New articles: immigrants' information needs; scholarly misconduct

- Shahid, S.H. & Sinnamon, L. (2026). A meta-ethnographic synthesis of researchers' views on scholarly misconduct in the health sciences. Library & Information Science Research, 48(1), Article 101399. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lisr.2026.101399 ("Complimentary access" which I think is free access for a limited period)
"the three forms of misconduct of most concern to researchers are fabrication and falsification, plagiarism, and unethical authorship, while emerging issues include power manipulation and failure to report integrity concerns." Although the focus is health sciences, I would think the findings are of interest/concern in other subjects too.

- Ahmadinia, H. (2026). Belonging through information: Mapping immigrant integration needs in Nordic societies. Library & Information Science Research, 48(1), Article 101400 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lisr.2026.101400 (Open access)
"The findings show that difficulties in locating reliable information, limited access to familiar languages, and fragmented institutional communication constrain participation across daily life. Participants often relied on informal networks to compensate for unclear or inaccessible official information."
Photo by Sheila Webber: snow, a few weeks ago, January 2026

Draft programme for #LILAC26 conference

The draft conference programme for LILAC 2026  (taking place 30 March - 1 April 2026) has been published and you can download it from https://www.lilacconference.com/lilac-2026/conference-programme-1 
Also, if you want to attend, the Early Bird conference rate ends tomorrow (6 February). 
My own University, Sheffield, is hosting the conference and we have a nice amount of participation on a wide variety of topics  (from mushrooms to makerspaces!) from colleagues and students in my department (School of Information, Journalism and Communication), and from colleagues in the library. 

Next month I will be featuring blog posts from my colleagues, to give tasters of what to expect! Our contributions will be: 
- Laura Woods: “Let them be louder, I’ll just be smarter”: gendered information experiences in undergraduate engineering education 
- Laura Williams: Breaking through the noise: exploring the role of social media content creators for fitness information literacies and ‘All mushrooms are edible but some only once’: rethinking information literacy in leisure contexts through hobbyist mycology 
- Pam McKinney and Laura Woods: Digital literacy through arts and culture activities: supporting older adults 
- Vicky Grant, Amanda Bellenger (University of Western Australia) and Mara De Brasdefer: Supercharged by AI: the power of global collaboration in facilitating critical AI literacy 
- Graham Mclearney, Rosa Sadler and Vicky Grant: Making, makerspaces and the role of information literacy
- Pam McKinney, Sheila Webber, Pete Holdridge and students from our Librarianship programmes: Reflections from the next generation of IL educators 
- Sheila Webber (me!): keynote talk! (current working title Reflecting on Information Literacy in a time of polycrisis and cherry blossom)

Webinar: Digital Literacy and Information Literacy

On 11 February 2026 at 11.00-12.00 US Pacific time (which is 19.00-20.00 GMT) LILi present a free webinar Digital Literacy and Information Literacy, with presenters Cori Biddle, Emily Zimmerman, Kristi Addleman Ritter, and Frankie Checchio from Penn State University Libraries, USA.
"Digital literacy and information literacy have increasingly become 2 sides of the same coin in academic libraries; students struggle with basic digital technology skills almost as much as they do with basic research skills. In this session, presenters will explain how Penn State University Libraries developed Tech Academy to help provide a basic introduction to the technology and digital tools available to all Penn State students. The goal of this session is to share how librarians adapted their information literacy instruction to meet digital literacy learning needs. Attendees will also learn more about the strategies followed to keep the content relevant and up to date. They will also have time to share their own experiences with digital literacy." 
Join online at https://uci.zoom.us/my/marquezn 
A recording will be available on the LILi Show & Tell webpage after the session https://lili.libguides.com/showandtell/home

Handling AI in One-Shots

A practical blog post on dealing with the topic of AI: 

Ball, E. (2026, January 22). Let’s Discuss: How Should We Handle AI in One-Shots? ACRLog. https://acrlog.org/2026/01/22/lets-discuss-how-should-we-handle-ai-in-one-shots/
Photo by Sheila Webber: snowmen on the melt a couple of weeks ago, January 2026

Webinar: Harnessing AI as a Collaborative Partner for Ethical Research & Writing

On 26 February 2026 at 13.00 US Eastern time (18.00 GMT) there is a free webinar sponsored by Springer Nature: Harnessing AI as a Collaborative Partner for Ethical Research & Writing. The speakers are librarians Yulia Sevrygina (University of Michigan , USA) and Helen Bischoff (University of Kentucky, USA) "who have developed meaningful best practices and tactics for integrating AI responsibly into writing and research. Learn how they’ve developed practical approaches which empower researchers and learners while navigating the AI challenges of bias, credibility, and ethics."
Information and registration at: https://www.choice360.org/webinars/harnessing-ai-as-a-collaborative-partner-for-ethical-research-writing/
Photo by Sheila Webber: shadows on the snow a couple of weeks ago, January 2026

Contemporary Approaches to University Teaching MOOC

You can enroll for free in the Contemporary Approaches to University Teaching MOOC which runs 16 February 2026 – 28 June 2026. "The course is presented under the auspices of the Council of Australasian University Leaders in Learning and Teaching (CAULLT) and is led by Professor Agnes Bosanquet (Torrens University, Australia) and A/Prof Marina Harvey (Macquarie University, Australia)."
It is aimed at anyone who teaches in Higher Education (including librarians!), and there is a choice of 24 "two hour" modules. The MOOC content is also available to universities to share and adapt under a Creative Commons license.
Register at https://canvas.instructure.com/enroll/DGJ4KE
There is a blog post that links to more information about of the modules at https://theslowacademic.com/contemporary-approaches-to-university-teaching/
Photo by Sheila Webber: spot the squirrel, December 2025

Happy days

The Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists have produced their 2026 Doomsday Clock Statement, and it is pretty grim reading, as they assess that "It is now 85 seconds to midnight". They summarise all the awful and threatening things going on in the world very concisely.
This includes threats concerning information "... the AI revolution has the potential to accelerate the existing chaos and dysfunction in the world’s information ecosystem, supercharging mis- and disinformation campaigns and undermining the fact-based public discussions required to address urgent major threats like nuclear war, pandemics, and climate change."
As background "Founded in 1945 by Albert Einstein, J. Robert Oppenheimer, and University of Chicago scientists who helped develop the first atomic weapons in the Manhattan Project, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists created the Doomsday Clock two years later, using the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero) to convey threats to humanity and the planet." Their website seems to have interesting material on various serious/alarming world issues e.g. this item (mainly a video) on the impact of US healthcare policy.
The Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. (2026, January 27). 2026 Doomsday Clock Statement: It is now 85 seconds to midnight. https://thebulletin.org/doomsday-clock/2026-statement/
Photo copyright Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, January 2026

Libraries as AI Literacy Leaders

There is a "special issue" of the online magazine Information Matters, focusing on Libraries as AI Literacy Leaders. All the articles are short, so it can serve as providing a brief overview of some of the issues. The items were posted between November 2025 and January 2026. 
Go to https://informationmatters.org/si-libraries-as-ai-literacy-leaders/
Photo by Sheila Webber: dynamic light installation (outernet), London, December 2025

Webinar: AI and Pedagogy Discussion: Library Directors Perspective

The ALISE Innovative Pedagogies Special Interest Group has organised a free online panel: AI and Pedagogy Discussion: Library Directors Perspective on 30 January at 15.00 US Eastern time (20.00 GMT) 
"As we all (either willingly or unavoidably) lean further into the realities, influences, and impacts of Artificial Intelligence related to pedagogy and practice, we invite you to a panel and roundtable discussion featuring three Library Directors, who will offer both big picture administrative perspectives within their libraries as well as the pedagogy and practice consideration."
Panellists are: Dr. Amanda Folk (Professor and Director of Libraries at Denison University, USA), Kelvin Watson (Executive director of the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District, USA), Shawn(ta) Smith-Cruz (Dean of Barnard Library, USA) and Dr. Amelia Gibson (Associate Professor, and director of the Community Equity Data & Information Lab at the College of Information Studies at the University of Maryland, USA). 
The Zoom meeting link is https://dom.zoom.us/j/97107578085#, Meeting ID: 971 0757 8085. 
Photo by Sheila Webber: dynamic light installation (outernet), London, December 2025

Webinar: AI Applications for Improving Library Research and Student Support

On 28 January 2026 at 11:00 am US Pacific (19.00 GMT)is a free webinar from LIli AI Applications for Improving Library Research and Student Support. The presenter is Stephanie Garrett  (Catholic International University, USA) 
"This presentation will explore how two powerful AI tools, Perplexity.ai and NotebookLM, can enhance the work of librarians, instructors, and students. We'll begin by examining Perplexity.ai, an AI trained on academic sources, and discuss effective prompting strategies that help research and reference librarians expand their access to high-quality, subject-specific materials from both open and academic web sources. Then, we'll turn to NotebookLM, a free tool for personal and academic use, focusing on how instructors can use it to increase student engagement with sources and leverage multiple modalities to improve learning outcomes. "
The Zoom link is https://uci.zoom.us/j/9498248706. A recording will be available on the LILi Show & Tell webpage after the session.

National Media and Information Literacy (MIL) Strategies

Last month (December 2025) the Council of Europe’s Steering Committee on Media and Information Society (CDMSI) adopted the policy document National Media and Information Literacy (MIL) Strategies: Practical Steps and Indicators "The document provides member states with practical guidance on developing and implementing national MIL strategies, aiming to support them in effectively responding to the transformations in the media and information ecosystem brought about by the digital era." I haven't read the document in depth, but it has useful summaries and appendices including the indicators, actions for policy, research and practice, and amn overview of existing Council of Europe guidance on MIL. It does acknowledge the "Information" dimension of MIL to some extent, though it talks about Media Literacy more. 
Council of Europe Steering Committee on Media and Information Society. (2025, December 4). National Media and Information Literacy (MIL) Strategies: Practical Steps and Indicators. (CDMSI(2025)09) https://rm.coe.int/cdmsi-2025-09-guidelines-for-national-media-and-information-literacy-s/488029ec67
Photo by Sheila Webber: winter day, December 2025

Recording of Medieval Information Literacy: Research Into Practice

There is a recording (57 minutes) of the 21 January 206 webinar in the Institute for Information Literacy at Purdue's ID:EALS series: Medieval Information Literacy: Research Into Practice. 
Speakers were Dr. Andrew (Drew) Whitworth of the University of Manchester and Dr. Kristin Browning Leaman of Purdue University, who explored "how scholars created and employed systems of information literacy to navigate the information spaces of the medieval period. While information literacy may be new as an organized and independent discipline, these scholars' work points to it being a longstanding concept in human engagement with knowledge." 
Go to https://youtu.be/VqFvDxP1AZ0?si=QrwfFEwMGS37rH4l

Artificial Intelligence and Information Literacy Assessment Day

There is very little detail, but this half day event held last week "Hosted by the University Assessment and Program Review Committee, University Libraries and the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning" at the University of Toledo, USA, sounds an interesting collaboration and event for faculty, staff and graduate students. Badged as Artificial Intelligence and Information Literacy Assessment Day 2026: Guiding Students Through the Noise, it had "focused sessions on classroom practices, assessment approaches, and responsible use of AI tools" and covered "topics such as: What is Information Literacy and What Does It Look Like in the Classroom? How to Assess Information Literacy; AI and Information Literacy in the Classroom. 
I found the brief information here: https://news.utoledo.edu/index.php/01_21_2026/utoledo-hosting-artificial-intelligence-and-information-literacy-assessment-day-on-thursday
Image created by Sheila Webber using Midjourney AI.