Page 15 - DLIS006_INFORMATION SOURCES AND SERVICES

Information Sources and Services

Notes (iii) Tertiary Sources: The tertiary sources of information are last to appear and mostly do
not contain subject knowledge. It is designed to provide information about
information and so acts as a guide to the primary and secondary sources of
information. The main function of tertiary sources is to aid the user in using primary
and secondary sources of information. The tertiary sources of information are
bibliography of bibliographies, guides to libraries, other organizations, indexing
and abstracting periodicals, list of accession, list of research in progress, directories,
etc.

Notes Eventually there is no rigid line of demarcation between primary, secondary and
tertiary sources of information.
(c) S. R. Ranganathan Classification: Based on the physical characteristics of documents S. R.
Ranganathan classified documentary sources of information into four categories. These
also reflect the chronological order of their development. They are:
(i) Conventional: Books, periodicals, Map etc.;

(ii) Neo Conventional: Standards, specification, patent etc.;
(iii) Non-Conventional: Audio visual, microcopy etc.;
(iv) Meta Document: Direct records unmediated by human mind.

Self Assessment

State whether the following statements are true or false:
10. Documents representing new facts can be regarded as primary publication and those
having the character of reviews can be grouped as secondary publication.
11. UNESCO (1968) defines a primary publication as “original scientific paper describing new
research, techniques or apparatus.”
12. A subject does not become a discipline in its own right when independent primary sources
begin to be produced in that area.
13. There are certain primary sources of information, which remain unpublished.

1.4 Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Sources

Let us discuss the primary, secondary and tertiary sources in detail.

1.4.1 Primary Sources

Primary sources of information are more current and up-to-date than any other sources of
information. These constitute the latest available information. Primary sources consist of new
knowledge or new in of old knowledge. Much of the information published in primary sources
is never re-published in other sources. These sources are also called Original sore rocs of
information. Primary sources are the first published records of original research and development
activities. The research findings by the researchers are recorded and published first in the primary
sources such as journals. These sources are very useful for the researchers to keep them up-to-
date about the latest developments in their area of research. This will also help the researchers

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