Information Literacy
Full course description
A key aspect of studying at university and later on working at university level, is the correct and critical appraisal of scientific as well as non-scientific information. This course will teach about different aspects of information literacy, such as judging the value of an argument, recognizing misinformation and fallacies in reasoning (e.g. confirmation bias, hindsight bias, heuristics). Both qualitative and qualitative data and documents will be studied, to learn that different research questions require different types of data and value the provided information in a correct way. To be well prepared for the future, the course will also pay attention to the growing amount of information provided via artificial attention, bringing new challenges in correctly valuing information.
Key words:
- Skepticism
- Critical thinking
- Argumentation
- Data literacy
- Information literacy
- Inductive and deductive reasoning
Course objectives
Students will learn to:
- Detect misinformation ("bullshit")
- Recognize good and bad reasoning
- Develop a skeptical mind
- Use appropriate data for different research questions (qualitative and quantitative)
- Think like a scientist: recognize biases and assumptions in processing information
- Understand different types of truths and untruths/recognize true and untrue information
- M.J.E. Urlings
- M.T. Kiefer