Migration as interacting transitions: Rethinking information behavior during migration

Migration is commonly understood as a major life transition, yet it often involves multiple concurrent transitions unfolding across different areas of everyday life. While research in information behavior has examined how migration reshapes people's information needs, sources, and practices, less attention has been paid to how concurrent transitions shape one another and how these interactions influence information behavior. This study draws on qualitative interviews with 20 young French women who migrated to Israel and subsequently served in combat roles in the Israel Defense Forces. The findings show that participants experienced migration not as a single transition but as a multiple interacting geographic, institutional, linguistic, social, and identity transitions. These transitions continually influenced one another, creating dynamic information environments in which access to information, trusted sources, and the meaning of information changed over time. Viewing migration through the lens of interacting transitions helps explain why migrants' information environments remain dynamic throughout the migration process and how information behavior evolves in response to these ongoing changes. Although developed in the context of migration, this perspective may also be useful for understanding information behavior during other complex life transitions involving multiple concurrent processes of change.