Measuring the psychophysiology of Information Literacy #ecil2018

Geoff Walton from Manchester Metropolitan University reported on a CILIP Information Literacy Group funded project to discover if theories of challenge and threat and how people react to stress in a pressured environment affect information discernment, and whether there is a psychophysical aspect to Information Literacy. Participants were asked about their consumption of news information, and were connected to a finometer that measured blood flow and heart rate. People with high information discernment were more curious about the world and tended to use multiple sources to verify information, and were more likely to be sceptical about information found on search engines, in particular wouldn’t regard the first page of search resu,to as the most trustworthy, and were aware of authority. Information discernment can affect physiological reaction to stressful research tasks, and react in a more physiologically healthy. The eye tracking software revealed that people with high information discernment looked at more of the screen, and read more of the information, and had higher levels of concentration. There is evidence that improving a persons information literacy has a positive effect on learning capabilities, as well as their physical health, because they do not react in a stressful way to misinformation.