At the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library, our mission is to advance meaningful engagement with information. We believe that meaningful engagement occurs through deliberate and constructive information activities, such as:
1. Recognizing an Information Problem
Also known as "setting the scene," an important aspect of this step is to identify and use authoritative, well-established, and trustworthy reference sources. This activity includes the following tasks: locating facts and statistics, exploring key concepts and theories, discovering perspectives, generating themes, and identifying trends.
2. Collecting Information on a Topic of Interest
Information gathering, also known as "negotiating the topic," concerns collecting information from different sources, using multiple applications and tools. It includes the following tasks: locating known information, harvesting metadata, following references to trace sources and uncover more information, using citation chaining or snowballing, and browsing and filtering information.
3. Managing Collected Information
Collected information needs to be organized and prepared for presentation, publication, and learning activities or stored for possible future use. This activity includes the following tasks: assessing the importance of a paper, data, or study; organizing and storing information, either temporarily or permanently; generating reading lists; and creating bibliographies.
4. Creating New Information
New information is usually created as the result of gaining understanding through analysis and synthesis from collected information and gathered data. This activity includes tasks such as developing a thesaurus for the selected topic and investigating and verifying sources, and it typically results in generating new ideas and hypotheses.
5. Exchanging Information
Information exchange refers to imparting information to peers or readers formally or informally. Tasks include writing a paper, presenting work in a seminar or a conference, sharing information through social and mainstream media channels, citing and referencing the work of others, and networking and self-promotion as part of career development.
6. Monitoring Information
Monitoring information refers to intentionally returning to familiar sources and services on an ongoing basis to check for updates or to see whether any new information has been added. The goal of this task is to stay current on a topic or on trends in a profession. Tasks involved may include tracking research claims, tracking data sources, observing information sources for any changes, and monitoring information concerning certain people or events.
To make these information activities truly meaningful, three factors need to be considered: the information itself, the purpose of such information activities, and the technology that enables these activities.
In regards to information, it is important to think of it in broad terms: everything has potential to inform us, whether it is written, spoken, recorded, or observed. One cannot assume that information is accurate. We often encounter inaccurate, incomplete, and at times deliberately misleading information. It is therefore vital to engage with information in its totality — all the facts, perspectives, claims, and findings that were produced over time. One also needs to establish the origin(s) of this information and question its accuracy. In the words of Tim Gorichanaz, "the more different forms of information that are involved in the more diverse information activities over the longer span of time, the greater the understanding."[1]
To make an information experience consequential, it is important to recognize sense-making, or understanding, as the fundamental aim behind it. As we encounter information, prompted by need or curiosity, we should exercise questioning, reviewing, analyzing, and interpreting. Making sense of information is an iterative process of discovering both the obvious and the hidden relationships in a body of information. This process takes time and effort, along with the skills and determination to face and overcome challenges along the way.
Technology, and information systems in particular, are a critical factor in all information activities. It is widely acknowledged that information systems today are well designed to return snippets of information in the form of facts and documents. However, even though some of these tools have features and functions to support sense-making, none of the current systems are prepared to fully support understanding.[2] Learning how to take advantage of the benefits these systems offer and how to mitigate the limitations they have requires a deliberate effort and awareness. Given how rapidly technology changes, it is imperative to be flexible and open-minded to new options and possibilities.
Meaningful engagement with information results in sense-making. For the activities involved in this process to afford us satisfaction and success, we must take the time, develop the skills, and expend the effort to have a truly meaningful experience.
[1] Gorichanaz, T. (2018). Understanding and information constellations in ultrarunning. Library Trends, 66(3), 329–350.
[2] Bawden, D., & Robinson, L. (2015). Information and the gaining of understanding. Journal of Information Science, 42(3), 294–299.