[marvin]

I think academia is just IT impaired.

The "omg, google is destroying student research motivation" is nonsense. Google just allows students to turn in acceptable work products for less outlay and lets the lazy/crappy students be lazier. It's just that there are more of the lazy/crappy students new due to the massive jumps in college enrollment.

Really, the main problem is the poor availability of digitized information. They should just can all physical public libraries and use that funding to create a national digital library. With the economies of scale involved, access to pretty much everything would run only a few dozen dollars per citizen.

 

[number1sixerfan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by matt8268 /img/forum/go_quote.gif I think what's being overlooked is that internet searching is a skill in and of itself. If you are good at searching the internet, you have way more PRACTICAL information at your fingertips than is in any library.

Bingo! I agree 100%. I do not use the library although I realize it is a great option. I use the internet because in the past four years I have mastered the internet search and I know what sources to trust and when it will suffice(this is when I hit the library). After a 30 page business law paper I thought I was an internet research god.

 

[lobehold]

Research impaired? I'd say more like research empowered.

The net only acted as a magnifier that multiplied the amount of material you can access. Even though it made it easy for junk info to be viewed by the masses, so did it enable many valuable knowledge to be made available.

One just need to have proper research discipline.... the same that weeds out books with dubious facts back in the day.

 

[TheAnomaly]

hmm. i'm 20 now, and the idea of this generation that is unable to use information sources is somewhat foreign to me. in grade school i don't really recall using much if any internet-based sources. it was all books and sometimes they allowed one encyclopedia entry for basic stuff. in middle school and high school we were expected to use fully library sources and maybe some limited access to computer-based databases. we were taught boolean operators my freshman year of HS...been useful ever since...

fast forward to today. i spend very little time in our library. it's 85% online database culling and card catalog perusing, followed by a quick flight to the shelves if necessary. random internet articles or information were never appropriate sources, except as maybe 1 or 2 out of the 6 you needed for high school projects (let alone college essays...).

in short, i'd say the "google generation" is more suited to information retrieval than most older folks because they've grown up with search engines and online resources. not wanting to "go the extra mile" beyond the first few pages of google seems more a function of laziness than inability, if this impairment even proves extant.

 

[Omega]

Apologies, should have made it clear all MY observations were USA-centric! (article is presumably UK-centered) Sometimes I forget what a wonderfully international forum we have here

Those who were insulted by being lumped into the "Google generation," did you read the linked study PDF? (Hehe, actually, that kind of gets to the root of the question, eh?) This isn't just a journalist (or me) inventing a new catch phrase, it is the outcome of a large longtudinal study + primary observations at British Library. Clearly, commentary on generational tendencies have to be taken with a grain of salt, as generalizations can be misleading when considering an individual. Didn't mean to marginalize anyone into a generation they would rather not own up to

The point about internet searching being a skill itself is interesting, but one I thought was apparent. The article concludes (in the Myths section in the middle) that "Digital literacies and information literacies do not go hand in hand. A careful look at literature over the past 25 years finds no improvement (or deterioration) in young people's information skills." This clearly indicates that "they make 'em like they used to," and I would agree. Assuming one generation is inherently smarter or more talented than any other generation is dangerous (and probably wrong). Assuming one generation has a different set of cultural/political/economic influences and pressures can lend perspective and shed light on differences in behavior...that's the question I was trying to get at...

Interesting responses, thanks!

 

[Mister Crash]

What I've found is that the ability to quickly search for pretty much anything online has dramatically impaired my memory. When I was in school (and before I had been introduced to the internet), I had a very good memory. If I was interested in something, I could remember every little detail about it. Now, since that same information is easily available online, I feel that I can always just look it up if I need that information again. There is little need for me to remember it, so I don't. As a consequence, my memory has gotten rather sloppy.

 

[LostOne.TR]

When I tried doing research, I was able to use resources (online) supplied to me by my school. The school's net provides access to several databases [i.e. LexisNexis and Business Source Premiere] of which includes peer reviewed journals, articles, studies. These databases more often than not, have an "online copy" of the printed media. Or at the very least, can point me to where I'd need to look/whom I need to contact to find it.

I think it's just a matter for the internet dependent to learn/know of the availability of access to these sources via the internet. As opposed to just google/google scholar.

For quite a long while, I was just using google myself too for my research paper. However throughout the process of writing it, I found my sources lacking. And it was then when I finally tried using some of these databases.

 

[nickknutson]

I wouldn't worry about it, the internet is just a fad anyway! We'll be going back to paper in no time!

But seriously, you raise a good question. I'm 27 and used the internet for the majority of my research from grade 10, on...and this was back in the day with dial-up. Although, if I remember correctly, the teachers started to require both online sources, as well as phyiscal book sources...which, at the time, was a good idea. But the way society is going, we'll all be using a computer for most everything we do, so having them use the internet for research isn't a bad thing...atleast it's a useful skill they'll get out of school, where most you learn isn't very applicable.

 

[FalconP]

There is certainly Google- and Wiki- phobia in the academia. The world is flooded with information and this is not going to change. Instead of banning certain sources outright, academia should teach student to pick out signal from noise, and identify quality information from that of lesser quality.

 

[Kirosia]

One of my Lit. teachers won't even allow us to use digital scans of printed books or e-books as sources. That's... stupid.

 

[XGJFilmsX]

i think this should be called
"All other generations are google-impaired."

 

[MD1032]

I think google is great. While it's true that the internet is not always a completely reliable source, there are sites like Wikipedia that have gone from being wrong in some cases to having cited sources and full articles that are actually correct.

Why spend an hour going to the library to get a piece of information when the same information can be found within seconds using google?

My roommate was in class and the professor cited a quote and asked if anyone knew who said the quote. 2/3 of the class raised their hands. He then said "if you just used google or wikipedia to get your answer, put your hands down", and the whole class put their hands down. This is an interesting situation, though, because it shows that the internet is powerful enough that in this classroom situation, it made no difference whether the student took time to memorize it beforehand or simply looked it up on the spot. The information was there when it needed to be there.

 

[loveheadphones]

the strange thing is I've had to go back to the library.
There's really no substitute for a book when it comes to comprehensive analysis of a topic. Sure, you can get snippets and stuff off of google or through wikipedia, but it just doesn't cut it.

 

[sandino]

The internet is great but see, the way I see it is that we're (I'm 19) killing the very heart of the academe by using bastardized, distilled, and filtered information for our research. I actually have classmates who put Wikipedia in their bibliographies (which is just pathetic and somewhat funny; besides that's unacceptable in my school. It has been clearly stated: WIKIPEDIA IS NOT A SOURCE)

Oh I don't know. I just really like the feel of flipping though real books to find sources. Besides, it's totally cooler if you put real books in your bibliography.

 

[nick_charles]

I use Google Scholar quite a lot but only to find online journal or conference papers, my library also has a collection of individual journals of which many are either born digital or scanned to digital, we also have a several online databases such as the ACM Digital Library and IEEE databases. Often I use google/scholar to find a source and then go to the Library's online catalog to see if I can find a physical book. Most of my Library's physical journals are on microfilm or microfiche which is painful to use.

I will be honest the availability of online resources has made my research a lot easier. As for Wikipedia I use it circumspectly, it can be a useful place to start but I never actually cite Wikipedia, in the area I publish in that is simply not acceptable, and the liberal use of web pages as references is considered dodgy though I may hunt down any decent references cited in a Wikipedia article.