Information Use and User

Shubhada Nagarkar, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor

Department of Library and Information Science

Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune

shubha@unipune.ac.in

National Conference on “Libraries in the Changing Information Marketplace”

SNDT, University, Mumbai, 24-26 February 2016

To begin with..

• Use

• Print and electronic resources

• User studies

• Information needs and Information seeking behavior studies

• New methods of use and user studies

• Experience sharing

• Competencies needed

LIS Professional

Knowledge ofreaders

Knowledge of recorded

information

Knowledge of methods of brining records and

readers together

SelectionAcquisition

OrganizationInterpretation

Evaluation of results

Ref.: Shera, J.H. (1972) Foundations of Education for Librarianship, New York, Baker and Hayes, Inc. p 206.

Role of LIS professional

Library

SDI and CAS

OPAC

Online database

Traditional services

User

Web and Library

2.0

Online services

Institutional Repositorie

s

Digital Libraries

OSS

Mobile devices

Use studies

Use study

Collection

• Print – books, journals and non book material

• E-resources

• E-journals, E-books

• Digital Libraries

• Institutional repositories

• Open Access resourcs

• e-books

Methods – usage of print collection

• Collection based analysis

• Mining and analysis of issue records

• Library Analytics, LMS reports

• Surveys

• Citation analysis

Issue record of LIBSYS

Analysis

Measuring the use of E-resources

Methods

• Usage statistics by publishers, aggregators and consortia

• Citation analysis, i.e. application of quantitative techniques

• Conduct surveys

Benefits

• To benchmark the needs

• To utilize the grants properly

• Journal wise usage

• To fill the gaps in subscriptions

• Add new relevant journals

Publishers log file

Source: www.infotoday.com/climag/nov12/Welker--Counting-on-Counter..shtml

Counting Online Usage of Networked Electronic Resources (COUNTER)

• Launched in March 2002, COUNTER (Counting Online Usage of Networked Electronic Resources) is an international initiative serving librarians, publishers and intermediaries by setting standards that facilitate the recording and reporting of online usage statistics in a consistent, credible and compatible way.

• SUSHI - Standardized Usage Statistics Harvesting Initiative (SUSHI) Protocol (ANSI/NISO Z39.93-2014)

• Defines automated request and response model for harvesting e-resource usage data

• Designed to work with COUNTER, the most frequently retrieved usage reports

http://www.projectcounter.org/usage_factor.html http://www.niso.org/workrooms/sushi

Limitations of usage statistics

• Constantly changing resources and technology

• eBooks still need some work

• Limited picture of what users are actually doing

Need to know

• Queries or Searches

• Page Views or Record Views

• Non vendor data – google analytics

How to increase usage? for librarians..

• Do not accept mediocrity from vendors.

• Be willing to educate yourself on and participate in NISO Project COUNTER, and open source initiatives

• Conducting usability studies would help to understand the problems in searching information

• Information literacy programs about the use of e-resources, writing effective search strategies, etc. would help to a great extent

• Marketing of subscribed e-resources

Marketing and Evaluation

• Marketing Plan

• Understanding library users

• Creating the message

• Spreading the word

• Evaluation

http://www.slideshare.net/houeidakam/marketing-eresources-adequate-tools-to-increase-usage

Evaluation

• Gather feedback

• Ensure you are

reaching the

intended audience

• Analyze your usage

statistics (compare

multi- years)

Library web sites

• Revamp the webpage if needed

• Make your e-resources page attractive

• Use your library homepage to advertise

• Use of social media for marketing

• Attractive flyers with relevant information and instructions about the use of e-resources

• e-Resources Visibility, Website Trainings

• LibGuides Library Events Discovery Tool

• Library portals with links to e-resources

http://www.slideshare.net/houeidakam/marketing-eresources-adequate-tools-to-increase-usage

User awareness OR Information Literacy Programs

• How to use electronic resources?

• Which e-resources are subscribed?

• How to search them effectively?

• Facilities provided by publishers and database vendors

• How to use e-resources on mobile devises or through smart phones

Questions to consider

• What are your goals for collection assessment?

• How do you evaluate e-resources at your library?

• Do you know whom to contact for usage data?

• When is a good time of year to evaluate e-resources?

• What is your process for cancellation/renewal?

• Do you have a collections committee?

http://scholarworks.gsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1020&context=southeasternlac

User study

User study

• Information needs

• Information seeking behavior

Methods and Tools

• Survey-questionnaire, interviews

• focus groups

• Delphi

• Usability studies

Information need and Information Seeking Behaviour

• An information need is a recognition that your knowledge is inadequate to satisfy a goal that you have

• Information seeking is a conscious effort to acquire information in response to a need or gap in your knowledge

Information needs and information seeking behavior studies

Study user information needs by various ways

• Survey

• Working as a team member is user groups – embedded librarian

• Study user preferences in selection of information resources

• Study theoretical models of Information needs and ISB

• Conduct Usability studies of Library websites, OPACs, portals, specific databases

Cluster Mycology Biotechnology/

Biochemistry

Farmer

Characteristics of

fungusP

Biological observations /

field observationsP

Geographical

informationP P

Host Parasite

Interaction

Information

P P

Biochemical changes P

Molecular Sequence

information P

Classification of fungus P P

Economic importance of

fungiP P P

Fungicide Information P

Bibliographic

referencesP P

Links to other database

entriesP P

User groups and their information requirements

Usability testing

Usability testing of library web sites and OPACs helps

• ‘user-friendliness’ of the system

• To identify difficulties faced by the users in locating the library information including materials, services, timings etc.

• in eliminating these problems with some changes in the interface design.

What is usability?

Methods of usability testing

• Card Sorting

• Contextual Interviews

• Focus Groups

• Heuristic Evaluation

• Individual Interviews

• Task Analysis

• Writing for the Web

• Parallel Design

• Personas

• Prototyping

• Surveys (Online)

Temasek Polytechnic Library, Singapore, Changes in User Interfaces

Competencies needed

Core subject knowledge

• Be familiar with latest trends in the fields by participating in

training programmes / conferences and seminars

• Participate in awareness workshops other than library and

information science fields to understand the trends in research

• Awareness of latest trends in publishing

• Awareness of copyright and intellectual property laws

Information organization skills

• Classification and cataloguing of library collection

• Use of control vocabulary tools like MeSH and other thesaurus

• Development and design of library portals

Competencies..

Computing skills

• Tools for library automation, digital libraries and content

management, data and text mining

• Mobile and cloud based information services

• Skills of effective use of various search engines

Collaborative skills

• In-depth knowledge of research and development

programmes in the organization

• Collaborative activities with other faculty on the campus or

within the organisation

• Work like embedded librarian and become a team member of

scientific activities

Competencies

Communication skills

• Negotiation and communication skills with publishers and

suppliers

• Communication skills with users to understand information

needs

Information literacy skills

• Design and development of information literacy programmes

• Teaching abilities

Conclude with…

• Great actors represent the key features of human personalities so that they are meaningful to an audience.

• Similarly, we represent the critical features of information collections for people to access and use.

• Just as well trained actors do not require lived experience of the roles they portray in order to convey them powerfully,

• We do not need deep knowledge of a topic to represent it to others.