just google it
TRANSCRIPT
Just Google It…
James Andrew Burris
History of The Book: 4235
Dr. Alan Rauch
May 6th, 2015
Burris 1
James A. Burris
Dr. Alan Rauch
History of The Book 4235
May 6th, 2015
Just Google It…
We live in an unimaginably connected world. A person’s first read of the day
was typically a newspaper delivered to their doorstep, but in todays world, we turn
to our computers, phones, and other personal gadgets to get our first information
fix. Always connected: always in reach. No longer do we have to work so hard to find
the information we desire, to reach a loved one, or to be productive. The constant
flow of information seems wonderful; but is it? What kind of proverbial “strings”
could be attached to such advancement in technology? I believe that, as is typical
with most aspects of life, technology must be used carefully and in moderation,
while being approached by an educated mind. We must determine what is valid and
what is not; what we should believe, and what we should be cautious of. To begin, I
will discuss whether or not the search for knowledge is easier or more difficult
today compared to life before the Internet. Additionally, I will touch on Wiki
sources, as well as the best ways to discover whether or not you have found a
quality source. Finally, I will cover the importance of finding the best sources, as
well as situations where the prior might not be that important after all.
We do, indeed live in a time of instant gratification. You can instantly check
your bank account balance, find directions to the local gyms, download your favorite
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songs, and of course we have instant grits and mashed potatoes! In general we have
instant access to nearly any source of information you could think of. So it seems
like the obvious answer to whether or not the search for knowledge is easier or
more difficult today would be a resounding YES, right? Well mostly, but not exactly.
You might be thinking, “You just said, “No longer do we have to work so hard to find
the information we desire…” So doesn’t that statement answer this question?”
Ultimately, it depends on how you define information versus knowledge. A key
factor, which I will touch on later, is the validity of the sources of information, but
first, I will discuss how that new information is obtained and retained by your brain.
There is information everywhere. A quick search on any smartphone can give you
an answer or method to solving a problem. It provides you information the moment
you need it, as long as you have a connection to the World Wide Web. I myself have
used this for situations where I needed to quickly troubleshoot my furnace, find the
most effective ways to naturally remove carpenter bees from my deck, and so on;
however the odds that I retain all this information in the future is drastically lower
than it used to be. Retention is the knowledge. This always interested me: why was
it that we have so much free access to information, but when I ask, or am asked, a
question pertaining to this information at a later time, it is a struggle to recall
accurately without looking this information up again to verify? Attempting to
answer this question led me to find a resolution in the psychology of our brains and
how they process and store information. One possible answer can be related to why
we create schemata, and stereotypes, to classify the people and things around us.
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Schemata and stereotypes are quick visual indicators that allow us to lessen our
mental efforts.
When we meet someone for the first time, we notice a number of
things about a person – clothes, gestures, manner of speaking, body
build, and facial features. We then draw on these cues to fit the person
into a category…For example, if a woman is wearing a white coat and
has a stethoscope around her neck, you could reasonably categorize
her as a doctor.
(Morris, 2014, pg. 458)
These shortcuts used by our brains to make sense of information lead to what
psychologists call a primacy effect, which help make our thought processes easier by
using prior information.
Over time, as we continue to interact with people, we add new
Information about them to our mental files. Our later experiences,
however, generally do not influence us nearly as much as our earliest
impressions. This phenomenon is called the primacy effect. Schemata
and the primacy effect reflect a desire to lessen our mental effort.
Humans have been called “cognitive misers”. Instead of exerting
ourselves to interpret every detail that we learn…we are stingy with
our mental efforts.
(Morris, 2014, pg. 458)
So how does this relate to the “information” that the Internet provides to us? Since
we know our brain simplifies the way we view the world in order to lessen cognitive
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effort, we can also confirm that our brain finds other ways to take shortcuts. The
Internet provides a constant connection to information, and because of this, our
brains spend less time learning and remembering the information that we find.
Carolyn Gregoire of The Huffington Post elaborates on this in her article entitled
“How Technology Is Warping Your Memory:”
Research has found that when we know a digital device or tool will
remember a piece of information for us, we're less likely to remember
it ourselves. A recent Scientific American article likened the Internet
to the brain's "external hard drive," explaining that the social aspect of
remembering has been replaced by new digital tools.
(Gregoire, 2013)
The digital age has provided us with a plethora of information, constantly at our
fingertips, but we pass the responsibility of retention back to the readily available
information source itself: the Internet and our gadgets. To transform information
into knowledge, we must store that information into our long-term memory.
Besides what could be called cognitive laziness by our brains, what other reasons
could there be for the information on the Internet to remain unlearned? I touched
earlier on schemata, being a mental representation of information used for memory,
but there are two other methods that we typically use to store information into our
long term memory; rote rehearsal and elaborative rehearsal. Rote rehearsal is your
standard repetitive memorization technique. You use it for short bits of information
that you repeat in your short-term memory, with the intent that over time it will be
stored in your long-term memory. The later, elaborative rehearsal is largely the
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favored method of memorization because of its effectiveness. In Charles Morris’s
Understanding Psychology, he describes how elaborative rehearsal functions to
create lasting memories:
Through elaborative rehearsal, you extract the meaning of the new
information and then link it to as much of the material already in long-
term memory as possible. We tend to remember meaningful material
better than arbitrary facts; and the more links or associations of
meaning you can make, the more likely you are to remember the new
information later.
(Morris , 2014, pg. 193)
So essentially, if new information is associated with old information and
experiences, the chances of the information being remembered is greater.
Additionally, information is easier to remember when creating a larger “memory” of
the event. Think of the old saying, “It is about the journey, not the destination.” In
many ways, there was growth in knowledge and experience (and retention)
involved in the journey while doing research. The Internet has significantly
shortened the “journey”, making the information you seek available without the
effort. In his article, “On Research: How did it ever get done before the Internet,” E.
John Love comments on the effort it took in the library to find what he was looking
for:
Back in high school, I remember that we were taught how to use the
card catalogue to look up books by their call numbers. It seemed to
take a long time and a lot of searching to find one or two 20 year-old
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books, and then, more searching in each volume to find the
information you were looking for in the first place…The difference in
time and effort spent on research today is like the difference between
walking somewhere and teleporting there.
(Love, 2011)
This displays a benefit of the way we find information now: it certainly saves time.
With that in mind, teleporting would be much faster, but walking to your destination
would keep you in better shape, don’t you think? In much the same way, doing
concentrated research the traditional way, away from the distractions of Internet
ads and tangent links, leads to more concentration, allowing a greater chance for
knowledge to be acquired. So how should this knowledge be applied in our studies?
I suggest that the topics one would want to master be studied the traditional way:
study literature and not a distracting webpage, put in the extra effort required to
fully experience the material instead of “cram sessions” on the computer. Leave the
Internet for the information that you do not mind forgetting, because there is a
greater chance that you will.
Seeking knowledge from the Internet certainly has its obstacles with regard
to distractions and retention, but there is another major drawback to the medium:
How do you determine what is worth reading, and what is valid? An often-
experienced example, one with frightening yet occasionally humorous results, is the
typical attempt to diagnose an illness via Internet search. Most have felt sickness or
pain in some way, and have turned to their computer or smartphone for guidance
on what they should do, leading to page after “gloom and doom” page of their
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symptoms aligning with some of the worst diseases known to mankind. Even a web
search for a common headache will elicit one of the online medical databases to
inform you that you could have cancer. I suppose it could be a possibility, yet the
percentage chance that a headache indicates cancer does not align with the
percentage of Internet sources implying cancer. The Internet if full of useful
information; it really is quite remarkable when you think about the world having a
unified information source the way we do today, but for all the accurate
information, the inaccurate is far more plentiful. So how can we navigate the
dangerous terrain of the Internet landscape? The University of Illinois at Urbana-
Champaign University Library has a guideline that assists with finding the most
valid information. Essentially, in regards to determining whether a webpage is
factual, they have six criteria that can be used to judge the source. The more criteria
that the webpage complies with, the higher chance of validity. Questions such as:
How did you find the page?
What is the site’s domain?
What is the authority of the page?
Is the information accurate and objective?
Is the page current?
Does the page function well?
(“Evaluating Internet Sources,” 2012)
So the first question, how the page was found, is a great place to start. There are
multiple ways to search the Internet, yet most default to one of the major search
engines such as Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc. They allow a quick portal to the most
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relevant information to the query entered, yet due to the way they function with
advertisement revenue, the top results in a search might not be the most accurate,
instead relying on whichever site drives more clicks and traffic. The best way to find
quality information is knowing the history of the source. What reputation does this
source have? If a source has reputation for delivering quality information, they often
give the extra effort in order to maintain that reputation. These sites also tend to do
their own research before publishing articles and their works cite other reputable
sources. There are many times where one does research in a field they have no prior
knowledge, and that is where observing the websites domain name becomes
essential. The University of Illinois also breaks down each domain type to help filter
the type of information that most likely is contained within:
.org: An advocacy website, such as a not-for-profit organization
.com: A business or commercial site.
.net: A site from a network organization or an Internet service
provider.
.edu: A site affiliated with a higher education institution.
.gov: A federal government site.
.il.us: A state government site.
~: The tilde usually indicates a personal page
(“Evaluating Internet Sources,” 2012)
Virginia Montecino, of George Mason University, further categorizes websites into
groupings, such as: personal home pages, special interest sites, professional sites,
news and journalistic sites, and commercial sites, with professional and news and
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journalistic sites as being the most reputable (Montecino, 1998). Many professional
sites, such as university and government pages, are seen as a reliable source
because of their credentials and that they are reviewed for accuracy. Other websites,
such as personal pages, special interest sites, and commercial sites (.com, .org, .net)
need to be approached cautiously as they often contain biased views, are
opinionated, and often have an agenda to the material presented. If a person wants
to know the best way to keep their lawn looking fresh and green year round, the
best source might not be a .com website of a lawn care business that sells a
particular grass seed. Their advice would typically involve leveraging their product
for profit, even if there could be a better option for the one doing the research. This
same website might be a fantastic source, as long as they deliver credible, quality
information to back up their claims. Additionally the overall professional look of the
website as well as how current the information is can be indicators of credibility. A
technology journal discussing the best email solutions for your business written
three years ago, although relevant at the time, might not display the most accurate
information today. These examples are hypothetical and fairly straight forward, but
what if a website is unbiased and is not so easy to judge when it comes to credibility
and validity? What if the webpage looks professional, is current, and is constantly
reviewed by the entire user base? A website that fits the above criteria is none other
than Wikipedia itself, which has increasingly become the most used source of
information on the web. The largest downside however, is also its strength: it can be
edited anytime by anyone. Wikipedia itself testifies that because of this, it should
not be used as a scholarly source, and must be approached with caution.
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Wikipedia is not considered a credible source. Wikipedia is
increasingly used by people in the academic community, from
freshman students to professors…however, citation of Wikipedia in
research papers may be considered unacceptable, because Wikipedia
is not considered a credible or authoritative source.
("Wikipedia:Academic Use,” 2014)
Wikipedia also points out two rules to follow when approaching the information on
their site.
Follow two simple rules:
Do your research properly and wisely. Remember that any
encyclopedia is a starting point for research, not an ending
point…it is great for getting a general understanding…but then
you do have to dive into the subject.
Use your judgment. Remember that all sources have to be
evaluated.
("Wikipedia:Academic Use,” 2014)
These are two simple rules that help, not only with Wikipedia usage, but general
Internet usage while researching information. A builder is only as good as his
materials, and a Wikipedia page is only as good as its sources of information. A great
use for Wikipedia is view it as a starting point. Use it to gain a general knowledge on
a subject, and then scroll to the bottom of the page to look over the references, and
you might find credible sources that can be cited in research papers, your own
articles, or can result in piece of mind that the information you have gained is
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credible and valid. With Wikipedia or any source on the web, one must resist the
urge to take shortcuts and believe whatever they read, and take time to verify the
credibility of who or where the information comes from.
With all the misinformation that exists on the Internet, why are we not more
careful in what we choose to consume? I wrote earlier on how our brain tries to
make life easier on itself, through the example of schemata as well as allowing the
Internet and our devices to remember for us. Ease of use, the path of least
resistance, and desire for efficient time management all contribute to the occasional
oversight in how credible, or not so credible, our sources are. Wikipedia, which has
millions of entries, has completed most of the work for us. It is also an example of a
clean, pretty package: a very professional, advertisement free interface with
information on nearly anything you could imagine. Since it is used so often, it is
normally the first entry to a search engine query, which permits even less effort to
use it. I also believe we look at Wikipedia as a, “By the people, for the people,”
organism that represents our inner wants to trust each other; to believe that
something can be so beneficial and inherently good, that no one would want to
interfere and ruin it. For the most part, this has been correct in Wikipedia’s case,
aside from honest mistakes and a very small percentage that alter its contents for
malicious or humorous effect. Yet still, as humanistic of an approach as we would
like to take towards Wikipedia, and more importantly, the internet as a whole, the
fact remains that there is too much biased, misinformed, agenda driven information
intertwined within its pages to be taken lightly. Whether through blogs, articles, or
social media, we live in an era in which ignorance can spread at a rapid rate. Our
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very country has seen the devastating effects of hate and racism spread due to the
power of social media, with the majority being misguided and based upon little fact.
At one time, we used torches and pitchforks; now all we need are status updates. A
study conducted in 2014 by the Pew Research Center showed that, of the adults
studied, seventy one percent had a Facebook account with twenty three percent
having a Twitter account, and these numbers had been consistently increasing year
over year (Duggan, 2014). For an increasing number of people, these sites do much
more than provide a connection to their family and friends; these media outlets also
supply their daily news and politics. Since Facebook and Twitter are typically meant
for short status updates and messages, the “source” of the news quickly summarizes
the story and provides a link to the full article, but in doing so, will typically use an
overdramatized summary or title in order to grab the readers attention. It can often
be seen as a positive when people are exposed to news they were otherwise
disconnected from, but now more than ever, the additional research needs to be
conducted in order to ensure that accurate information is spread and that
propaganda riddled with ignorance is not.
In our digital age, we are privileged with more information available to us
than we know what to do with. In contrast, we are burdened with more
misinformation than we have ever had to filter through before, and because of this
truth, we must ensure that we have the knowledge to navigate the oceans of
information before us. What are the writer’s credentials? Is this source known for
providing solid information? Does the information read as unbiased and fact
presenting? These are just some of the questions we should ask ourselves when
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deciding what to believe and what to discard. For the areas which we desire to
acquire knowledge in, we must take the steps necessary to validate our sources for
their credibility, and in doing so, develop our sense of self efficacy and
independence. Too many take what they read for truth without challenging the
source, focusing only on ease and time efficiency. In doing so, true knowledge is
sacrificed for a quick answer; mastering a subject is forgone and replaced with just
enough information to get by in the moment, only to be quickly forgotten and
replaced by something else. In a society that focuses vividly on the destinations of
life, I say our purpose is for the journey; navigating through misinformation for the
truth that we all seek.
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References
1. Duggan, Maeve, and Nicole Ellison. "Social Media Update 2014." Pew
Research Centers Internet American Life Project RSS. Pew Research Center,
09 Jan. 2015. Web. 03 May 2015.
<http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/01/09/social-media-update-2014/>.
2. "Evaluating Internet Sources." Evaluating Internet Sources. University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 29 Aug. 2012. Web. 02 May 2015.
<http://www.library.illinois.edu/ugl/howdoi/webeval.html>.
3. Gregoire, Carolyn. "How Technology Is Warping Your Memory." The
Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 11 Dec. 2013. Web. 02 May 2015.
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/11/technology-changes-
memory_n_4414778.html>.
4. Love, E. J. "On Research: How Did It Ever Get Done before the Internet?"
EJohnLoveBooks.com. WordPress, 23 July 2011. Web. 02 May 2015.
<http://ejohnlovebooks.com/2011/07/on-research-how-did-it-ever-get-
done-before-the-internet/>.
5. Montecino, Virginia. "Helpful Hints to Help You Evaluate the Credibility of
Web Resources." Helpful Hints to Help You Evaluate the Credibility of Web
Resources. George Mason University, 1998. Web. 02 May 2015.
<http://mason.gmu.edu/~montecin/web-eval-sites.htm>.
6. Morris, Charles G., and Albert A. Maisto. Understanding Psychology with
DSM-5 Update. Pg. 193,498. N.p.: Pearson, 2014. Print.
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7. "Wikipedia:Academic Use." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 4 Sept. 2014.
Web. 03 May 2015.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Academic_use>.