Poster Session - Having Our Say: Where the Occupation Literature is Published

Background & Rationale: Central to all research studies is a review of existing literature relevant to the subject being studied. Occupational scientists may be challenged when reviewing the literature on occupation because it appears in many sources over many years. This presentation will make use of my skills as a librarian as well as a “student of occupation” to provide a structure for thinking about approaches to locating relevant published literature on occupation. Statement of Intent: I propose there are eight key periods of publication relevant to the study of occupation that are of interest to occupational scientists. Each period has been given a name for easy reference in addition to brief descriptions of the relevant search terms and pertinent ideas of that time period. Argument: Occupation is a dynamic subject which changes over time as society and culture shift what constitutes everyday living illustrated by the differences between farming and factory-city life. The argument for this presentation is to suggest that a better knowledge of how the changes have affected publication may be helpful in providing better methods of retrieving relevant documents of interest. Eight time periods spanning the years from 1850 to the present are presented. The focus includes both “everyday” occupation and occupation as a therapeutic medium. An example is the term “habit training,” familiar to occupational scientists because Eleanor Clarke Slagle’s established programs of habit training in New York state institutions, but the concept originated in 1910 as treatment for dementia praecox, the old term for schizophrenia, and called systematic teaching or systematic occupation for temporally organizing daily occupations (Slagle, 1923; La Moure, 1910). Also in 1910 Thomas Bessell Kidner published a book entitled Educational Handwork which provides systematic instructions “for the training of the hands” in several manual training projects and occupations (Kidner, 1910, p. 9) Conclusion: Knowledge of different time periods of publication and the types or purposes of publishing during a given time period can facilitate locating literature relevant to the review of literature for a particular research study. Importance to OS: Advancing the study of occupation requires an understanding of the historical documents that provide the foundation for both occupational science and occupational therapy. Improving techniques for retrieving historical publications facilitates use of that information in current research