New Voices RGU Student Series 2025 – Emily Roberts

Category: RGU Student Series 2025

In the 2025 New Voices Student Series, the CILIPS Students & New Professionals Community will be sharing the views of Robert Gordon University students from the MSc in Information and Library Studies.

With special thanks to Dr Konstantina Martzoukou, Teaching Excellence Fellow and Associate Professor, for organising these thought-provoking contributions.

Today’s blog post author is Emily Roberts. Emily was raised in Bristol, where she still lives now, and has a bachelors degree in Religion, Philosophy and Ethics. Emily loves reading and existential questions.

Generative Artificial Intelligence

Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) is an AI system that uses machine learning to create new content (Kalota, 2024). While traditional searching relies on the skill of knowing and using search methods, GenAI interacts with its users with conversational dialogue, able to answer follow-up questions, challenge the questions asked or even deny to answer something it deems to be inappropriate (OpenAI, 2022). This new method of researching has the potential to redefine the practice of information seeking, and it’s already started.

In recent years, GenAI has exploded in popularity. ChatGPT was released in late 2022 and GenAI was thrust into the public eye, earning both positive and negative attention (Kalota, 2024). Since then, GenAI seems to have rapidly taken over the tech world and its integration into day to day life continues to grow. A simple google search now delivers an automatic AI response at the top of any search result page and AI continues to coalesce with social media platforms and streaming services (Noora Hirvonen et al., 2023). It seems like it won’t be long until GenAI becomes completely unavoidable.

So how does this affect information professionals? When so much of your education and professional career has revolved around the importance of search techniques like Boolean operators, phrase searching and using a controlled vocabulary, the introduction of a machine that is seemingly able to bypass these steps and give you instant results can be unsettling. Add in the concerns around misinformation, biases, credibility and academic integrity, the whole concept can feel quite dismal. While these concerns are not hidden away from the public, they do require the user to be vigilant. ChatGPT is rather open about the machine’s ability to make mistakes or deliver incorrect information, including this message on both the OpenAI’s introductory webpage, and including a line of text under the ChatGPT search bar. This will not, however, be successful in reaching all of its users and some will inevitably fall through the net. This is just one area where information professionals will be vital in limiting the misuse of these tools.

Professionals in library and information services must acknowledge their obligation to staying up to date with the world of AI in order to best service their communities and users. As Abram (2024) puts it, ‘we have a duty to learn, study, and have a professionally informed opinion – no matter how much it scares or excites us emotionally’. While we will have our own individual feelings towards AI, library and information professionals must still dedicate themselves to learning the intricacies of these tools. There are several ways in which they will be key to helping the general public use GenAI efficiently and ethically. This could be embracing the role of teacher for those who don’t understand the capabilities of AI, promoting the use of critical thinking and providing guidance (Essex.ac.uk, 2023). It could be by providing a space to discuss the implications of these tools or providing resources for users to develop their knowledge on AI, therefore encouraging people to be an active and informed user. Libraries and information professionals would undoubtedly struggle with delivering effective support to their communities if they do not embrace new technologies like GenAI.

While many may find this evolution daunting or troublesome, we must remember what the role of information professional really means – to support the learning of your local community (Mislan et al., 2020). Whether this is in a school, a public library or any other setting, information professionals support others in their learning and it will be the same for AI. There should be no fear of being replaced by machines, as no machine can provide the empathetic human experience that we can, we must instead be prepared to work with these new tools and be at the forefront of making sure people stay informed of the potential risks involved with using GenAI and promote vigilance in its use.

References

Kalota, F. (2024). ‘A Primer on Generative Artificial Intelligence’, Education Sciences, [online] 14(2), p.172. Available at: https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci14020172.

OpenAI (2022). Introducing ChatGPT. Available at: https://openai.com/index/chatgpt/. (Accessed: 17 November, 2024).

Noora Hirvonen, Ville Jylhä, Lao, Y. and Larsson, S. (2023). ‘Artificial intelligence in the information ecosystem: Affordances for everyday information seeking’, Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 75(10), pp. 1152-1165. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.24860.

Abram, S. (2024). ‘This Librarian’s Journey of Testing New Search Innovations: From Retrieval to Artificial Intelligence (AI)’, Access: An International Journal of Nepal Library Association, 3(1), pp. 13–50. Available at: https://doi.org/10.3126/access.v3i1.69419.

Burnet, B., Phipps, J. (2023). ‘Essex Blogs’, The Future of A.I. in Information Services Available at: https://www.essex.ac.uk/blog/posts/2023/09/21/the-future-of-ai-in-information-services (Accessed: 22 Nov. 2024).

Mislan, M.H., Yatin, S.F.M., Taib, S.K.M., Ma’roof, N.A.N., Mohamad, N., Hanuzi, D.N.E.M.M., Abdul Rahman, S., Rahmad, F. and Abdul Kadir, M.R. (2020). ‘Information Professional in 21st Century: Evolve or Dissolve’, International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 10(11), pp. 1113-1126. Available at: https://doi.org/10.6007/ijarbss/v10-i11/8186.