Kaitlin L. Costello
Associate Professor of Library and Information Science
Faculty, PhD LIS Faculty
Biography
Kaitlin Costello studies health information in everyday life, focusing on the information practices and behaviors of disabled and chronically ill people. Their interpretivist and qualitative research program incorporates methodologies like grounded theory and situational analysis to better understand people's experiences with health information. Studies examine how people use the internet to search for health information, how they assess the relevance of health information from non-clinical sources, and the medicalization of technology and surveillance. They recently co-authored the award-winning article "Predictive ads are not doctors: Mental health tracking and technology companies."
Costello teaches classes in human information behavior, health information, and algorithms and society. In 2020, they received the Outstanding Faculty Support to the Rutgers Graduate Community award from the Rutgers University Graduate Student Association. They are also the concentration coordinator for the Health Information Concentration in the Master's of Information program, which prepares students to find, evaluate, synthesize, and share authoritative health information with a wide variety of constituents. Costello is currently working on a project about the National Library of Medicine.
Education
Ph.D., Information and Library Science, University of North Carolina
M.S., Library and Information Science, Certificate of Special Collections, University of Illinois
B.A., Film, Vassar College