Risky (information) business: an informational risk research agenda
| Date | 14 February 2023 |
| Pages | 1147-1163 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-09-2022-0198 |
| Published date | 14 February 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Records management & preservation,Document management,Classification & cataloguing,Information behaviour & retrieval,Collection building & management,Scholarly communications/publishing,Information & knowledge management,Information management & governance,Information management,Information & communications technology,Internet |
| Author | Alison Hicks |
Risky (information) business:
an informational risk
research agenda
Alison Hicks
Department of Information Studies, University College London, London, UK
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this conceptual paper is to suggest that the growing sociocultural theorisation of
risk calls for a more robust research focus on the role that information and in particular, information literacy,
plays in mediating hazards and danger.
Design/methodology/approach –Starting by tracing how information has been conceptualised in relation
to risk through technoscientific, cognitive and sociocultural lenses, the paper then focuses on emerging
sociocultural understandings of risk to present a research agenda for a renewed sociocultural exploration of
how risk is shaped through the enactment of information literacy.
Findings –The paper identifies and examines how information literacy shapes four key aspects of risk,
including risk perception, risk management, risk-taking and “at-risk”populations. These four aspects are
further connected through broader themes of learning, identity, work and power, which form the basis of the
sociocultural risk research agenda.
Originality/value –This paper is the first study bringing together the many understandings related to how
risk is informed and establishes risk as a key area of interest within information literacy research.
Keywords Information literacy, Risk, Research agenda, Information work, Information practices,
Informational risk
Paper type Conceptual paper
1. Introduction
Risk plays a prominent role within many societies today. Associated with the growth of an
increasingly litigious health and safety culture, risk is also implicated in many Western
governmental initiatives, including the growing reliance on nudge economics (Thaler and
Sunstein, 2008), which uses carefully planned messaging to influence responsible decision-
making. Most recently, risk has come to prominence within the COVID-19 pandemic when
peoplewere forced to eithermake or abide by decisionsmade for them aboutthe personal, social
and economic risks of becoming infected with the SARS-2 virus (Brown, 2020;Finnikin and
Spiegelhalter, 2021). The importance that is placed upon risk calls for a detailed examination of
the role that information plays in shaping responses to hazard and danger, including in
everyday as well as more specialised health and political contexts. More specifically, the need to
understand the information strategies thatpeople employto learn about anddeal with perceived
dangerdemands arenewed focus onthe role that information literacy,whichis defined as “away
of knowing the many environments that constitute an individual’s being in the world”(Lloyd,
2017), plays in shaping responses to risk. While the concept of risk has long played an important
role within the broader field of Library and Information Science (LIS), for example, related to risk
assessment within digital preservation and curation (e.g. Frank, 2020), there has been far less
emphasison the rolethat informationliteracyplays in recognisingand shapingresponsesto risk
within everyday life. This focus forms the basis of the paper.
The need for this work is extended through the growingsociocultural theorisation of risk
rather than the more typical technoscientific perspective. The concept of risk is often
A research
agenda for
informational
risk
1147
This study was funded by the British Academy/Leverhulme, SRG2021\211338.
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
https://www.emerald.com/insight/0022-0418.htm
Received 13 September 2022
Revised 1 December 2022
Accepted 25 January 2023
Journal of Documentation
Vol. 79 No. 5, 2023
pp. 1147-1163
© Emerald Publishing Limited
0022-0418
DOI 10.1108/JD-09-2022-0198
automatically associated with risk assessment, which refers to health and safety measures
designedto prevent injury.Information plays a vitalrole within this approachto understanding
risk, includingbeing linked to dealing with dangerin both Griffin et al. (1999) risk information
seekingand processing (RISP) modeland Kahlor’s(2010)riskinformation seekingmodel (RISM).
However, the emphasis that this work places on objective calculations of risk obscures the
socialand cultural contextsin which risk is brought into being.Another popular understanding
of riskis therisk society, Beck’s (1992)and Giddens’s (1991) visionsof the ways in which society
organises in response to the hazards of modernity, including constant change and cultural
breakdown. Whilethe risk society thesis emphasises the contextual shape of risk, the crux of
this work remainsfocused on expert responsesand the individualisationof society rather than
everyday responses to situatedhazards. From an informationperspective, these emphasesare
problematic because they preclude broader theorisation about the ways in which risk and
informationare entwined;research remains focusedon how authoritativeinformation is sought
and processed(e.g. Griffin et al., 1999;Choo, 2017) ratherthan the multiple ways in which riskis
constructed and configured, as in a sociocultural approach. It also removes considerations of
learning from understandings about how riskis informed or the role that informationliteracy
plays in mediating questions of danger within everyday social contexts.
This conceptual paper addresses these concerns by presenting a research agenda for
informational risk, which refers, in this study, to any way in which information is implicated
within the conceptualisation, construction and experience of risk. As a concept, informational
risk is not widespread but has traditionally been used to refer to risks that information might
pose, including the risk of sharing identifiable patient information (e.g. Fisher et al., 2020)or
the risk that financial or economic information might not be accurate (e.g. D
anescu et al.,
2013). The definition of informational risk used in this research agenda broadens these ideas
to focus on how information shapes or mediates risk rather than the risks that data and
knowledge may, in themselves, pose. In centring on how people become informed about
danger, informational risk draws upon the conceptualisation of information as “any
difference which makes a difference”(Bateson, 1972, p. 386), a sociocultural perspective that
acknowledges the importance that meaning and value plays within the development of
knowing. This definition of informational risk also acknowledges that information forms a
“red thread”(Bates, 1999, p. 1048) that runs throughout and connects people’s lives, an
understanding that further enables us to examine how conceptualisations of risk are shaped
within and in relation to everyday information environments.
The basis for this emerging conceptualisation of informational risk is a selective review
and close reading of sociocultural literature related to risk, information and information
literacy. This approach, which was inspired by Dalmer and Huvila’s (2019) conceptual
examination of information work, led to the identification and examination of four key
aspects of risk that are shaped through the enactment of information literacy. These four
aspects of risk are further analysed to produce a research agenda that places sociocultural
approaches to risk and information literacy in dialogue with each other rather than in
isolation. The literature search that forms the basis for this work centred on extensive
searching of relevant databases and reference chaining and was carried out as part of a series
of research projects exploring information literacy within sociocultural approaches to risk.
Nonetheless, the paper’s emphasis on discussion, debate and the value for future study means
that the review does not claim to be exhaustive or systematic.
The worth in a research agenda that moves beyond technoscientific traditions and the
individualisation of experience lies in the elaboration of richer knowledge about the role that
information plays withinrisk contexts. A greater focus on the sociocultural contexts in which
risk is negotiated extends research by shifting attention from the personal characteristics that
might “predispose”people to manage hazards (e.g. Griffin et al., 1999;Kahlor, 2010)tothe
development of risk knowledge in everyday life, including how information activities constrain
JD
79,5
1148
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