ASIS&T Poster

 

 

The first output from our Risk and Resilience project is a poster that we presented at ASIS&T 2020. Awarded second prize in the poster contest, this poster highlighted the initial vision, methodology and preliminary findings from our first study. More specifically, the poster elaborated on how risk, defined as a threat to health, wellbeing, financial and employment stability, pervades the COVID-19 pandemic, and how this intersects with people’s access and ability to engage with appropriate information.

Online interviews, conducted from May-June 2020, examined the lived experience of people as the pandemic progressed. Employing constructivist grounded theory methods to identify themes and narratives about people’s experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic, the poster explored areas such as, awareness of emerging risk, and experiences of changing conditions that impact working, educational, well-being and caring practices. Participants highlighted the range of risks they encountered in the early months of the pandemic, including, social, economic, educational, and employment. To mitigate these risks, participants engaged in several social, corporeal and textual information activities to help them map and orient themselves within a new environment as well as to reconcile existing practices.

Many information forces were emerging at once, with participants attempting to navigate conspiracy theories and misinformation alongside the frequently changing legal requirements and social expectations. Early findings suggested varying degrees of information overload and renewed attention on avoiding and ignoring information as people mediate mental health and other ongoing challenges. At the time of publication, the analysis was still ongoing, however, these emerging findings provided connections to global responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, while further establishing foundational knowledge that will be useful for civil contingency, emergency services, health and education professions looking to support prepared and informed communities.

The document can be viewed on the ASIS&T site here.