How College Students Seek Information in the Digital Age (pdf) is a report from Project Information Literacy, maintained by the Information School at the University of Washington that contains a few surprises for libraries:

• Course readings were the first place most students turn to for course-related research (97%).
• Over 80% of students used library-provided research databases.
• Usage of library offering (research databases, OPAC, print materials, and study areas) were all above 50%.

Now the not so good:

• All interactive library research (talk to a librarian, attend a training session, use chat, e-mail or other online “Ask A Librarian” service) fell below 25%.
• Students are missing out on potential resources (including library research assistance), simply because those resources are not within their range of research activity.

Where are students going for assistance?  They tend to go to their instructors for guidance and assistance, but otherwise they simply use the resources they already know about, or discover in the course of their research.

What might this mean for libraries?  We should push for better interaction with instructors, so that they will be more likely to understand the full range of resources available for students to use, and will be more likely to refer students to an interactive library resource (which was only done 26% of the time — and the only result on the survey below 60%).

We also should examine our online presence.  How does it present research resources?  Will someone looking for a particular type of information be able to locate all the resources that the library has to offer?  Print and online library guides for these activities can also be very beneficial.

This report should be read, and reviewed, with each of our libraries in mind.  By understanding that the people we interact with are only one-fourth of the population using our resources, we can begin to re-focus our efforts to ensure that what we have to offer will be used effectively.

found via Bill Drew, who found it via the Free Range Librarian

For the background on this issue, see Quis custodiet isos custodes.

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, the American Psychological Association has decided to offer copies of the second printing of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 6th ed as replacements for July’s first printing, which was found to contain a significant number of errors.

A quick search of the APA website hasn’t found any announcements or instructions, but a quick search of the social networks has turned up the following:

• A notice on the Inside Higher Ed Quick Takes site, linking to…
• A posting on the Boycott the APA Manual, 6th Edition Facebook page (membership required to view) by John Foubert, a faculty member from Oklahoma State, which states the following:

“I have just received word that After November 2, call APA at 1-800-374-2721, ext. 5510. Ask for instructions on how to go on-line and print a mailing label you can use to return your copy and receive a corrected copy.”

Whether this is all correct remains to be seen (and any incorrect information will be changed or removed as I learn more), but it appears that there is a window between November 2nd and November 15th to initiate replacing copies of the manuals.

found via Bill Drew on Facebook (more of that social networking)

The ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 2006 (3MB Pdf here), the third annual report, has been released.  These have been very informative reports, containing information on a broad range of student/IT interactions.

thanks to Bill Drew for posting this at Web4Lib

There is a new publication out there in libraryland, and it is peer-reviewed and open-access (two of my favorite hyphens)!

Library Student Journal is being published by the School of Informatics at the University of Buffalo in New York, and they describe their scope as:

Library Student Journal (LSJ) seeks to publish the best student papers from Library and Information Science (LIS) students worldwide and to serve as a forum for discussion of LIS education and training, career paths and future trends. Submissions may cover a wide range of topics, but should always relate to and advance the discussion of LIS topics. This is a rapidly evolving field. As such, LSJ especially encourages submissions relating to new technologies and future trends. Papers submitted to the peer-reviewed section of the journal should advance the existing literature with original ideas or original research.

Their first issue is online, so check them out!

from Web4Lib posting (Thanks Bill Drew!)