Provides an overview of public administration and its similarities to library and information science, and notes research themes in public administration (innovation, organizational development and change, decision-making and evaluation, personnel, financial concerns, marketing, dissertations). Future of public administration research and its…

Relevance of sociological theory and methodology to research in librarianship is discussed, noting findings from citation analysis developed from bibliographic database search (type of work and number of citations; most frequently cited authors, journals, and books; and rank order of sociological journals cited). Twenty-two references and journals…

This article presents a psychological perspective on research in librarianship and explores potential for application of psychological research principles and practices to behavioral research in libraries. Highlights include evolution of a theory of user behavior and the nature of psychological research and research designs and methodologies.…

Illustrates two types of studies undertaken in librarianship using political theories or concepts--institutionally focused and behaviorally focused. The nature of political inquiry, conceptual frameworks for understanding political science, methodology and research design, and explanations of the dearth of politically based research are discussed.…

This review discusses major organizational theories used by researchers to investigate questions related to librarianship: libraries as bureaucracies; contingency theory; decision-making; design and structure; technology; organizational climate; research by social scientists; theory, research, practice. Development of organizational theory and its…