Assessing Health Information on the Web by Medicine, Nursing and Midwify Students and Faculty members

Exploring how academic users including students and faculty members evaluate health information on the web especially with regard to their personality characteristic of conscientiousness.

A random sample including 148 students and faculty members located at the two faculties of Medicine Sciences and Nursing and Midwify at the Tehran University of Medical Sciences was the population of the study. Two validated questionnaires related to credibility and conscientiousness were distributed among the population. Gathered data were then analyzed by SPSS software.

Some problems in evaluating credibility assessment of health information and quick retrieval were mentioned. About half of the population evaluates web health information as credible often and very often. Most important quality assessment criteria were objectivity، currency and authority. There was a significant correlation between conscientiousness and credibility assessment of the students and faculty members. There appears a change in trust to information found accord with change in conscientiousness levels. There was no significant correlation between conscientiousness and trust to information among ill people.