Information Ecology Research Articles

Evidence and gap map of infodemic management interventions in emergencies: a case of COVID-19

Abstract Background Because infodemic management (IM) is an evolving field that is bridging science into practice, it is often conducted in the field in an ad-hoc manner, focusing on implementation to address immediate challenges, and is less evaluated or reported in the scientific literature. This project used the Evidence and Gap Map (EGM) as a tool to provide an overview of investments in research and evidence for IM interventions. Methods A WHO working group advised development of protocol and of taxonomy of IM interventions and outcome measures based on literature review and expert discussion. Search was conducted on electronic databases and grey literature. Screening/coding of the studies was carried out independently by reviewers in two stages: the title and abstract and the full-text screening stage. Data extraction/critical appraisal was carried out for the included studies. Results 983 studies were included from 29,117 search records. Among impact studies that measured and reported outcomes, the reported interventions were on ‘science & health communication’ (n = 30), ‘education & training’ (n = 30), and ‘engagement’ (n = 10). ‘Individual knowledge, attitude and behaviors’ was the most frequently measured outcome. In descriptive studies not measuring outcomes, majority reported an intervention of ‘monitoring/detection of narratives, questions, concerns, and misinformation in the information ecosystem’ (580 studies), by ‘science + health communication’ (n = 258), ‘education + training’ (n = 86), ‘engagement’ (n = 86) and ‘laws, regulation + ethics’ (n = 60). Conclusions The EGM reviewed the evidence base on IM interventions. The analysis shows scarcity of impact evaluation studies in this area. Moreover, the map reflects concentrations of research in social media analytics studies, model studies for misinformation detection, individual level interventions. Major gaps exist in systems level interventions that address the information environment, and in broader impact measures. Key messages • Research funders should prioritize impact evaluation studies for systemic interventions to address infodemic to support solutions in design and implementation of such complex studies. • More research on infodemic management interventions is needed in LMICs and at health system level.

Risk assessment and governance path of social media rumors based on GRA and FsQCA

ABSTRACT The research on the risk assessment and governance path of social media rumors is of great significance to build a harmonious network environment. This study constructs a risk assessment indicator system of social media rumors based on information ecology theory and uses entropy weight method (EWM) to calculate the weight of risk indicators. Taking data set of Sina Weibo cases as an example, this study uses grey relational analysis (GRA) to construct a risk grading model of social media rumors. Based on the hierarchical data set, this study uses fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to further explore the formation path of high-risk rumors. Five configuration paths are obtained and governance methods of social media rumors for the government and social media platforms are proposed.

Public reporting format transformation in the concept of information transparency of the Performance of Economic Entities

The concept of corporate transparency in the business world is becoming a “new philosophy” in the system of communication interaction between business and stakeholders; at the same time, the most effective channel for an open dialogue is the reporting of economic entities. The demand of modern users has shifted towards the valueand risk-oriented nature of information disclosure and the possibility of using interactive tools for navigation and data visualization. Understanding this leads the professional community to an active search for new solutions to create an optimal model of public reporting and the very architecture of information support for companies. The purpose of the study is to develop an integrated concept of accounting and corporate reporting based on the principles of information transparency, ecosystem, connectivity, and manufacturability. In the course of the work, the methods of deduction and induction, logical and structural analysis, empirical research, content analysis, comparison and grouping were used. The article presents a comprehensive review of the developments of Russian and foreign scientists in the field of corporate reporting and highlights the key areas of its development. The author has studied the methodological, organizational and technological aspects of creating a modern architecture for information support of the activities of economic entities within the framework of the concept of a single corporate reporting format as an element of the business information ecosystem. As a result, a model of a complexly structured level of disclosure of reporting data was proposed by the author in the form of a single, unified digital information and analytical platform built on the principles of differentiation of approaches to disclosure, typification of the level of information transparency and definition of indicators that should be reflected in the reporting. The system of mandatory and voluntarily disclosed reporting forms has been formulated, representing the modern information outline of economic entities, systemically interconnected, linked and integrated with each other in the format of a single, unified corporate reporting. The study may be of interest to national regulators, scientific, professional and business communities.

Community-Centered Epidemic and Pandemic Information and Engagement Platform, the Hive.

The COVID-19 pandemic underlined that communities are key in sharing trusted, timely and relevant information especially during a health emergency where the overabundance of information makes it difficult to make decisions to protect one's health. The WHO Hive project grew out of the desire to create a community-centered solution with the potential to change the way credible health information is shared, adapted, understood and used for health-related decision making before, during and after an epidemic or pandemic. The Hive online platform provides a safe space for knowledge-sharing, discussion, and collaboration, including access to timely scientific information through direct engagement with WHO subject matter experts, and the true innovation lies within the platform's ability to leverage the power of communities to crowdsource solutions to community concerns and needs. The platform is equipped with a set of synchronous and asynchronous features and tools to encourage coworking and facilitate cross-sectorial collaboration. The Hive seeks to leverage the expert communities to share resources and knowledge for epidemic and pandemic preparedness and provide an environment that is able to respond to the challenges faced in a complex information ecosystem.

Research on ecological evaluation of an enterprise open innovation community website

PurposeWhile providing users with important innovation resources, an enterprise's open innovation community also encounters numerous challenges. The purpose of this study is to develop and implement a set of evaluation systems that can identify the ecological characteristics of open innovation communities. The ultimate goal is to provide guidance for the construction and establishment of these communities.Design/methodology/approachFirstly, from the perspective of information ecology, according to the connotation requirements of the four information elements of “people, information, technology and environment” in the information ecosystem, this paper determines the evaluation indicators of enterprise's open innovation community from the aspects of integrity and dynamics. Then, based on the improved analytic hierarchy process, the weight of each index is calculated, and a complete evaluation system of open innovation community is established. Finally, the fuzzy comprehensive evaluation method is used to conduct empirical research on Haier Open Partnership (HOPE) platform, analyze its ecological situation and existing problems and put forward the corresponding construction recommendations.FindingsThe application of HOPE platform shows that the evaluation index system built in this study has good applicability, and the whole research process and research method have certain reference value for future studies. At the same time, the study found that the HOPE platform has good ecological characteristics, but there are also some problems. This study can directly promote the construction of the platform.Originality/valueThis paper, for the first time, combines the information ecology theory with the open innovation community. The results demonstrate that the open innovation community is an information ecosystem, which can be evaluated ecologically. Furthermore, to ensure the calculation's scientific accuracy, the index weight is determined by constructing a judgment matrix based on expert questionnaires.

Are multiple ecosystem stability metrics equally sensitive and consistent to environmental gradient? A test for African terrestrial biomes

It is necessary to find effective methods for quantifying ecosystem stability that can forewarn massive collapses of ecosystem structure and inform ecosystem management. Multiple ecosystem stability metrics (ESMs) have been proposed and are increasingly employed to quantify terrestrial ecosystem stability. However, their sensitivity and consistency in depicting stability changes in diverse terrestrial ecosystems have not been thoroughly examined. Here, we evaluated 11 commonly suggested ESMs using two vegetation indices (normalized difference vegetation index, NDVI, and enhanced vegetation index, EVI) and examined their responses to the climatic gradient in diverse African biomes. We found that ESMs exhibited unequal sensitivity as certain metrics showed insignificant trends with climatic drivers whereas others indicated significant changes in stability in the same case. Among the significant results, inconsistent trends indicated by different ESMs were prevalent. Moreover, diverse ESMs exhibited mostly weak correlations despite being based on the same theoretical deduction. The ESMs derived from NDVI and EVI exhibited inconsistencies in some cases, suggesting the influence of the adopted variables on ESM performance. Our study revealed that multiple ESMs were unequally sensitive and inconsistent in indicating ecosystem stability. ESM performance was synthetically influenced by the ESM algorithm (different metrics), the adopted variable for ESM calculation, and the target biome type. Improvements in ecosystem stability evaluation on broad scales, therefore, are needed through further exploration and verification of ESMs.

Pervasive Uncertainty: Citizens' Perspective on the Efficacy of Healthcare Services in Combating Vaccine Reluctance; A Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) Approach

Nations around the world have conducted huge COVID-19 vaccination programmes; however, certain groups of individuals are resistant to the vaccine. Despite its demonstrated effectiveness, the general public is beginning to view vaccination as harmful and pointless. During 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic, plunged the globe, killing tens of thousands of people and halting commerce all across the planet. Scientists from every continent in the world worked together to develop vaccinations to halt the spread of the deadly virus. Even as efforts are made to eradicate the pandemic through vaccination campaigns, the COVID-19 "infodemic" continues to weaken public faith in these efforts. Although vaccine skepticism is a major problem, it is not usually the result of a flawed information ecosystem or defective vaccinations. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the incidence of COVID-19 vaccine hesitation in India and identify pertinent healthcare service-oriented factors contributing to this hesitancy. In order to investigate the prevalence of COVID-19 vaccine reluctance in India, a meta-analysis was conducted. In total, 305 respondents from Bangalore, India, were contacted via mail survey to collect the information required to assess the aforementioned objective. The Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) method was used to assess the many causes of vaccine hesitancy in healthcare services. Keywords: Covid-19, vaccination, hesitancy, healthcare services, Information services

The impact of information sphere in the economic security of the country: case of Russian realities

Novel information technologies have facilitated not only the development of new industries, but also brought new opportunities and challenges. The range of challenges includes threats related to the information security of not only the commercial, but also the public sector of the national economy, which can adversely affect its stability and competitiveness. In view of this, the problem of ensuring information security (IS) in the economic sphere is of particular relevance. Despite the abundance of studies on IS, the impact of the information sphere on the country’s economic security has not yet been sufficiently studied. The purpose of this article was to identify and systematize threats posed to economic security by the information environment and determine a set of measures to protect the areas at risk. Within the framework of the study, two interrelated models were built. The first systematized the IS threats and challenges, whereas the second demonstrated those IS threats that are directly connected with the state’s economic security. At the same time, the models developed allowed focusing on the protection of objects potentially under threat. The research quintessence was represented by the development of recommendations directed at preventing and minimizing the negative impact of information sphere threats to economic security. Hence, a diversified ecosystem of information and economic security of the state was created. The study findings and recommendations can be used by officials of government bodies and other organizations to develop regulatory documents related to the strategy of ensuring information and economic security at various levels (state, regional, corporate).

Disclosure Standards for Social Media and Generative Artificial Intelligence Research: Toward Transparency and Replicability.

Social media dominate today's information ecosystem and provide valuable information for social research. Market researchers, social scientists, policymakers, government entities, public health researchers, and practitioners recognize the potential for social data to inspire innovation, support products and services, characterize public opinion, and guide decisions. The appeal of mining these rich datasets is clear. However, there is potential risk of data misuse, underscoring an equally huge and fundamental flaw in the research: there are no procedural standards and little transparency. Transparency across the processes of collecting and analyzing social media data is often limited due to proprietary algorithms. Spurious findings and biases introduced by artificial intelligence (AI) demonstrate the challenges this lack of transparency poses for research. Social media research remains a virtual "wild west," with no clear standards for reporting regarding data retrieval, preprocessing steps, analytic methods, or interpretation. Use of emerging generative AI technologies to augment social media analytics can undermine validity and replicability of findings, potentially turning this research into a "black box" enterprise. Clear guidance for social media analyses and reporting is needed to assure the quality of the resulting research. In this article, we propose criteria for evaluating the quality of studies using social media data, grounded in established scientific practice. We offer clear documentation guidelines to ensure that social data are used properly and transparently in research and applications. A checklist of disclosure elements to meet minimal reporting standards is proposed. These criteria will make it possible for scholars and practitioners to assess the quality, credibility, and comparability of research findings using digital data.

Information in Crisis Mode? A Conceptual Analysis of the Information Crisis Discourse

ABSTRACTThe concept of ‘information crisis’ is playing an increasingly prominent role within information studies literature and practice. Yet, the term is rarely defined and its meaning often remains both inconsistent and ambiguous. This opacity calls for a greater grounding of the term if it is to become a key concept in the field, including how it operates and what it enforces. This short paper draws upon information studies literature to present a conceptual analysis of the concept of ‘information crisis.’ From this analysis, we argue that an ‘information crisis’ framing is typically used to either establish the status quo, through centring challenges to established information ecosystems, or maintain the status quo, by outlining the operations needed to renew or protect these landscapes. These findings illustrate how ‘information crisis’ can obscure the very contexts of inequality and injustice through which crisis operates and delimits the possibility of changing/disrupting the status quo.

The Potential for Public Impact in a J Department’s Local Information Ecosystem: Key Ingredients for Starting a Journalism Teaching Hospital

Journalism teaching hospitals have long been a steady source of news in the communities they call home. As these programs have a track record of increasing essential public knowledge and adding vitality to journalism programs, this study mines the knowledge of current and former journalism teaching hospital leaders to ascertain the necessary elements for starting what will be a sustainable program. Critical elements found included a passionate founder, a local coverage gap the program can fill, and support from academic leadership.

Governing the informed city: Examining local government strategies for information production, consumption and knowledge sharing across ten cities

Cities are more and more embedded in information flows, and their policies are increasingly called assessment frameworks to understand the impact of the systems of knowledge underpinning local government. Encouraging a more systemic view on the data politics of the urban age, this paper investigates the information ecosystem in which local governments are embedded. Seeking to go beyond the ‘smart city’ paradigm into a more overt discussion of the structures of information-driven urban governance, it offers a preliminary assessment across ten case studies (Barcelona, Bogotá, Chicago, London, Medellín, Melbourne, Mexico City, Mumbai, Seoul and Warsaw). It illustrates how both internal and external actors to local government are deeply involved throughout information mobilization processes, though in different capacities and to different extents, and how the impact of many of these actors is still not commonly assessed and/or leveraged by cities. Seeking to encourage more systematic analysis the governance of knowledge collection, dissemination, analysis, and use in cities, the paper advocates for an ‘ecosystem’ view of the emerging ‘informed cities’ paradigm.

Retiring TDWG Standards and How Mapping Standards Could Support Agility

Since its genesis in September 1985, TDWG (formerly Taxonomic Databases Working Group now Biodiversity Information Standards) has become the steward of standards for the biodiversity informatics community; however, there is not yet a process for retiring standards. This talk will educate the community members on TDWG Standard categories of "Current Standard", "Prior Standard", "2005 Standard", and the history and context of how these categories came to be. It will also report on the progress the TAG (Technical Architecture Group) has made on moving towards creating a process for retiring standards through auditing, community participation, and other methods. Mapping TDWG standards can provide an agility to address overlaps, gaps, contradictions, and/or inconsistencies between standards in a proactive manner. Mapping standards' relationships provides infrastructure to support decision-making, combat information overload, and give context to the community as it continues to progress at a rapid pace. More specifically for TDWG, it gives a clear picture how updating, ratifying, and/or retiring a singular standard impacts the greater TDWG information ecosystem and how to update adjacent standards to preserve clarity and consistency for the community as a whole.

Rise of social bots: The impact of social bots on public opinion dynamics in public health emergencies from an information ecology perspective

Social bots exacerbate emotional chaos and network disorder during sudden public opinion outbreaks. Drawing on information ecology theory, we analyze how social bots as information person characteristics influence information characteristics represented by topic tendency and sentiment spreading and environmental characteristics represented by information diffusion and network influence, and further discuss the conditional role played by social bots in public opinion dynamics. By comparing different machine learning models, the study selects the XGBoost model with the highest accuracy to identify the type of social bots with specific automation features in the Chinese context. Meanwhile, based on the representative public health emergency, the study uses a large-scale social media dataset (N = 328539) to explore how social bots affect multi-dimensional public opinion dynamics in the information ecosystem. It was found that the information published by social bots and human users has an entirely different dissemination mechanism, and social bots have a significant impact on topic tendency, sentiment spreading, information diffusion, and network influence in cyberspace. Moreover, social bots also play an important moderating role in the information diffusion and network influence of affective information. Relevant findings provide a practical reference for the recognition and prevention of social bots, and help emergency management departments to stabilize public sentiments by intervening in the behavior of social bots, weakening the influence of negative public opinion, and promoting the management of public opinions in emergencies and the maintenance of network order.

Soil microbial community, dissolved organic matter and nutrient cycling interactions change along an elevation gradient in subtropical China

To identify possible dominating processes involved in soil microbial community assembly, dissolved organic matter (DOM) and multi-nutrient cycling (MNC) interactions and contribute to understanding of climate change effects on these important cycles, we investigated the interaction of soil chemistry, DOM components and microbial communities in five vegetation zones - ranging from evergreen broad-leaved forest to alpine meadow - along an elevation gradient of 290–1960 m in the Wuyi Mountains, Fujian Province, China. Soil DOM composition and microbial community assembly were characterized using Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry (FT-ICR MS) and Illumina MiSeq high-throughput sequencing, respectively. Sloan's neutral model and the modified stochasticity ratio were used to infer community assembly processes. Key microbial drivers of the soil MNC index were identified from partial least squares path models. Our results showed that soil DOM composition is closely related to the vegetation types along an elevation gradient, the structure and composition of the microbial community, and soil nutrient status. Overall, values of the double bond equivalent (DBE), modified aromaticity index (AImod) increased, and H/C ratio and molecular lability boundary (MLBL) percentage decreased with elevation. Lignins/CRAM-like structures compounds dominated soil DOM in each vegetation type and its relative abundance decreased with elevation. Aliphatic/protein and lipids components also decreased, but the relative abundance of aromatic structures and tannin increased with elevation. The alpha diversity index of soil bacteria gradually decreased with elevation, with deterministic processes dominating the microbial community assembly in the highest elevation zone. Bacterial communities were conducive to the decomposition of labile degradable DOM compounds (H/C ≥ 1.5) at low elevation. In the cooler and wetter conditions at higher-elevation sites the relative abundance of potentially resistant soil DOM components (H/C < 1.5) gradually increased. Microbial community diversity and composition were important predictors of potential soil nutrient cycling. Although higher elevation sites have higher nutrient cycling potential, soil DOM was assessed to be a more stable carbon store, with apparent lower lability and bioavailability than at lower elevation sites. Overall, this study increases understanding of the potential linkage between soil microbial community, multiple nutrient cycling and DOM fate in subtropical mountain ecosystems that can help predict the effect of climate change on soil carbon sequestration and thus inform ecosystem management.

“Please forward before they delete it!” Assessing conspiracy theories and disinformation in chain e-mails about Covid-19 in the Czech Republic

The outbreak of the pandemic, marked with many unknowns and uncertainty, provided a fertile ground for disinformation, conspiracy theories, and pro-Kremlin propaganda in the Czech Republic which was delivered through various communication channels. This is also the case of so-called “chain e-mails” forwarded especially among older people to substitute social networks. The main aim of the article is to reveal the nature and content of chain e-mails communicating Covid-19 with a special focus on narratives and its development. The article is based on the analysis of 2,056 unique Covid-19-related chain e-mails forwarded among people in the Czech Republic between March 2020 and May 2022. Next to revealing key targets, techniques, and narrative developments, the analysis contributes to a better understanding of disinformation, propaganda, and conspiracy theories in the Czech Republic and the (dis)information ecosystem in general. The final discussion is dedicated to the possibilities of how to address the negative effects of chain e-mails.

Increasing adoption despite perceived limitations of social media in emergencies: Representative insights on German citizens’ perception and trends from 2017 to 2021

The value of social media in crises, disasters, and emergencies across different events, participants, and states has been examined in crisis informatics research. While some studies examined social media use representatively for their target audience, these usually only comprise a single point of inquiry and do not allow for a trend analysis. This work provides results (1) of a representative survey with German citizens from 2021 on use patterns, perceptions, and expectations regarding social media during emergencies. Furthermore, it (2) uses longitudial data and compares these results to previous surveys and provides insights on temporal changes and trends from 2017, over 2019 to 2021. Our findings highlight that social media adoption in emergencies increased in 2021 and 2019 compared to 2017. Between 2019 and 2021, the amount of information shared on social media remained on a similar level, while the perceived disadvantages of social media in emergencies significantly increased. In light of demographic variables, the results of the 2021 survey confirm previous findings, according to which older individuals (45+ years) use social media in emergencies less often than younger individuals (18–24 years). Furthermore, while the quicker availability of information was one of the reasons for social media use, especially the potential information overload was a key factor for not using social media in emergencies. The results are discussed in light of the dynamic nature of attitudes regarding social media in emergencies and the need to account for heterogeneity in user expectations to build trustworthy information ecosystems in social media.

Exploring the barriers and facilitators to implementing electronic health records in a middle-income country: a qualitative study from South Africa.

As more countries are moving towards universal health care, middle-income countries in particular are trying to expand coverage, often using public funds. Electronic health records (EHR) are useful in monitoring patient outcomes, the performance of providers, and so the use of those public funds. With the multiple institutions or departments responsible for providing care to any individual, rather than a single record, an EHR is the interface through which to view data from a digital health information eco-system that draws on data from many different sources. South Africa plans to establish a National Health Insurance fund where EHRs will be essential for monitoring outcomes, and informing purchasing decisions. Despite various relevant policies and South Africa's relative wealth and digital capability, progress has been slow. In this paper, we explore the barriers and facilitators to implementing electronic health records in South Africa. In this qualitative study, we conducted in-depth interviews with participants including academics, staff at parastatals, managers in the private health sector, NGO managers and government staff at various levels. The Western Cape provincial government over a 20-year period has managed to develop a digital health information ecosystem by drawing together existing data systems and building new systems. However, despite having the necessary policies in place and a number of stand-alone population level digital health information systems, several barriers still stand in the way of building national electronic health records and an efficient digital health ecosystem. These include a lack of national leadership and conflict, a failure to understand the scope of the task required to achieve scale up, insufficient numbers of technically skilled staff, failure to use the tender system to generate positive outcomes, and insufficient investment towards infrastructural needs such as hardware, software and connectivity. For South Africa to have an effective electronic health record, it is important to start by overcoming the barriers to interoperability, and to develop the necessary underlying digital health ecosystem. Like the Western Cape, provincial governments need to integrate and build on existing systems as their next steps forward.

Effectiveness of Mdantsane FM community radio in health information promotion among residents of eastern cape province, South Africa

Community radio's effectiveness in health information ecosystem in rural Africa has yet to be explored much in the literature. This paper seeks to understand rural residents’ perceived effectiveness of community radio in health promotion using Mdantsane FM's listeners in selected communities in Eastern Cape Province as a point of departure. We applied Qualitative and quantitative methods within the theoretical frameworks of the public sphere and Uses and Gratification theories. The findings showed that Mdantsane Community F.M. could be an effective health information source. However, the station still needed to optimise its health information promotion role. To fulfil this role, community radio stations must proactively and intentionally create and broadcast culturally nuanced health programmes consistently and sustainably.

Концепция ESG-аудита организаций государственного и корпоративного секторов

The article raises the issues of leveling by the audit community the influence of the ESG transformation of the information ecosystem of the activities of economic entities on the development of the methodology for auditing public reporting. The essence of the problem lies in the significant lag of the regulatory system and the applied practice of confirming the reliability of information published in the reporting of corporate and public sector organizations from the pace of updating regulatory regulation and expanding the practice of generating and disclosing non-financial reporting information in the context of rapid ESG transformation. The article provides an overview of the regulatory framework and practice of verifying the reliability of non-financial information by audit organizations. The characteristics of methods of verification of non-financial reporting information, alternative to traditional audit, are given. The conceptual provisions and methodological approaches to the ESG audit of public and corporate sector organizations are formulated.