Diane Mizrachi

Worldwide Commonalities and Challenges in Information Literacy Research and Practice

Overview and research.- Policies and strategies.- Theoretical framework.- Related concepts.- Citizenship and digital divide.- disadvantaged groups.- Information literacy for the workplace and daily life.- Information literacy in Europe.- Different approaches to information literacy.- Teaching and learning information literacy.- Information literacy instruction.- Assessment of information literacy.- Information literacy and K-12.- Information literacy and higher education.- Information literacy skills of LIS students.- Librarians, libraries and ethics.

Undergraduates' personal academic information management and the consideration of time and task‐urgency

Young undergraduate college students are often described as “digital natives,” presumed to prefer living and working in completely digital information environments. In reality, their world is part‐paper/part‐digital, in constant transition among successive forms of digital storage and communication devices. Studying for a degree is the daily work of these young people, and effective management of paper and digital academic materials and resources contributes crucially to their success in life. Students must also constantly manage their work against deadlines to meet their course and university requirements. This study, following the “Personal Information Management” (PIM) paradigm, examines student academic information management under these various constraints and pressures. A total of 41 18‐ to 22‐year‐old students were interviewed and observed regarding the content, structure, and uses of their immediate working environment within their dormitory rooms. Students exhibited remarkable creativity and variety in the mixture of automated and manual resources and devices used to support their academic work. The demands of a yearlong procession of assignments, papers, projects, and examinations increase the importance of time management activities and influence much of their behavior. Results provide insights on student use of various kinds of information technology and their overall planning and management of information associated with their studies.

LITE Bites: broadcasting bite‐sized library instruction

Purpose – This paper sets out to describe a successful collaboration between the UCLA Library and a campus‐based student television production team to create and broadcast a series of short library commercials. Librarians provide content ideas and editorial oversight; the students write, act, produce and broadcast these “Bites” on the Office of Residential Life cable television station. They are also converted to streaming video for access from the Library web page. Reactions and feedback on the clips from student focus groups provide valuable insight into the preferences and attitudes of the undergraduate population. This article also seeks to discuss library partnerships to produce videos and the use of visual media for marketing and instruction by public and academic libraries.Design/methodology/approach – An extensive literature review of previous academic and public library video and television projects discusses the benefits of collaboration, costs, and lessons learned. The case study of LITE Bites ...

Buy, borrow, or access online?: Format behaviors among college freshmen in a reading-intensive course

Purpose This paper aims to investigate the reading format choices of students in a reading-intensive course when faced with options of purchasing their assigned readings in print, borrowing them from library reserves, accessing them from their course website or any combination thereof. It also seeks to map their behaviors to their academic aptitudes and achievements. Design/methodology/approach An online survey was distributed at the end of the quarter consisting of nine multiple-choice and open-ended questions on their format behaviors and academic aptitudes. Descriptive statistics, Chi-square tests and content analysis were used to obtain results. Findings Most students in this study purchased print copies of their assigned readings even though they were available for free both in the library and online. Over 72 per cent read their assignments either in“print” or “mostly in print”. However, the data did not produce evidence of correlations between format behaviors and SAT Writing scores or final grades in the course. Research limitations/implications The self-selected sample of participants appears to be academically homogeneous without enough diversity of behaviors and aptitudes to make generalizations. Replication of this study should be performed among a more academically diverse group of students. Originality/value Studies show that students prefer print to electronic format for academic readings, but they often cite factors like cost and convenience that impact their behaviors. Rather than survey general preferences, this study examines actual behaviors when presented with several format options and discusses why students make their choices.

Information Literacy. Lifelong Learning and Digital Citizenship in the 21st Century

This paper is the full keynote address written for the 2014 ECIL Conference by Michael Eisenberg. Key information literacy milestones in his career that are representative of significant developments in information literacy, as well as education, information and library science, and information technology are presented in the paper.

Academic reading format preferences and behaviors among university students worldwide: A comparative survey analysis

This study reports the descriptive and inferential statistical findings of a survey of academic reading format preferences and behaviors of 10,293 tertiary students worldwide. The study hypothesized that country-based differences in schooling systems, socioeconomic development, culture or other factors might have an influence on preferred formats, print or electronic, for academic reading, as well as the learning engagement behaviors of students. The main findings are that country of origin has little to no relationship with or effect on reading format preferences of university students, and that the broad majority of students worldwide prefer to read academic course materials in print. The majority of participants report better focus and retention of information presented in print formats, and more frequently prefer print for longer texts. Additional demographic and post-hoc analysis suggests that format preference has a small relationship with academic rank. The relationship between task demands, format preferences and reading comprehension are discussed. Additional outcomes and implications for the fields of education, psychology, computer science, information science and human-computer interaction are considered.