Information & Research Literacy - A self-guided Program

The first frame is Authority is Constructed and Contextual. There's a lot to unpack in that language, so let's get started.

Start with the word "Authority."

At the root of “Authority” is the word Author. So start there:

• Who created the piece of information?
• Why did they make it?
• What stake do they have in the information they’re presenting?
• What are their credentials?  Try searching them online.
• Who are they affiliated with? A public organization? A university? A company trying to make a profit? Check it out.

Now let's talk about how authority is "Constructed."

“Constructed”  in this context means people create (construct) systems to help order their thinking & their communities.  So, who is considered an authority is NOT inevitable. In some communities, grandma is THE authority on what to eat; in others, it may be a social media influencer, in still others, a government health department. When we say “authority” is constructed, we’re basically saying that we as individuals and as a society create authority.

A common way of assessing authority is by looking at an author’s education. We’re inclined to trust someone with a PhD over someone with a high school diploma because we think the person with a PhD is smarter. That’s a construct. We’re conditioned to think that someone with more education is smarter than people with less education, but we don't know it for a fact. Especially if we are seeking first-hand experience of a phenomena.

If aliens land on Lantau Island in the HKSAR, there will be many voices contributing to the information collected about the event. Someone with a PhD in astrophysics might write an article about the mechanical workings of the aliens’ spaceship. Cool, they are an authority on that kind of stuff, so I trust them.

But the teenager who was on the island and watched the aliens land has first-hand experience of the event, so I  will probably trust them too. They have authority on the event even though they don’t have a PhD in astrophysics.

So we cannot think someone with more education is inherently more trustworthy, or smarter, or has more authority than anyone else. Some people who are authorities on a subject are highly educated, some are not.

The final word is "Contextual."

This one is a little simpler. If I go to a hospital and a medical doctor says my leg is broken, I’ll probably be trust the diagnosis. If I go to a hospital and another patient in Accidents and Emergency tells me my leg is broken, I will trust the diagnosis less.

Medical doctors have authority in the context of medicine. Other patients may have expertise in some other areas.

This applies when we talk about experiential authority, too. If an doctor tells me what it’s like to be a delivery worker, I will not trust their authority. I will, however, trust a delivery worker (or several delivery workers) to tell me about what it is like to deliver things for a living .

The Takeaway:
Basically, when we think about Authority, we need to ask ourselves, “Do I trust them? Why?” If they do not have experience with the subject (like witnessing an event or holding a job in the field) or subject expertise (like education or research), then maybe they aren’t an authority after all.

Ask Yourself:

• In what context am I myself an authority?
• If I need to figure out how to make a steamed egg custard, who would I ask? Who's an authority in that situation?
• If I need to find out how many electric cars were registered in Hong Kong in the years 2015-2024, who would I ask? Where would I look? Who is an authority in that situation?

Based on Emily Metcalf's Frame of the Day, April 2, 2019. Mary and Jeff Bell Library Blog, Texas A&M Corpus Chisti Library.