Information School News

Earlier this week, Dr Paul Reilly was interviewed on BBC Radio Leicester's Jonathan Lampon show about recent research findings on nomophobia. Nomophobia is anxiety associated with not being able to access and use smartphones, and recent research suggests that it is becoming an increasing problem amongst young people. Dr Reilly spoke about this and also whether or not it affects older smartphone users. The article which sparked this conversation and references this research was this one from the Daily Mail. You can listen to Dr Reilly's interview by clicking here  and skipping forward to 1:46:40.

Earlier this month, Professor Paul Clough was interviewed on the first episode of Machine Minds, a podcast about the influence of technology in modern life. The episode, entitled 'Search Engine and Bias', looked at bias in search engines and Paul's input was based on work he undertook with Dr Jo Bates from the Information School and Jahna Otterbacher from Open University Cyprus. You can listen to the podcast here.

As our graduate intern over the last six months, Stuart Crowley has worked on improving our provision for our iLab facility. On his last day in the department, he has written the following blog about his work here. After my graduation in English Language and Linguistics and an arduous stint of unemployment, I successfully applied to become a graduate intern for The Information School. For the past six months, I was tasked with evaluating and improving the state of the iLab facilities, a research facility with the purpose of observing and analysing human interaction with and without electronic devices. Thus, the iLab can be used to test website design and accessibility as well as analysing social interaction accompanied or unaccompanied by electronic devices – a potential goldmine for innovative and creative research projects. Before I arrived, the iLab was not always reaching its full potential. To evaluate this, I researched the needs and wants of previous and potentia...

Senior Lecturer Dr Paul Reilly was interviewed this week on BBC Radio Leicester's Jonathan Lampon show on the topic of oversharing on social media. You can find the show here  - skip ahead to 2:44:30 for Paul's interview.

Professor Stephen Pinfield of the Information School has been interviewed by Library Journal. The interview is part of the publications series on Open Access and includes the following questions: ·        What are the forces that brought open access this far? ·        How is open access being implemented in different ways globally? ·        What are the viable alternatives to green and gold models? ·        Do different discipline-based approaches to open access present a challenge? ·        Do subject or institution repositories make open access materials harder to find? ·        What is the future of the version of record? The interview can be accessed on the Library Journal website   here.