What is the Information Cycle?

Discussions about news and media literacy often revolve around developing a healthy sense of skepticism, and evaluating the quality of the information we consume. While this is important, we should also have an understanding of how the information gets produced, from the moment an event occurs to the days, weeks, months, and years that follow. Librarians refer to this as the "Information Cycle," and we use it as a framework for understanding what types of information sources will be the best for learning about and researching a topic. Aside from maybe individual social media posts, news outlets are usually the very beginning of the cycle. It goes something like this:

Think of Election Night for a presidential election.

• Watching television news, you see commentators announcing the latest reported poll results, maybe voting difficulties in certain states, along with projections. But it's all up in the air-- things are reported that are later determined to be wrong, and new information is presented.
• In the days and weeks that follow, the information becomes more firm, and further information comes to light. Recounts take place and information moves from just spitting out facts to becoming more analytical--Why did this precinct vote the way it did?, etc.
• As the weeks turn into months and years, the event gets placed in historical perspective, demographic analysis takes place, and readers learn possible reasons for the election results. Scholars weigh in through journal articles and books, and then...
• It's about time for the next election.

In an always-on internet culture, where any news article that appears in a search might be from any point in time, the Information Cycle framework is important to keep us mindful of the process of how news evolves over time and what we can expect from it at given point.

Want to know more?

Check out the University of Illinois' Library page about the Information Cycle: