Australian motor sport enthusiasts’ leisure information behaviour

Purpose: This paper explores the leisure information behaviour of motor sport enthusiasts, examining: their information needs; their information seeking and sharing; what personal information they had; and their satisfaction with their information seeking and personal information management efforts. Method: This exploratory study examined participants’ information behaviour from a postpositivist and inductive research approach. An online survey was completed by 81 motor sport enthusiasts. Analysis: The quantitative survey data were analysed using descriptive statistics, whilst the qualitative data were analysed using thematic coding. Findings: The research findings highlighted that enthusiasts engaged in mixed serious leisure. They required information before, during, and after race events, and sought this primarily from online sources, as well as from other individuals. Ninety participants shared information about their interest in motor sport with family, friends, and fellow enthusiasts, primarily via emails (69%) and Facebook (49%). They also gathered information about motor sport, including photographs and memorabilia. Participants were satisfied with their information management strategies for their personal collections. Limitations: Participants were limited to motor sport enthusiasts in Australia, hence findings cannot be generalised more broadly. Originality/Value: This study fills a gap in the literature about leisure information behaviour of motor sport enthusiasts in Australia. It identifies and provides a typology of the 12 categories of information needed by enthusiasts. Further, introduces a preliminary Motor Sport Information Behaviour Model. These understandings of enthusiasts’ information behaviour provide information management professionals with insights to work with this user community

A critical assessment of marine aquarist biodiversity data and commercial aquaculture:identifying gaps in culture initiatives to inform local fisheries managers

It is widely accepted that if well managed, the marine aquarium trade could provide socio-economic stability to local communities while incentivising the maintenance of coral reefs. However, the trade has also been implicated as having potentially widespread environmental impacts that has in part driven developments in aquaculture to relieve wild collection pressures. This study investigates the biodiversity in hobbyist aquaria (using an online survey) and those species currently available from an aquaculture source (commercial data and hobbyist initiatives) in the context of a traffic light system to highlight gaps in aquaculture effort and identify groups that require fisheries assessments. Two hundred and sixty nine species including clown fish, damsels, dotty backs, angelfish, gobies, sea horses and blennies, have reported breeding successes by hobbyists, a pattern mirrored by the European and US commercial organisations. However, there is a mismatch (high demand and low/non-existent aquaculture) for a number of groups including tangs, starfish, anemones and hermit crabs, which we recommend are priority candidates for local stock assessments. Hobbyist perception towards the concept of a sustainable aquarium trade is also explored with results demonstrating that only 40% of respondents were in agreement with industry and scientists who believe the trade could be an exemplar of a sustainable use of coral reefs. We believe that a more transparent evidence base, including the publication of the species collected and cultured, will go some way to align the concept of a sustainable trade across industry stakeholders and better inform the hobbyist when purchasing their aquaria stock. We conclude by proposing that a certification scheme established with government support is the most effective way to move towards a self-regulating industry. It would prevent industry "greenwashing" from multiple certification schemes, alleviate conservation concerns, and, ultimately, support aquaculture initiatives alongside well managed ornamental fisheries

Facció de museus com a lleure seriós (serious leisure)

Peer-reviewedAmateur museums are independent museums made as leisure projects outside professional frameworks. This paper attempts to distinguish museum making as a leisure activity from professional museums and from collecting and to broadly identify some implications arising from their relations as questions of interest for future research. To do so, I rely on Stebbins theory of serious leisure (1992) and on some literature on institutionalism, collecting and museology, specially Martin¿s research on popular collecting and its relation to professional museums (1999).Els museus amateurs són museus independents que s¿han creat com a activitat de lleure, al marge de qualsevol entorn professional. Aquest article intenta distingir entre els museus creats com a activitat de lleure, els museus professionals i el col·leccionisme, i alhora identificar àmpliament algunes de les implicacions que sorgeixen de les seves relacions com a qüestions d¿interès per a futures investigacions. Per a fer-ho, m¿he basat en la teoria de Stebbins sobre el lleure seriós (1992) i en certes obres sobre institucionalisme, col·leccionisme i museologia, especialment la recerca de Martin (1999) entorn del col·leccionisme popular i la seva relació amb els museus professionals.Los museos amateurs son museos independientes creados como una actividad de ocio, al margen de cualquier entorno profesional. Este trabajo intenta distinguir entre los museos creados como actividad de ocio y los museos profesionales y el coleccionismo, y a la vez identificar ampliamente algunas de las implicaciones que surgen de sus relaciones como temas interesantes para futuras investigaciones. Para ello, me he basado en la teoría de Stebbins sobre las actividades de ocio serio (1992) y en algunas obras sobre institucionalismo, coleccionismo y museología, especialmente la investigación de Martin (1999) sobre coleccionismo popular y su relación con los museos profesionales

Nazi memorabilia, dark heritage and treasure hunting as “alternative” tourism : Understanding the fascination with the material remains of World War II in Northern Finland

Peer reviewe

'Mulla on parempaa kamaa kotona' : Aarteen etsintä ja toiseen maailmansotaan liittyvien esineiden yksityinen keräily Suomen Lapissa

Peer reviewe

Re-enactment and its information practices; tensions between the individual and the collective

© Emerald Group Publishing Limited. Purpose–The purpose of this paper is to explore the practices used by Australian re-enactors to achieve authenticity, a communally agreed measure of acceptability in the creation of an impression, the dress, behaviours and accoutrements of the period, through the concepts of serious leisure and information practices. Design/methodology/approach–Re-enactment is a practical, information-based performative activity. In this paper, the research styles and decision-making processes developed and employed by its enthusiasts to create authentic impressions are examined through an ethnographic case study. Findings–The re-enactors are identified as “makers and tinkerers”, in Stebbins’s categorisation of serious leisure. Research, documentation and the sharing of information, knowledge and skills are common practices among re-enactors and acknowledged as integral to the processes of creating an impression to a collectively agreed standard of authenticity. Re-enactors’ “making” includes not only the creation of the impression but also the documentation of their process of creating it. They prize individual knowledge and expertise and through this, seek to stand out from the collective. Originality/value–Although communities of re-enactors are often studied from a historical perspective, this may be the first time a study has been undertaken from an information studies perspective. The tension between the collective, social norms and standards that support the functioning of the group in understanding authenticity, and the expert amateur; the individual with specialist skills and talents, encourages a fuller investigation of the relationships between the individual and the collective in the context of information practices

An investigation into the motivation underlying restricted and repetitive interests and activities in autistic spectrum disorders

Available from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:DXN064717 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreSIGLEGBUnited Kingdo

Opportunities for Public Aquariums to Increase the Sustainability of the Aquatic Animal Trade

The global aquatic pet trade encompasses a wide diversity of freshwater and marine organisms. While relying on a continual supply of healthy, vibrant aquatic animals, few sustainability initiatives exist within this sector. Public aquariums overlap this industry by acquiring many of the same species through the same sources. End users are also similar, as many aquarium visitors are home aquarists. Here we posit that this overlap with the pet trade gives aquariums significant opportunity to increase the sustainability of the trade in aquarium fishes and invertebrates. Improving the sustainability ethos and practices of the aquatic pet trade can carry a conservation benefit in terms of less waste, and protection of intact functioning ecosystems, at the same time as maintaining its economic and educational benefits and impacts. The relationship would also move forward the goal of public aquariums to advance aquatic conservation in a broad sense. For example, many public aquariums in North America have been instrumental in working with the seafood industry to enact positive change toward increased sustainability. The actions include being good consumers themselves, providing technical knowledge, and providing educational and outreach opportunities. These same opportunities exist for public aquariums to partner with the ornamental fish trade, which will serve to improve business, create new, more ethical and more dependable sources of aquatic animals for public aquariums, and perhaps most important, possibly transform the home aquarium industry from a threat, into a positive force for aquatic conservation. Zoo Biol. 32:1-12, 2013. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc

Remembering and Forgetting, Discovering and Cherishing: Engagements with Material Culture of War in Finnish Lapland

The events of the Second World War left considerable material remains in Finnish Lapland, ranging from the remnants of structures that were destroyed in the 1944–45 Lapland War, through to small, portable objects connected to soldiers, prisoners of war and civilians. These material remains have variously been saved and cherished by survivors and their families, disregarded as ‘war junk’, ‘discovered’ by hobbyists exploring the landscape, amassed and exchanged by private collectors, and accessioned into official museum collections. These various processes represent transformations of material culture to take on various meanings and embodiments, depending on the different individuals and organizations involved. In this article we present and analyse data collected through ethnographic fieldwork in and around the Lapland village of Vuotso: primarily interviews and observations. We have conducted interviews with history hobbyists and museum professionals who engage with the WWII history of Lapland, and observed the treatment of ‘war material culture’, for example through exhibitions (both public and hidden) and through personal meaning-making practices. These encounters have centred around the material remains of the Second World War, and the ways in which different actors perceive, value and otherwise understand those remains. While some objects are transformed through musealisation, others remain ‘officially’ unknown and unrecognized (although known – even traded and exchanged – through private channels). Furthermore it may be as important for some actors to leave material culture in situ – for example as testimony to the past conflict or trauma – as it is for others to exercise personal ownership. Within this context, we deconstruct the notion of ‘expert’ as it relates to the local and historical knowledge. Being regarded by peers and others as an expert is not necessarily the same thing as having professional authority and status, for example as a museum curator or university-affiliated scholar. We draw upon theories of relational materiality, and suggest different typologies of engagement with the material culture. Different networks of interest and expertise emerge, dependent on the actors involved (including their status – e.g. museum professional, survivor, ‘incomer’, local activist – and how their knowledge is thus accepted, challenged or rejected by others), the context of ownership, situationality and perceived levels of authenticity