Informational Cascades in Online Learning
September 7th, 2004I’m going to have to read this article entitled, “Informational Cascades in Online Learning” in more depth (I only glanced at it this evening), but it seems fascinating:
“Fortunately for us, a growing number of researchers from a wide range of disciplines is coming to study these “greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts” phenomena. The community of online learning professionals has an opportunity to participate in this effort and contribute to it. As a small and early step in that direction, this article examines a phenomenon that behavioral economists call an “informational cascade,” which is essentially a kind of logical trap that leads groups of perfectly bright, sensible people to participate in illogical “herding” behaviors such as stock-market bubbles and fashion crazes.”
Surowiecki touched upon informational cascades in Wisdom of Crowds, and I was blown away by the concept. I’m not sure that I can relate it to librarianship (I’m going to try - see future posts), because I’m not sure I can. In my studies of collaboration and group work, I always try to relate what I am reading to librarians and how we perform our work and how we can possibly do it better. (article link via Jeremy Wagstaff’s LOOSE wire)