Information Sources Preference of Post Graduate Students in Federal University of Technology Owerri, Nigeria

Abstract

The paper investigated postgraduate students in federal university of technology Owerri Nigeria to find out the information sources preferred for research. The descriptive survey employed questionnaire and interview as instruments for data collection. A total of one hundred questionnaires were distributed to postgraduate students from various departments while fifty were returned and found useable for the study. Data were analyzed with percentages while charts were employed to present results of the findings. The study showed that postgraduate students in FUTO prefer electronic sources of information for research.  Responses from both the questionnaire and interview showed that the major reason for preferred sources were easy and quick access, ease of use, convenience and currency. It was also discovered that very few of the postgraduate students identified database subscription from the library as available sources of information for research. This implies that library prints and subscribed databases were not popular among postgraduate students as preferred sources of information for research. This finding however, point to the need for aggressive information literacy campaign for postgraduate students tailored towards creating awareness and use of library resources and databases to  justify the university library’s role in tertiary education.

Keywords: Information sources, Postgraduate students, University libraries, Electronic resources, Nigeria.

DOI: 10.7176/IKM/10-1-04

Publication date: January 31^st 2020