The impact of COVID-19 on the information competences of users of business sharing groups

Abstract

Purpose/Thesis: The outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic ‘forced’ the strengthening of the importance of digital space in the daily functioning of individuals. The aim of this article is to try to answer the question of whether COVID-19 contributed in any way to changes in the Information Literacy of a specific type of information user, i.e. members of internet groups in the area of ​​business sharing.
 Approach/Methods: The above research problem was solved mainly by a questionnaire and a critical analysis of the scientific literature.
 Results and conclusions: 104 people from 8 groups representing both the Małopolska region as well as the Tri-City, Silesia and Mazovia took part in the pilot study. The questionnaire covered such issues as identifying information needs and obtaining information, evaluating and using information, defining and subjective assessing information competences. As the analysis shows, in the opinion of group users, COVID-19 did not have a significant impact on their information skills, and they themselves assess the level of their competences sufficiently or highly.
 Originality/Value: The article supplements the existing literature with new research and may be an inspiration for a discussion on a wider group of social media users.

Human information behavior during the Covid-19 health crisis. A literature review

“…If certain information practices may produce negative emotions and result in inconsistent behaviors, other practices such as sharing information with other people appear to regulate the emotional response to information about the crisis (Chivers et al, 2020;Tandoc & Lee, 2020). Second, aligning with studies on HIB in the context of illness, the corpus of works analyzed here make emotions dependent on, and produced by, the situation in all its dimensions more than the search process itself, and many authors stress the entangled nature of emotions during information practices (Chivers et al, 2020;Eriksson-Backa, 2020;Ke et al, 2021;Rak, 2020;Sen & Spring, 2013;Song et al, 2021;Wong et al, 2021). The fact that, in real situations, emotions coexist and combine makes it a bit more difficult to understand them in connection to HIB, which leads to a third important implication.…”

“…Emotions emerge as the common thread in the otherwise disperse range of impressions that Eriksson-Backa (2020) gathered from a web survey with 258 respondents recruited through the Finnish Åbo Akademi university's website and different social media platforms. Rak (2020), also points to the intertwining of different concurrent emotions while searching for information in her study of business sharing user groups.…”

“…As previously mentioned, some studies centre on different emotions entangling and occurring at the same time (Chivers et al, 2020;Eriksson-Backa, 2020;Rak, 2020;Song et al, 2021;Wong et al, 2021). The sentiment analysis of threads related to Covid-19 in a mothering online support forum pointed to mostly negative content with fear, anger, joy, and sadness as dominating emotions, whilst, by interacting in the forum, women found an appropriate way of getting informed and supported, avoiding fear-provoking mainstream news sources (Chivers et al, 2020).…”

“…Besides uncertainty, other negative emotions discussed in the literature include confusion, concern, worry, sadness, guilt, and anxiety. Indeed, in studies reported earlier, emotions are usually predefined by researchers; the studies reported in Table 6 are designed to detect shades in the emotional environment that surrounded information seeking about the pandemic and often highlights individual emotions as well as bundles of intertwined emotions (Chivers et al, 2020;Eriksson-Backa, 2020;Rak, 2020;Song, Yao, & Wen, 2021;Wong et al, 2021). Anxiety, a relatively easy to measure construct, results often from conflicting information or overexposure to information and social media (Singh, Cumberland, Ugarte, Bruckner, & Young, 2020; Soroya, Farooq, Mahmood, Isoaho, & Zara, 2021; Wong et al, 2021).…”

“…Despite the existence of an important tradition of research on emotions in HIB, the reviewed research poses new questions in this sense also. The health crisis has been marked by uncertainty, but, in general, the literature reviewed has highlighted all kinds of emotions from confusion, perception of threat, anxiety, concern, and worry, to anger, hate, indifference, guilt, or confidence, and, in some cases, research has underscored conflicting or entangled emotions (Eriksson-Backa, 2020;Rak, 2020;Wang, 2020). Emotions are not new in HIB research and they have been conceived as feelings accompanying decision processes at different search stages; as an "affective load" during the search process; as predictors of online search actions; and as promoters of online health searching (Fourie & Julien, 2014;Kuhlthau, 1991;Kuhlthau, 2005;Lopatovska, 2014;Myrick & Willoughby, 2019;Nahl, 2004;Nahl, 2005).…”