Implications For Library and Information Science
The concept of cognitive authority was developed in Library and information science and has attracted a lot of attention in this field. Its importance for this field is related to questions such as: What criteria should be used for selecting information sources? For advising users about selecting information? For interpreting user studies and relevance judgments? All such issues involve questions of cognitive authority and epistemology.
"Perhaps we should learn to be more critical of the very concept of authority. Authority is legitimate only within the boundaries of the community (subject or otherwise) in which it is based. Many questions pertain to areas claimed by competing disciplines, and some to areas beyond the bounds of recognized disciplinary communities. Even when we are able to locate authoritative sources with answer to questions, they tend to be less certain than they look, and greater authority is no guarantee of quality. Authority tells us only that the creators of the source have qualifications and institutional affiliations that match the expectations of a given disciplinary community, not that the source is infallible, or even that its disciplinary community it the best to pursue the information sought" (Pierce, 1991, p. 31).
Read more about this topic: Cognitive Authority
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