A new study conducted by PhD student Michelle Bak and Assistant Professor Jessie Chin, which was recently published in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association (JAMIA), reveals how large language models (LLMs) respond to different motivational states. In their evaluation of three LLM-based generative conversational agents (GAs)—ChatGPT, Google Bard, and Llama 2—the researchers found that while GAs are able to identify users' motivation states and provide relevant information when individuals have established goals, they are less likely to provide guidance when the users are hesitant or ambivalent about changing their behavior.

Professor and Dean Eunice E. Santos was named a 2024 Women's History Month Honoree by the Illinois Office of Comptroller. She was recognized at a ceremony hosted by Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza on March 21 in Springfield. At the Women's History Month celebration, Santos and three other women trailblazers were honored for their achievements and contributions to the community.

Associate professor Carol Tilley on Wonder Woman, public libraries vs. drugstores, and our very visual culture.

A book edited by Associate Professor Sarah Park Dahlen and Ebony Elizabeth Thomas, associate professor in the University of Michigan's Marsal Family School of Education, has received the Children's Literature Association (ChLA) Edited Book Award. The annual award recognizes the contributions of an outstanding edited collection of essays to children's literature history, scholarship, and criticism. 

Professor and Associate Dean for Research J. Stephen Downie and Professor Ted Underwood will present their research at the Digital Humanities International Symposium on March 13 and 15 in Japan.

A paper by Professor Emerita Linda C. Smith, "Reviews and Reviewing: Approaches to Research Synthesis," is one of seven papers included in the relaunch of the Annual Review of Information Science and Technology (ARIST), a collection of peer-reviewed, comprehensive, and systematic reviews on topics relevant to information science.

Associate Professor Emily Knox has been invited to join the editorial board of The International Journal of Information, Diversity, & Inclusion (IJIDI). The quarterly, open-access online journal is sponsored by East Carolina University and the University of Toronto and hosted on the servers of the University of Toronto Library.

Three of the twelve projects that recently received funding through the Chancellor's Call to Action Research Program to Address Racism and Social Justice are led or co-led by iSchool researchers. The program is a $2 million annual commitment by the University of Illinois to respond to the critical need for universities across the nation to prioritize research focused on systemic racial inequities and injustices that exist not only in communities but in higher education itself.

iSchool faculty, staff, and students will present their research in transparent data curation and cleaning, provenance management, certified transparency, and data ethics at the 18th International Digital Curation Conference (IDCC24), which will be held from February 19-21 in Edinburgh, Scotland. The theme of this year's conference, which brings together individuals, organizations, and institutions across all disciplines and domains involved in curating data, is "Trust Through Transparency."

Associate Professor Rachel Adler and Teaching Assistant Professor Jill Naiman have been selected for the 2024 National Institutes of Health (NIH) Grant Writing Series program in the Interdisciplinary Health Sciences Institute (IHSI). Led by faculty who have demonstrated a history of success with NIH proposals, the biennial NIH Grant Writing Series is designed to prepare Illinois faculty to submit their first R01 or other individual investigator proposals to the NIH.