Week 2 Information Science

Information science

•  brings together and uses theories, principles, techniques, and technologies of a variety of disciplines toward the solution of information problems

• Among the disciplines brought together in this amalgam called information science are

• computer sciences,cognitive science, Psychology, mathematics, logic

• They are brought to bear in solving the problems with information — its generation, organization,

representation, processing, distribution, communication and use

WHY DO WE NEED INFORMATION?

• Problem solving

• Dispel uncertainty

• Sensemaking

• Decision making

• Taking action(having agency)

• New information is something that surprises you!

• To become informed means going through an interactive and ongoing process of seeking information

At various levels of detail and granularity until the need for information is satisfied… 

• or satisficed (we find enough info to answer our immediate question or dispel our uncertainty).

Buckland, 1991.

INFORMATION CAN BE...SHAPED BY CONSENSUS & SOCIAL SYSTEMS

• Ma’s view shows how the concept of information has evolved since Buckman (1991)

• Information is now understood as something that is ‘constructed

  • built up, shaped or formed through social interactions.

  • Information is not a fixed entity but formed through

• Discourse

  • Conversation

  • Sensemaking

• Societal Interpretation (society collectively assigns meaning, value or significance to information

  • Information is interpreted through the lens of norms, social structures, political dynamics 

and shared beliefs.

• Facts or data are understood differently depending on societal perspectives, power dynamics

and discourse

Information - as -thing’-

• where information is an object that information systems manage

Information as process

which is the act of giving or receiving information between people and / or information systems and sources

Information -as -knowledge

 whereby knowledge is the intangible product of information-as-process

Know how

 being able to DO something –i.e., the knowledge to perform tasks.

Know why

•  being able to understand the cause , reason or purpose of something

Know what

• being able to identify and categorize what something is

Know who -

being able to connect to someone who may have the needed information

Data is =

• Facts, numbers, figures, records, etc           

Information is

• = Data placed into context through classification and categorization

Being knowledgeable is

• Having the information needed to make sense of a situation happening

and to know what to do based on past experience and evidence (data