Student misidentification of online genres

•60% of student identifications of online genre examples were incorrect.•64% of student identifications of scholarly sources were incorrect.•Students were inaccurate in judging which genres were most difficult to correctly identify.•Students who had received prior IL instruction showed significantly higher accuracy in identifying the online genres.

In the online information environment, new hybrid genres are emerging that resist easy classification into the traditional categories of print formats. However, students are often not equipped with adequate knowledge of online genres, particularly when it comes to finding scholarly sources. Understanding genre provides students a significant advantage in conducting effective research online, because it reduces the cognitive load of information seeking, improves the ability to judge relevance, and helps identify documents whose purpose matches the users' intent. This research explores how well students identify the information genres that they encounter in their real-life online research. 204 undergraduate students were asked to identify the genres of 15 online sources. 60% of the responses were misidentifications, and 64% of scholarly sources were incorrectly identified. Students were also inaccurate in judging which genres were most difficult to correctly identify. However, students who had received prior IL instruction showed significantly higher accuracy in identifying online genres. Suggestions are made for information literacy instruction to better help students identify, understand, and use online genres.