User Guide
This page serves as a guide to navigating, browsing and searching the documents in Mass Observation Project.
There were c. 55,000 responses submitted to Mass Observation in the period 1981-2009, and Mass Observation Project offers users various filtering and searching options in order to isolate documents in which they are interested.
User Guide
This page serves as a guide to navigating, browsing and searching the documents in Mass Observation Project.
There were c. 55,000 responses submitted to Mass Observation in the period 1981-2009, and Mass Observation Project offers users various filtering and searching options in order to isolate documents in which they are interested.
a. By manuscript or typescript format
Using the "Document: Manuscript or Typescript" filter produces document lists of either handwritten or typed documents. Both are full-text searchable by HTR or OCR.
You can create a list of all the responses by a particular observer or group of observers by using our dedicated tool. Go to the Filter by Observer tool to get started. This tool uses the unique numeric part of the observer code to filter by a particular observer or group of observers.
c. By directive
The most straightforward filter is by directive. Directives are open-ended questionaires sent out to observers inviting them to submit their thoughts on the topic or topics. On navigating to the Browse by Directive page, you are presented with a display of all the available directives, in chronological order. Clicking on a chosen directive's box takes you to a document list filtered by that directive's title – i.e. a list consisting of the directive and all the responses to it.
The option to filter by directive also exists in the filter bar in the documents list.
d. By observers' known characteristics
You can use the tick boxes in the document-list filters to filter by observers' characteristics and by date or date range. Used either individually or in combination, these filters can isolate responses of interest. For example, if you are interested in responses by women born in the 1950s and living in Wales, the three filters of Sex, Year of birth and Region can be used together to pare the list down to those responses only.
e. From a document's metadata
There are also filter options within a document's metadata. Each clickable metadata term functions in the same way as the filters in the document list, producing, when clicked, a shorter list filtered by the presence of that term.
So, for example, clicking on a directive number will produce a list of all the responses to that directive (plus the directive itself); clicking on an observer's code will produce a list of all the responses from that observer; clicking on an observer's occupational category will produce a list of all the responses from all observers sharing that category; and so forth.
Filtering the document list
a. By manuscript or typescript format
Using the "Document: Manuscript or Typescript" filter produces document lists of either handwritten or typed documents. Both are full-text searchable by HTR or OCR.
You can create a list of all the responses by a particular observer or group of observers by using our dedicated tool. Go to the Filter by Observer tool to get started. This tool uses the unique numeric part of the observer code to filter by a particular observer or group of observers.
c. By directive
The most straightforward filter is by directive. Directives are open-ended questionaires sent out to observers inviting them to submit their thoughts on the topic or topics. On navigating to the Browse by Directive page, you are presented with a display of all the available directives, in chronological order. Clicking on a chosen directive's box takes you to a document list filtered by that directive's title – i.e. a list consisting of the directive and all the responses to it.
The option to filter by directive also exists in the filter bar in the documents list.
d. By observers' known characteristics
You can use the tick boxes in the document-list filters to filter by observers' characteristics and by date or date range. Used either individually or in combination, these filters can isolate responses of interest. For example, if you are interested in responses by women born in the 1950s and living in Wales, the three filters of Sex, Year of birth and Region can be used together to pare the list down to those responses only.
e. From a document's metadata
There are also filter options within a document's metadata. Each clickable metadata term functions in the same way as the filters in the document list, producing, when clicked, a shorter list filtered by the presence of that term.
So, for example, clicking on a directive number will produce a list of all the responses to that directive (plus the directive itself); clicking on an observer's code will produce a list of all the responses from that observer; clicking on an observer's occupational category will produce a list of all the responses from all observers sharing that category; and so forth.
Each response's metadata contains a list of key topics covered by its directive. For a list of all key topics used, see the dedicated Filter by Key Topics tool, from which any topic can be clicked on to produce a list of all the documents tagged with it.
It is beneficial to 'search' via this list, since it uses consistent vocabulary. For example, Europe, EEC and Euro-elections are used at various times in the directives to refer to what later became the European Union. Doing a basic search for any of these terms will produce results, but Europe is the single term used in the list of key topics. Clicking on Europe in this list will produce hits in the metadata of manuscript responses, as well as finding the term in the full text of typed or printed responses.
Using key topics
Each response's metadata contains a list of key topics covered by its directive. For a list of all key topics used, see the dedicated Filter by Key Topics tool, from which any topic can be clicked on to produce a list of all the documents tagged with it.
It is beneficial to 'search' via this list, since it uses consistent vocabulary. For example, Europe, EEC and Euro-elections are used at various times in the directives to refer to what later became the European Union. Doing a basic search for any of these terms will produce results, but Europe is the single term used in the list of key topics. Clicking on Europe in this list will produce hits in the metadata of manuscript responses, as well as finding the term in the full text of typed or printed responses.
The various browsing and filtering options outlined above are our recommended means of isolating documents of interest to achieve the best results, but various methods of searching the documents are of course available.
Both manuscript and typed or printed material are now fully searchable at site-wide level through the main search box on every page. Typed or printed material is searchable via Optical Character Recognition (OCR), and manuscript material via Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR).
Handwritten Text Recognition is a technology which delivers search results within manuscript documents by interpreting handwriting. Adam Matthew Digital utilises artificial intelligence and probability to produce very effective searchability of these documents.
The HTR application takes advantage of the latest advances in neural networks and uses complex algorithms to determine probable combinations of characters to find the search term.
Can I use phrase-searching and Boolean operators like AND or OR?
Phrase-searching and Boolean operators are not currently supported. The HTR software searches for each entered search term individually, so a search for “war AND peace” will search for instances of all three words, whether occurring separately or together.
Upon searching for a word, the hits will show as snippets on the document details page. If this word appears within another word, for example a pluralised version of the word, then a snippet of this hit will appear in plain text of the document details page. This is because the exact word has not been found on the image, but a pluralised or word stemmed word has been.
Results of a site-wide search can be restricted to results in metadata only, or to full-text results (i.e. results in the searchable text of typed/printed documents) only, by deselecting one or the other button under the 'Current search criteria' heading above the results list.
Site-wide searches can be customised – e.g. to search in only certain metadata fields, or to restrict the date range of the documents returned by a search – using the tools on the Advanced Search page.
Searching the documents
The various browsing and filtering options outlined above are our recommended means of isolating documents of interest to achieve the best results, but various methods of searching the documents are of course available.
Both manuscript and typed or printed material are now fully searchable at site-wide level through the main search box on every page. Typed or printed material is searchable via Optical Character Recognition (OCR), and manuscript material via Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR).
Handwritten Text Recognition is a technology which delivers search results within manuscript documents by interpreting handwriting. Adam Matthew Digital utilises artificial intelligence and probability to produce very effective searchability of these documents.
The HTR application takes advantage of the latest advances in neural networks and uses complex algorithms to determine probable combinations of characters to find the search term.
Can I use phrase-searching and Boolean operators like AND or OR?
Phrase-searching and Boolean operators are not currently supported. The HTR software searches for each entered search term individually, so a search for “war AND peace” will search for instances of all three words, whether occurring separately or together.
Upon searching for a word, the hits will show as snippets on the document details page. If this word appears within another word, for example a pluralised version of the word, then a snippet of this hit will appear in plain text of the document details page. This is because the exact word has not been found on the image, but a pluralised or word stemmed word has been.
Results of a site-wide search can be restricted to results in metadata only, or to full-text results (i.e. results in the searchable text of typed/printed documents) only, by deselecting one or the other button under the 'Current search criteria' heading above the results list.
Site-wide searches can be customised – e.g. to search in only certain metadata fields, or to restrict the date range of the documents returned by a search – using the tools on the Advanced Search page.
Users whose institutions have access to Mass Observation Online, AM's digitisation of the original 1930s-1960s Mass Observation material, will find that searches they perform in Mass Observation Project will be run automatically in Mass Observation Online at the same time, through our AM Explorer tool.
Click on the AM Explorer pop-up in your search-results list to see the hits in all AM products including Mass Observation Online. Users will only be able to view documents from resources for which your institution has access.
Cross-searching AM's Mass Observation Online
Users whose institutions have access to Mass Observation Online, AM's digitisation of the original 1930s-1960s Mass Observation material, will find that searches they perform in Mass Observation Project will be run automatically in Mass Observation Online at the same time, through our AM Explorer tool.
Click on the AM Explorer pop-up in your search-results list to see the hits in all AM products including Mass Observation Online. Users will only be able to view documents from resources for which your institution has access.