Wednesday 3 February 2016

Week 3: Epistemology Quiz

I am not entirely surprised that my epistemology quiz result was Michel Foucault, especially having completed my undergraduate degree in English. That said, I have also taken enough quizzes online to know that there is very little reason to take the results seriously, no matter how much I hope to get Tami Taylor as a result in a quiz called, "Which Friday Night Lights character are you?". And perhaps it is very Foucauldian of me, but I am also aware  that because of my underlying desire to get the Tami Taylor result, I will be unable to separate that underlying bias from my choices, when perhaps I am more of a Landry Clark at heart. In research terms, I suppose this is also a problem with surveys.

One of my favourite Internet phenomenons right now is Clickhole. They are constantly posting quizzes that brilliantly satirize the both the content of these types of quizzes, and the very act of taking them. Here are a few recent gems:







2 comments:

  1. Lindsay I totally agree that, generally, these online quizzes are unreliable and sometimes downright silly (like the "will he propose to me soon one" haha). Still, I do feel that there is some fun in it which is why even I will spend time on the most recent Buzzfeed quiz posted to Facebook (especially if the quiz is Disney-related).

    I thought this paper I found by the professor and students who made the epistemology quiz would be an interesting read, however, as they themselves discuss the limitations of the quiz the created. Basically, they say that the quiz is accurate to the two epistemologies you are most like which is why if many of our peers took the quiz again they might get a different person than the first time. I hope this quiz can be trusted for more accurate answers than Buzzfeed and Clickhole, especially since it was made by a bunch of academics in a research class!

    Strickland, B., & Lawrence, E. (2015). What is your epistemology?: Quiz design as a pedagogical tool in Library & Information Science doctoral education. Retrieved from https://www.asist.org/files/meetings/am15/proceedings/submissions/posters/190poster.pdf

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  2. Ah man, Leslie. I just spent far too much time on that website. Thanks for sharing! Hilarious.

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