Essas rugas têm história: o comportamento informacional da pessoa idosa no cenário da Covid-19 sob o olhar plural da Ciência da Informação

Abstract

It deals with the theme informational behavior of the elderly in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, having as an epistemological outline the theoretical framework of user studies, from the lenses of Information Science – this is an area of knowledge that can contribute with its scope to develop arguments inherent to informational studies in neglected contexts, where access to information is proving to be challenging in the daily experience with elderly people that motivated the research, which presents the following guiding questions: How to understand the informational behavior of the elderly, the search and use of information, in the face of the challenges caused by the Covid-19 Pandemic?How do the elderly people who live in the Spiritist Institution Nosso Lar (IENL) behave in the face of the search and use of information to satisfy their informational needs? Based on these questions, the general objective was outlined: to analyze the informational behavior in view of the need, the search and the use of information by the elderly person assisted by the IENL. This is an exploratorydescriptive research, with a qualitative focus, from the perspective of the Collective Subject Discourse (CSD), a modality of presentation of qualitative research results, which aims to capture individual voices in a collective context, allowing a more in-depth analysis of the perceptions and opinions of a group of people on a given subject. The analysis and interpretation of the research data are based on the contributions of the search behavior model and. The analysis and interpretation of the research data are based on the contributions of Carol Kuhlthau's (1991) model of search behavior and use of information. The results reveal a variety of approaches adopted by elderly people in the search for information, which, even in the face of difficulties, are able to identify their informational needs, and thus seek, use and share information and experiences with colleagues and professionals in their daily lives. It is concluded that the analysis of the informational behavior of the elderly in the context of the pandemic is extremely relevant to expand the understanding of how the pandemic affected and generated emerging challenges and opportunities in this scenario, given the possibilities of promoting the quality of life of elderly people, considering that they live in a long-term care institution.And also, that the IC and its researchers strengthen reflections on the responsibility and social function that fall on their shoulders.