Lisl Zach

Use of microblogging for collective sense-making during violent crises: a study of three campus shootings

The purpose of this study is to understand how microblogging communications change and contribute to collective sense-making over time during a crisis. Using B. Dervins (1983) theory of sense-making applied to crises and communications during crises, we examined 7, 184 microblogging communications sent in response to three violent crises that occurred on U. S. college campuses. The analysis of patterns of microblogging communications found that information-sharing behaviors dominated the early response phase of violent crises, and opinion sharing increased over time, peaking in the recovery phase of the crises. The analysis of individual microblogging communications identified various themes in the conversation threads that not only helped individual contributors make sense of the situation but also helped others who followed the conversation. The results of this study show that microblogging can play a vital role in collective sense-making during crises.

Twitter for city police department information sharing

In this paper, we examine the use of Twitter by city police departments in large U.S. cities (cities with populations greater than 300,000). The purpose of our study is to determine what types of information are shared by city police departments over Twitter and to determine how the public uses the information shared to converse with the police departments and with each other. We read and analyzed 4,915 posts authored by 30 city police departments that have active Twitter accounts. The analysis shows that city police departments in large U.S. cities primarily use Twitter to disseminate crime and incident related information. City police departments also use Twitter to share information about their departments, events, traffic, safety awareness, and crime prevention. To a lesser extent, city police departments use Twitter to converse directly with the public and news media. We also sampled four weeks of public-authored tweets, totaling 1,984 tweets, that contained police department Twitter usernames and found that a majority of these tweets were retweets of police authored tweets; public-authored tweets also mentioned police departments in discussions or were used to send direct messages. This paper furthers our understanding of information sharing by city police departments as well as public redistribution of this information through the use of social media tools.

Collaborating to develop and test an enhanced text messaging system to encourage health information seeking

The growing importance of the role of the individual in making informed health decisions has spurred efforts to improve health literacy, especially in vulnerable populations characterized by disparities in health status and access to care. As part of this effort, libraries have engaged in outreach activities targeted at specific populations, institutions, and community groups, often involving multidisciplinary partnerships 1–4. These services are aimed at improving both health literacy and health information literacy. The latter is defined by the Medical Library Association as “the set of abilities needed to recognize a health information need, identify likely information sources and use them to retrieve relevant information, assess the quality of the information and its applicability to a specific situation, and analyze, understand, and use the information to make good health decisions” 5. Health information seeking is generally regarded as a component of health literacy 6. The study reported here describes an approach that used enhanced text messages to encourage health information seeking during pregnancy. The study objectives were to develop and test a simple, replicable intervention that would promote successful and satisfying information seeking by guiding users to key resources on topics relevant to their prenatal education and experience. We also wanted to examine how health sciences librarians add value to multidisciplinary teams engaged in health literacy activities. Building upon previous work reported elsewhere 7, our team of faculty, clinical staff, and librarians identified the opportunity for a health literacy intervention at Drexel Universitys 11th Street Health Services Center, a federally qualified health center that is located in a public housing development and serves a low-income, predominantly minority population.

An enhanced Text4Baby program: capturing teachable moments throughout pregnancy.

Mary K. Green RN, MSNa,⁎, Prudence W. Dalrymple PhD, MS (Informatics), AHIP, Kathleen H. Turner MS, Michelle L. Rogers PhD, Heather Williver-Farr , Lisl Zach PhD Drexel University College of Nursing and Health Professions, Eleventh Street Family Health Services, Philadelphia, PA Institute for Healthcare Informatics, Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA Drexel University Health Sciences Libraries, Philadelphia, PA College of Information Science and Technology at Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA College of Information and Technology at Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA

Law enforcement agency adoption and use of Twitter as a crisis communication tool

Abstract: This chapter describes the results of a research study investigating the adoption and use of Twitter as a crisis communication tool by law enforcement agencies from large US cities (cities with populations greater than 300,000). The study consisted of two parts – an analysis of Twitter use based on publicly available posts authored by 30 law enforcement agencies that have active Twitter accounts and an analysis of data collected through 17 semi-structured interviews with law enforcement public information officers and public media specialists.

Influence of Interfaces on Novice Users’ Performance in Social Virtual Worlds

This paper explores how interface environments have an influence on novice users’ performance in social virtual worlds (SVWs), which are emerging user-centric three-dimensional cyberspaces. Despite their early popularity. SVWs have experienced that numerous new users leave the cyberspaces soon before they become long-term users. One possible reason is that unfamiliar interfaces of SVWs can be a barrier to novice users’ adaptation of the technology. To understand a role of interfaces in the users’ assimilation of SVWs. we examine an impact of three interface factors (presence, affordance, and feedback) on performance which is regarded as a yardstick for users’ adaptation of SVWs. Forty participants were recruited and went through one-hour experimental sessions with seven tasks in Second Life: they were also asked to answer a questionnaire. Findings indicate that while affordance and feedback are significant factors influencing novice users’ performance, presence has no impact on their performance.

Understanding Internet access and use to facilitate patient portal adoption

Understanding the information-seeking preferences and Internet access habits of the target audiences for a patient portal is essential for successful uptake. The resource must deliver culturally and educationally appropriate information via technology that is accessible to the intended users and be designed to meet their needs and preferences. Providers must consider multiple perspectives when launching a portal and make any needed adjustments once the launch is underway. We report results of a study of 270 parents and caregivers of paediatric patients in a major health system during the process of implementing a patient portal. Through a 26-question paper-and-pencil survey, data were collected on participant demographics, Internet access and use, health information–seeking behaviours, health literacy, and potential use of a patient portal. Results indicate a positive attitude towards portal use but also suggest that low health literacy may be a key issue to portal adoption.