College students are notorious for spending hours on their cell phones, stalking their friends on Facebook.com and sending multitudes of e-mails per night.
But when it comes to using that technology for research, Educational Testing Services officials say that many students lack the necessary skills to take advantage of all that computers have to offer.
Only 52 percent of college-age students are able to judge the objectivity of Web sites correctly, and 35 percent were successful when asked to narrow an overly broad search, according to the ETS Web site.
6,300 students - who volunteered to take the company's Information and Communication Technology Literacy Assessment Test test - were polled in total.
The point of the test was to determine whether students could identify important information and incorporate it into their computer work in an effective and timely manner.
Officials at the California State University system announced plans last week to administer that same test to their students, and Penn has also been worried about this issue: The University has administered its own tests to assess students' technological knowledge and has found similar results.
"The scores, basically, are not so wonderful," said Marjorie Hassen, assistant director of Research & Instructional Services at Penn, a program that helps students improve their research skills in the library, she said.
Sampath Kannan, who teaches in the computer and information services department, agrees.
"We have found this [issue] to be the case, at least anecdotally, at Penn as well," he wrote in an e-mail.
The School of Engineering and Applied Sciences is currently in the process of creating the Engineering Information and Communications program, which will require SEAS undergraduates to participate in at least three engineering courses focused on improving research skills.
But despite these criticisms, many students scoffed at the idea of being called technologically illiterate.
"I don't think that's our generation," Wharton freshman Jared Joella said.
Engineering senior Ravi Balasubramanian agreed, pointing out that "you couldn't get by in engineering without technology skills."
Some students, however, did say that programs designed to take advantage of all that technology has to offer could be helpful.
"I think it might be useful for them to teach us about how to better use the resources available," College freshman Katie Polous said.
College freshman Sarah Dain likewise said that technology courses would be helpful, but that she wouldn't be worried about taking a computer literacy test.
"I'm confident I could pass it," Dain said.
