This paper compares website usability--specifically library users' understanding of library terms--for fifty-one original research studies between 2012-2021, with the findings of John Kupersmith's 2011 white paper "Library Terms That Users Understand." Studies reported approximately twice as many terms that users didn't understand than…

There are few references that critically evaluate the different ways of searching the literature on scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL), or how these are related to researchers' goals. We use an academic literacies perspective as a lens with which to explore the different ways that literature searches may be undertaken. While searching the…

Academic music libraries in the US collect resources to support music students and faculty in their performance and research needs. These resources include non-text items such as musical scores and recordings that are difficult to represent in standard library information systems that were built for text items. The advent of web scale discovery…

This study sought to (1) Determine how international students conduct research. (2) Determine whether international students conduct research in the way they perceive that they do. (3) Determine whether international students are efficient in conducting research. This study collected data from 67 international students who attend the University of…

This article extends Kuh and associates' research describing high-impact learning as kinds and types of projects and assignments shown to benefit postsecondary students and increase rates of student retention and engagement. Given that the content and implementation of postsecondary courses have continuously evolved in recent years, this present…

The information-seeking behavior has proven vital in understanding people's search behavior while seeking information about a particular topic or field. However, in some geographical regions, studies that focus on information-seeking behavior are few, specifically studying Arabic users' information-seeking behavior. A handful of studies…

Telephone interviews were conducted with 18 blind academic library users around the United States about their experiences using their library and its website. The study uses the perspective that blind users' insights are fundamental. A common theme was that navigating a webpage is time consuming on the first visit. Issues identified include the…

Engineering students often conduct information searches without sufficient consideration of the context of their research topic. This article discusses how development of a new information literacy (IL) mindset through instruction in integrated IL education affects students' understanding of research problems and formulation of information search…

Faculty librarians who advise undecided students have found the experiences of novice researcher and advisee comparable: Both groups seek to solve a problem or answer a question by finding new information to add to their current understanding and knowledge base. As a result, librarians familiar with needs and stages of the research process may…

This report presents findings about the challenges today's college freshmen face, and the information-seeking strategies they develop, use, and adapt as they make the transition from high school to college and begin to complete college-level research assignments. Included are data from a comparative analysis of library resources in 30 US high…

Google Scholar is a free service that provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly works and to connect patrons with the resources libraries provide. The researchers in this study analyzed Google Scholar usage data from 2006 for three library tools at San Francisco State University: SFX link resolver, Web Access Management proxy server,…

The contributions in this volume represent a decade of OCLC's user behavior research findings that articulate the need for the design of future library services to be all about the user. Highlights include: (1) People associate the library with books and do not consider the library in relation to online resources or reference services; (2) People…

The year 2011 was the PALNI (Private Academic Library Network of Indiana) consortium's "rookie season" for the implementation of Primo, the 2010 Discovery Layer 500 race winner. In this article, the authors report on their transition to the cloud within Ex Libris Ltd.'s Primo TotalCare environment: their preparation, the steps involved…

EBSCO Discovery Service (EDS) has been heavily used by UMUC students since its implementation in fall 2011, but experience has shown that it is not always the most appropriate source for satisfying students' information needs and that they often need assistance in understanding how the tool works and how to use it effectively. UMUC librarians have…

Academic libraries customize, support, and provide access to myriad information systems, each with complex graphical user interfaces. The number of possible information entry points on an academic library Web site is both daunting to the end-user and consistently challenging to library Web site designers. Faced with the challenges inherent in…