Assignment task:
1. Cognitive Biases. To which cognitive bias/heuristic do you believe you are most susceptible? How do you plan to go about reducing its influence on you?
2. Skepticism. How often are you skeptical of information that you encounter on social media? Are you equally critical of people or ideas you already agree with? How often do you engage in fact-checking or lateral reading on social media?
3. Social Media Use. How do you think social media has changed the way we view news and information? What are some ways you can modify your own social media and/or news consumption to broaden your mindset or worldview?
4. Self-Efficacy. How confident are you that you can effectively sift through information and media to make judgments about credible sources? To what extent do you find this task or goal overwhelming?
5. Impact & Ethics.
"What's shared online has offline consequences."
-John Green (2020) Social Media
What are the potential impacts of misinformation and disinformation on people? Is there a recent event that you can think of where information circulated online has had impacts on real people and created problems?
As a member of an information community, what power do you have to reduce harm and increase benefits for people through how you interact with information on social media (either what messages you internalize or information you disseminate)?
Considering many of you will end up working with vulnerable populations, what are your professional responsibilities regarding how you interact with information on social media?