How Covid-19 literacy influences fear, protective behaviour, and conspiracy beliefs among university students in Pakistan?

Background: Covid-19 literacy, a social vaccine, is crucial to cope pandemic situations as it helps individuals to manage panic situations, adopt health preventive behaviours and adapting to the new normal. Objectives: This research examined the effects of Covid-19 literacy on fear, protective behaviour, and conspiracy beliefs of university students using an online questionnaire. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted at two universities from Lahore with permission from concerned authorities. A total of 301 received responses were analyzed by applying descriptive as well as inferential statistics in SPSS. Results: The results indicated that Covid-19 literacy appeared to predict negatively fear of Covid-19 and conspiracy beliefs and positively health-protective behaviours. In other words, the university students with better Covid-19 literacy appeared to have less fear of Covid-19, more likely to adopt health-protective behaviours and believe less in conspirative information. Conclusions: These results demonstrated the potential benefits of Covid-19 literacy to respond proactively to the fear caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, managing infodemic and adoption of health-protective behaviours. These results would be useful for policymakers, NGOs, health professionals, and university librarians in planning health education and promotion for not only university students but also for general public. This research contributed to the existing research on health literacy related to the Covid-19 pandemic in general and Covid-19 literacy in particular as limited studies have been published so far.

How information literacy influences creative skills among medical students? The mediating role of lifelong learning.

This research investigated the influence of information literacy on the creative skills of medical students through the mediation of lifelong learning. A cross-sectional survey was conducted for data collection among medical students, recruited through a stratified convenient sampling procedure, of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. The questionnaire was personally administered by visiting each college with written permission. A total of 473 survey responses were collected and analysed using the partial least squares structural equation modelling. The results revealed that the information literacy of medical students had a direct and indirect but positive influence on their creative skills. Lifelong learning not had a direct but positive effect on creative skills but also mediated the relationship between information literacy and creative skills. The empirical evidence for how information literacy influences creative skills through the mediated role of lifelong learning may inform policy and practice for information literacy instructions. These results may help academicians and information specialists to initiate a credited or integrated course on information literacy in the curriculum of medical students not only in Pakistan but also in other developing countries. This research would be a worthwhile contribution to the existing research on information literacy as the mediated role of lifelong learning between information literacy and creative skills has never been examined so far.

Health literacy predicts Covid-19 awareness and protective behaviours of university students.

BACKGROUND: Health literacy is expected to help individuals deal with the required infection control and knowledge to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic. OBJECTIVES: This study examined the impact of health literacy on Covid-19 awareness and protective behaviours of university students in Pakistan. METHODS: An online questionnaire was used to collect data from students at three universities in Punjab. The approved questionnaire contained 12 statements related to HL, 21 items towards Covid-19 awareness, and 11 statements related to protective behaviours, along with some demographic data. Data analysis used Pearson correlation and simple linear regression. RESULTS: Health literacy of university students positively predicted their Covid-19 awareness and protective behaviours indicating that students with high health literacy were likely to be more aware of Covid-19 and adopt health protective behaviours. There were gender and rural/urban differences. CONCLUSIONS: The results demonstrated an urgent need for planning a needs-based health literacy programme focusing specifically on Covid-19 literacy in Pakistan. This research might help policy-makers, NGOs, and health librarians devise suitable programme.

Information Literacy as a Predictor of Work Performance: The Mediating Role of Lifelong Learning and Creativity.

This study examined the effect of information literacy (IL) on work performance with mediating role of lifelong learning and creativity among journalists in Pakistan. A cross-sectional survey using an online questionnaire was conducted in the press clubs of four provinces (e.g., Punjab, Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and Baluchistan) and the federal capital Islamabad for data collection. The received 1084 responses were analyzed using the partial least squares structural equation modelling. The results indicated that IL of journalists had a direct and indirect but positive influence on their work performance. The lifelong learning and creativity skills also mediated the relationship between IL and work performance. This study provided empirical evidence for how IL directly influence work performance and indirectly with the mediated role of lifelong learning and creativity. These pragmatic insights may inform academicians and enterprises about the IL importance at workplace for enhancement of organizational performance and achieving a competitive advantage. Such results may also initiate an instruction program for existing as well as for prospective journalists to impart IL education. This study could be a worthy contribution to the existing IL research in the workplace context in general and of journalists' workplace in particular as no such study has appeared so far.