INFORMATION OVERLOAD

What is information overload and how do we solve the issues it creates? Clay Shirky used the term filter failure to describe the problem of information overload in a digital world at the keynote talk of the Web 2.0 Expo NY conference (September 18, 2008). Watch the video to get a sense of a current theory of information overload: http://youtu.be/LabqeJEOQyI Print research strategies for this topic: The University of Alabama classic catalog can be used to look for books. Use the subject heading search for: Human information processing Knowledge management Information technology management Article research strategies for this topic: You can use Scout to search for these subject terms to find articles: Information overload Knowledge management Filtering of information Information filtering systems

But Information Overload itself is not merely a function of the sheer volume of information that exists. Rather, it manifests itself

When browsing on the shelf, look for these call numbers: HD 30.2 (Information technology management) Z 666.5 (Library and information science)

when the volume of information outpaces the capability of the tools we have to assimilate and manage that information. Spira, Jonathan B.

Recommender systems (information filtering) Collaborative filtering Personal information management Information resources management

Overload!: How Too Much Information Is Hazardous to Your Organization. Hoboken: John Wiley and Sons, 2011, 86.

What other subject headings and search strategies did you find useful? Share them on the class discussion board. Limit your results in Scout: Refinements Full text Scholarly (peer reviewed) journals Publication date Source types Academic journals Periodicals News Books

Reviews Reports Conference materials

Other research collections:

Safari Books Online Academic OneFile Information Overload Research Group Google Books

Didnt find the resource that you need at the University of Alabama? The Interlibrary Loan department can get books and articles for you!

Amy Ford, Adult Services Supervisor 24/7 librarian help at www.askusnow.info

aford@stmalib.org 301-863-8188 x1013

INFORMATION OVERLOAD
Selected resources: Books (use the library catalog through Scout to find books): Blair, Ann. Too Much to Know: Managing Scholarly Information before the Modern Age. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010. Klingberg, Torkel. The Overflowing Brain: Information Overload and the Limits of Working Memory. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. Pijpers, Guus. Information Overload: A System for Better Managing Everyday Data. John Wiley and Sons, 2010. Pollar, Odette. Surviving Information Overload: How to Find, Filter, and Focus On Whats Important. Menlo Park, CA: Crisp Learning, 2004. Spira, Jonathan B. Overload!: How Too Much Information Is Hazardous to Your Organization. John Wiley and Sons, 2011. (Available by interlibrary loan) Wurman, Richard. Information Anxiety. New York: Doubleday, 1989. Articles (use Google Scholar to find these articles in UA databases): Bawden, David, and Lyn Robinson. The Dark Side of Information: Overload, Anxiety and Other Paradoxes and Pathologies. Journal of Information Science 35, no. 2 (April 1, 2009): 180 -191. Dean, Derek, and Caroline Webb. Recovering from Information Overload. McKinsey Quarterly, no. 1 (March 2011): 80-88. Eppler, Martin, and Jeanne Mengis. The Concept of Information Overload: A Review of Literature from Organization Science, Accounting, Marketing, MIS, and Related Disciplines. Information Society 20, no. 5 (Dec2004): 325-344. Houghton-Jan, Sarah. Being Wired or Being Tired: 10 Ways to Cope with Information Overload. Ariadne, no. 56 (July 2008). Malhotra, Naresh K., Arun K. Jain, and Stephen W. Lagakos. The Information Overload Controversy: An Alternative Viewpoint. The Journal of Marketing 46, no. 2 (April 1, 1982): 27-37. Spira, Jonathan B., and David M. Goldes. Information Overload: We have Met the Enemy and He Is Us. New York: Basex, Inc., 2007. Tools for managing your research: Web clipping and note taking: Evernote Microsoft OneNote Google Docs Online backup, file storage, and sync: DropBox SugarSync Bibliographic management, citations, and article storage/annotation: Zotero WorldCat Mendeley CiteULike RefWorks
Generally speaking, information overload costs companies by lowering concentration levels, making it difficult for people to follow complicated trains of thought, lowering innovation levels, creating the likelihood of reinventing the wheel because information cannot be found, quickly propagating mistakes, and leaving knowledge workers to wonder how they will know if they got the 'right' information from the 'right' place. Spira, Jonathan B., and David M. Goldes. 2007. Information Overload: We Have Met the Enemy and He Is Us. New York: Basex, Inc., 14.

Amy Ford, Adult Services Supervisor 24/7 librarian help at www.askusnow.info

aford@stmalib.org 301-863-8188 x1013