We investigate emergency managers' perceptions of information overload from digital sources and examine the relationship of information overload to stress, analytical and intuitive thinking, and managers’ critical thinking disposition. We survey 273 county-level emergency managers from 43 states, and conduct semi-structured interviews with 19 emergency managers to investigate these questions. Above and beyond the effects of age, education, experience, and time spent on emergency managerial work, higher levels of perceived information overload from digital sources were significantly associated with higher levels of perceived stress. Holding the same variables constant, higher levels of perceived stress were linked with lower levels of analytical thinking and higher levels of intuitive thinking. Further, managers who reported higher levels of critical thinking disposition reported lower levels of stress. While we cannot imply causation, our qualitative analysis enriches the survey findings by highlighting problems of digital overload in managerial environments.

我们调查了应急管理人员对来自数字资源的信息过载的看法，并研究了信息过载与压力，分析性和直觉性思维以及管理者的批判性思维倾向之间的关系。我们调查了来自43个州的273名县级紧急情况管理人员，并对19名紧急情况管理人员进行了半结构化访谈，以调查这些问题。除了年龄，教育程度，经验和在紧急管理工作上花费的时间以外，数字来源的更高水平的感知信息过载与更高水平的感知压力显着相关。保持相同的变量不变，较高的感知压力与较低水平的分析思维和较高水平的直觉思维相关联。进一步，报告批判性思维倾向较高的管理人员报告的压力较低。虽然我们不能暗示因果关系，但我们的定性分析通过强调管理环境中的数字超载问题来丰富了调查结果。