{"id":27,"date":"2026-07-06T19:05:40","date_gmt":"2026-07-06T19:05:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/?p=27"},"modified":"2026-07-06T19:05:40","modified_gmt":"2026-07-06T19:05:40","slug":"module-6-reflection-on-hyperlinked-environments-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/2026\/07\/06\/module-6-reflection-on-hyperlinked-environments-issues\/","title":{"rendered":"Module 6 Reflection on Hyperlinked Environments & Issues"},"content":{"rendered":"

Recognizing diversity of perspectives, the complexity of technology<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

For this week\u2019s Choose Your Own Adventure format, I read some recent research from Pew on the state of technology usage and perception. I also read through Pew\u2019s collection of thoughts from futurists on their predictions for how technology use will change and affect us in coming years. One fact that stuck with me was the huge diversity of perspectives on issues including social media\u2019s effects on democracy and people\u2019s awareness of artificial intelligence in everyday life, (Anderson et al., 2021; Silver & Clancy, 2022).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The questions Silver and Clancy asked focused on people\u2019s perceptions and attitudes. This led me to wonder what recent research has been done to assess causality between technology use and real world outcomes or other social indicators. I then thought about how broad and interdisciplinary this area of research is. For example, I did a quick keyword search for articles on social media usage\u2019s effects on mental health in SJSU\u2019s OneSearch, and the results yielded articles from journals in communications and media, human-computer interaction, education, political communication, medicine and more.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Given the complexity of the social and political effects of emerging technologies, how can public libraries make informed decisions about how to integrate them into their services? I\u2019m primarily referring to more consequential players in our information ecosystem like privately-owned social media sites and generative AI. This module prompted me to reflect on the feasibility of devising a completely informed strategy within the time constraints of everyday public service. (For example, the library where I work hired a consulting company to help our library system create a Technology Roadmap. Due to budget and staffing issues, very few points in the plan have been achieved.) Many of our readings for this course so far have touched on frameworks to approach this issue, like listening to the interests of the community and the expertise and lived experiences of staff at all levels of the library system.<\/span><\/p>\n

How can public library workers balance the need to meet people where they\u2019re at \u2013 scrolling on platforms and dialoging with AI chatbots \u2013\u00a0 with the mission to teach the public about the social and political facets of information search in the internet age?<\/span><\/p>\n

With these technology perception statistics percolating in my mind, I came across a Linkedin post by Lauren Pressley, the Dean of Z. Smith Reynold\u2019s Library at Wake Forest University, (2026). Pressley argues the role of libraries today is no longer to provide access to information, as internet-equipped smartphones fill that need. Instead, libraries\u2019 role today is to promote discernment, \u201cknowing what to ask, noticing what a confident answer leaves out, and sensing when something is wrong.\u201d She continues, \u201cWhen you know something the challenge is being able to say with clarity why you think what you think.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Though I\u2019ve always recognized that libraries play a role as educators, Pressley frames education as libraries primary responsibility, not access. This conceptualization helped me better understand how libraries should approach emerging technology. It\u2019s not necessarily a question of how to adopt the technology into library services. It\u2019s a matter of how to teach people how these technologies affect our information landscape and the \u00a0ability to discern. For me, thinking with education and discernment as the goal instead of centering on the technology itself can be a more useful framework for approaching library service.<\/span><\/p>\n

References<\/span><\/p>\n

Anderson, J., Rainie, L., & Vogels, E. (2021). Experts say the \u2018new normal\u2019 in 2025 will be far more tech-driven, presenting more big challenges. Pew Research. <\/span>https:\/\/owl.purdue.edu\/owl\/research_and_citation\/apa_style\/apa_formatting_and_style_guide\/reference_list_electronic_sources.html<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Pressley, L. (2026, June 30). <\/span>Building the conditions<\/span><\/i>. <\/span>https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/pulse\/building-conditions-lauren-pressley-gxsoe\/<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Silver, L and Clancy, L. (2022). In advanced and emerging economies, similar views on how social media affects democracy and society. <\/span>https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/short-reads\/2022\/12\/06\/in-advanced-and-emerging-economies-similar-views-on-how-social-media-affects-democracy-and-society\/<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n



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Recognizing diversity of perspectives, the complexity of technology For this week\u2019s Choose Your Own Adventure format, I read some recent research from Pew on the state of technology usage and perception. I also read through Pew\u2019s collection of thoughts from futurists on their predictions for how technology use will change and affect us in coming … Continue reading “Module 6 Reflection on Hyperlinked Environments & Issues”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":866,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/866"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28,"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27\/revisions\/28"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/287.hyperlib.sjsu.edu\/revolvinglibraries\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}