Self-Reports Of Information Seeking: Is Social Desirability In Play?
Abstract
Social desirability, the likelihood of individuals to overreport behaviors they perceive to be approved by others, is often cited as a limitation in research but rarely controlled in a systematic manner. Social desirability can influence self-reported behaviors (e.g., voting behavior) and communication variables (e.g., argumentativeness). Information seeking may be susceptible to the effects of social desirability as knowledge and information are generally desired, and thus may be prone to overreporting. This article presents results from two online, information-seeking tracking studies investigating the influence of social desirability on self-reported information seeking. Participants indicated how much time they actually spent seeking information on a website. Unbeknownst to participants, their website use was being tracked using Google Analytics. This article compares actual time spent seeking information to reported information-seeking time. Results suggest that participants overreport information seeking in these two studies; social desirability may explain this result.
Publication Date
8-7-2016
Publication Title
Atlantic Journal of Communication
Volume
24
Issue
4
Number of Pages
242-249
Document Type
Article
Personal Identifier
scopus
DOI Link
https://doi.org/10.1080/15456870.2016.1208661
Copyright Status
Unknown
Socpus ID
84988484607 (Scopus)
Source API URL
https://api.elsevier.com/content/abstract/scopus_id/84988484607
STARS Citation
Neuberger, Lindsay, "Self-Reports Of Information Seeking: Is Social Desirability In Play?" (2016). Scopus Export 2015-2019. 2950.
https://stars.library.ucf.edu/scopus2015/2950