Evidence-based information-seeking behaviors of nursing students: Concurrent think aloud technique

BACKGROUND: With the expansion of scientific information, and the beginning of evidence-based practice (EBP), embracing “evidence-based information-seeking behaviors” is essential to provide effective up-to-date nursing care. To better support students’ evidence-based information-seeking behaviors, this study explores how nursing students actually search and identify evidence-based information. METHODS: A concurrent think aloud technique was employed in which 12 nursing students were asked to verbalize their thoughts whilst using search engines to find EBP to inform their practice. RESULTS: In general, searching literature per se is complex and many different searching activities are employed, including triggering, recalling, scanning, linking, accessing, retrieving, relating, extracting, evaluating and referencing. The search behavior may involve some iteration of the cyclical activities of scanning, linking and accessing. It is believed that background (recalling pre-existing knowledge), assessing relevancy, evaluating and referencing are pertinent to evidence-based practice information-seeking behavior. In view of this, the study proposes a new model of evidence-based information-seeking behaviors. CONCLUSION: This study presents an evidence-based information-seeking behavior model based on a number of identified searching features. Results may have important practical implications for nursing educators.