Americans’ information needs not being met, study finds

Americans' lives are still grounded in the communities where they live and require a set of basic information to navigate daily life, despite the proliferation of technology that seems to shrink the world by the hour. But even though these clear information needs exist, research suggests that they're not being met, according to a group of researchers led by Lewis Friedland , a professor in the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Journalism and Mass Communication, along with Ernest Wilson, dean of the University of Southern California's Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, and Philip Napoli, a professor at Fordham University. The research was commissioned by the Federal Commission, which was looking to examine existing research to identify the American public's information needs, as well as barriers into participation in the communication industry. "The information needs of local communities are not at odds with the national or global community," the report concludes. "But they are unique and specific. That is why we recommend that the FCC conduct serious, rigorous, research into whether and how these needs are being met. We have recommended that modeling community communication ecologies that can investigate whether and how local information needs are met is a critical first step to understanding how markets, government policies and individual and group actions can work together to meet the information needs of their communities." Friedland and his research partners presented their findings to the FCC last month; a Webcast of the presentation is available here.