Call for Papers: Exploring Next-Generation User Experiences in Digital Libraries

Call for Papers: Exploring Next-Generation User Experiences in Digital Libraries


BACKGROUND
The emergence of digital libraries and collections commenced during the 1990s, coinciding with rapid advancements in digital technologies and a growing demand for open-access resources. Cultural heritage institutions, including libraries and museums worldwide, strategically allocated financial and personnel resources toward digitization and digital infrastructure. The global COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 further accelerated this trend, as physical access to library collections became severely restricted. Consequently, teaching, learning, and research activities increasingly shifted to virtual and hybrid environments, with digital libraries assuming a central role as primary gateways to data, information, and knowledge.

The open science movement within academia has underscored the critical importance of access to digital and digitized research materials and cultural heritage assets. Government agencies worldwide have supported open science initiatives, recognizing the transformative potential of unrestricted access to knowledge. Digital libraries aim to democratize information by providing broad access to digital resources, allowing users to efficiently discover, retrieve, and utilize knowledge. By adhering to open knowledge principles, digital libraries contribute to global research and innovation, bridging digital disparities and enabling users to freely access and reuse information without financial or legal impediments.


AIMS AND SCOPE
User experience (UX) design plays a pivotal role in shaping the effectiveness and usability of digital tools and systems across various domains. In the realm of scholarly research, the evolution of next-generation user experiences presents exciting opportunities to enhance the way users of digital libraries (like scholars or laypersons) access repositories, interact with information, collaborate with peers, and disseminate knowledge. As the field of user experience (UX) design evolves, it is important to establish clear guidelines and frameworks for creating user-centric interfaces and systems that prioritise usability, accessibility, and inclusivity.

This special issue seeks to offer an in-depth examination and critical analysis of next-generation user experiences in digital libraries, with a specific focus on novel interface designs, interaction paradigms, and user-centred methodologies that enhance the usability, accessibility, and effectiveness of digital library tools and systems. We invite submissions that investigate innovative approaches to UX design in digital libraries, including the development of intuitive interfaces, immersive experiences, and personalised interactions that empower users to engage with digital content and resources in meaningful and impactful ways. This special issue also aims to highlight best practices and case studies in UX design for digital libraries, showcasing successful implementations of user-centred design principles and methodologies.

We highly encourage submissions from diverse areas, such as human-computer interaction (HCI), information design, interaction design, graphic design, cognitive psychology, and data visualisation, as well as interdisciplinary approaches that integrate insights from UX research to advance the usability and effectiveness of digital library tools and systems. 

The topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
Immersive User Experiences: Exploring the integration of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) technologies to create immersive and interactive interfaces for digital library users.
Natural Language Interfaces: Investigating the development and usability of interfaces that enable users to interact with digital libraries using natural language processing (NLP) techniques, such as voice commands or conversational agents.
Multi-Modal Interaction: Investigate the integration of multiple interaction modalities, such as voice, gesture, and touch, to create more intuitive and immersive user experiences in digital libraries, considering challenges and opportunities for accessibility and usability.
Interactive Information Retrieval: Examine novel techniques for enhancing the interactivity of digital library search and retrieval processes, including faceted search, exploratory search interfaces, and dynamic result visualisation, to support more effective and engaging user interactions.
Context-Aware Interfaces: Explore the design and implementation of context-aware interfaces for digital libraries that dynamically adapt to users' situational contexts, such as location, device, and task, to provide relevant and timely information in contextually appropriate ways.
Emotion-Aware Interfaces: Explore the role of emotion-aware interfaces in digital libraries, examining how emotion recognition and affective computing techniques can be used to enhance user experiences by adapting interface elements and content presentation based on users' emotional states and preferences.
Social and Collaborative Features: Investigate the integration of social and collaborative features into digital library interfaces, enabling users to share resources, annotations, and recommendations, as well as collaborate on information curation and knowledge sharing activities within online communities.
Personalized Information Retrieval: Discussing approaches for building interfaces that utilise user preferences, past interactions, and contextual information to deliver personalised search results and recommendations within digital libraries.
Interactive Data Visualization: Exploring innovative visualisation techniques and tools that enable users to explore and analyse large-scale datasets in digital libraries, fostering data-driven insights and discoveries.
Usability Evaluation and User-Centred Design: Discuss methodologies and best practices for conducting usability evaluations and user-centred design activities in the context of digital libraries, including user testing, heuristic evaluation, and participatory design approaches to inform interface design and improvement efforts.
Accessibility and Inclusive Design: Addressing the challenges and opportunities in designing interfaces that are accessible to users with diverse abilities and needs, ensuring equitable access to digital library resources for all users.


SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
We invite authors to submit their original research papers for consideration in the International Journal of Digital Libraries (IJDL) special issue. We are seeking original manuscripts that have not been previously published and are not currently under review by other journals or conferences. In the case of papers that have been extended from a conference, we request that at least a 30% extension be incorporated into the original paper. The 30% extension aims to enhance the original content by adding substantial improvements and additional elements when submitting them. This extension may include in-depth analysis, literature review, discussion and interpretation, detailed methodology explanations, expanded results and discussion, and a strengthened conclusion. The goal is to provide a more comprehensive and in-depth journal article that builds upon the foundation of the conference paper.

To submit your manuscript, kindly ensure that it complies with the guidelines for authors provided on the online submission page of the International Journal on Digital Libraries, which can be accessed at https://www.springer.com/journal/799/submission-guidelines. Once submitted, your manuscript will undergo a rigorous peer-review process in accordance with the IJDL reviewing procedure. During the submission process using Editorial Manager, we request that you select the relevant special issue title at the submission step. You can access the submission page at https://www.editorialmanager.com/ijdl/default2.aspx.


IMPORTANT DATES
Manuscripts submission deadline: 31st Dec 2024
Notification to authors: 1st April 2025
Revision deadline: 1st June 2025
Notification to revision authors: 1st July 2025
Final version submission: 1 month after acceptance

Please refer to the full call for papers for further information: https://resource-cms.springernature.com/springer-cms/rest/v1/content/27333368/data/v1 


GUEST EDITORS
Tony Russell-Rose (Lead Guest Editor), Reader in Cognitive Computing at Goldsmiths, University of London, UK. Email: [email protected]
Haiming Liu, Associate Professor, School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, UK. Email: [email protected]
Le Yang, Senior Librarian, Knight Library, University of Oregon, USA. Email: [email protected]

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