Aims: This poster investigates the potentials of the Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education (IL Standards) for the transdisciplinary field of addiction science. IL Standards were first developed in 2000 by the Association of College and Research Libraries and were recently updated in 2015.
Methods: Each of the six frames of the IL Standards was interpreted and evaluated in terms of their prospective application in addiction science. The six frames are Authority Is Constructed and Contextual; Information Creation as a Process; Information Has Value; Research as Inquiry; Scholarship as Conversation, and Searching as Strategic Exploration. Multiple examples were identified from the field to conceptualise each frame.
Results: Translating each frame into addiction science resulted in demonstrating a strong potential of adding value to addiction research by adopting these guidelines into the research process. Information specialists and librarians possess the skills and abilities to educate addiction researchers so that they could benefit from appreciating information, understanding how information is organized, acquiring the most essential searching skills, respecting the implications of processes over end results, and exploring the latest venues in scholarly commination, including their hazards and benefits.
Conclusions: The development and adoption of a rather common-sense set of guidelines customized for addiction science would greatly enhance the research experience and most probably, the research output as well. With a stronger emphasis on the development and dissemination of information, information specialists are in a unique position to augment research by facilitating addiction science information literacy instruction and providing best practices for the translation of research findings.
Co-Authors
William Bejarano, MLIS, MLER, PhD student, School of Communication and Information, Rutgers University Christine Mary Goodair, BA (Hons) FRSA, Programmes Manager (Substance Misuse), Population Health Research Institute, St George’s University of London Judit H. Ward, PhD, MLIS, AHIP, Director of Information Services, Center of Alcohol Studies, Rutgers University
Conflicts of interest:
Funding Sources: N/A
No conflict of interest
