's remarks on following a rule. The conception of rules as practices shifts the theoretical significance of the social role of retrieval practices from the margins to the centre of enquiry into foundations of information retrieval. The abstracted notion of a cognitive act of ‘information processing’ deflects attention from fruitful directions of research.

The Sociology of Education Abstracts project, funded by OSTI (Office for Scientific and Technical Information of the Department of Education and Science), is a three‐year project, now, after eighteen months, entering its second phase. The first phase has been concerned with (a) an analysis of SEA practice with regard to selection and abstracting, (b) consultation with specialists over questions relating to the dissemination of information in the sociology of education, and (c) experimentation with selected methods of subject indexing.

The broader context in the last twenty years awareness of the information and documentation problems of the social sciences has grown, but almost as if by stealth. During that period there have been significant developments for practice, organization and research in social science information, but knowledge of these has remained largely confined to small groups of specialists closely associated with them. In the main it has been library and information developments in science and technology that have captured the interest and attention of the majority of professionals and specialists as such: for example, the development of computer‐based citation indexes; the introduction of the computer database as a successor to the printed secondary journal; the development of online search facilities and associated software and retrieval techniques; the exploitation of telecommunications and computers to create new information technology, leading to alternative means of interpersonal communication, the possibilities of electronic journals and a vision of the paperless society. This situation is hardly surprising since science and technology provide the productive base for advanced societies.

Bibliographical databases employing a controlled vocabulary and a Boolean logic approach to retrieval remain the norm. The record structures for databases of this kind need to be designed in a way that reflects the underlying nature of the particular information they contain. Using education as a case study, a basic record structure is described. Possible extensions to this structure are discussed. Professionals in small special libraries, working in a PC environment and with time and resource constraints, are the intended audience.

The emergence of evidence‐based medicine has implications for the use and development of information retrieval systems which are not restricted to the area of medicine. ‘Evidence‐based’ practice emphasises the retrieval and application of high quality knowledge in order to solve real‐world problems. However, information seeking to support such evidence‐based approaches to decision making and problem solving makes demands on retrieval systems which they are not well suited at present to satisfy. A number of approaches have been developed in the field of medicine that seek to address these limitations. The extent to which such approaches may be applied to other areas is discussed, as are their limitations.

A summary of the report of the Unesco meeting of experts on the problems and strategies of incorporating the social sciences into the world science information system (UNISIST) is given, followed by discussion of the implications for social scientists, as users of information services, of some of the proposals put forward at that meeting. In particular, the problems involved in standardizing terminology for thesauri and other bibliographical facilities, and the advantages which are likely to be derived from common standards of data collection are discussed.

Sir, knowledge structures in information retrieval. This note has been stimulated by reading the recent article by David Ellis. The cognitive approach in information retrieval (I hesitate to call it a paradigm) is particularly illustrated by thinking of the retrieval process in terms of interacting knowledge structures. It can be diagrammed as: