Various definitions of IL abound in literature, as various IL practitioners and professionals engage the concept from different standpoints. One common understanding in the LIS literature reviewed is that information literacy is a necessary concept for the 21st century and beyond.
Throughout the literature surveyed, the importance of IL in academic institutions, workplaces and life demonstrates that the concept is believed as an important part of the current and future generation’s entire life. A discussion of the IL spectrum shows the relationship and understanding of the various concepts related to information literacy. The discussion also shows how the developments in technology are changing the various concepts relating to IL and bringing new ones to the fore. The differences in conception of IL by librarians, students and lecturers discussed are important for the development of effective IL initiatives. The reviewed studies show how the differences may affect the implementation of IL initiatives.
Emphasis is on a good lecturer-librarian partnership in IL delivery, to ensure students acquire good IL learning experiences.
Breivik (1998:2) sums up the IL role in education by stating that, “In this and next centuries, an
‘educated’ graduate will no longer be defined as one who has absorbed a certain body of factual information, but as one who knows how to find, evaluate and apply needed information.”
Literature has shown that the goal if IL is to develop lifelong learners who can adapt to any changing information landscape by critically evaluating information and using it effectively, conscious of its impact. Changes in technology have changed the way universities offer
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instruction, including information literacy. Differences in implementation depend on national, regional and institutional policies and budgetary allocations. The overview of IL initiatives in this study is a small representation that demonstrates the fact that much has been done to promote information literacy in higher education, worldwide. The IL initiatives have taken different forms, including stand-alone courses, integration in other courses and on-line tutorials.
The discussions around whether to offer IL as a separate instruction or integration into other courses seem to favour integration into individual subjects as a more recent trend that supports librarian-faculty collaboration. The review of the various information literacy conceptions and learning experiences revealed that there was a move to focus on understanding IL learning experiences from the standpoint of the students. Empirical literature has shown IL learning experiences of students, included learning to find information, learning as a process to use information, learning to use information to create a product, learning to use information to build a personal knowledge base, learning to use information to advance disciplinary knowledge, learning to use information to grow as a person and to contribute to others, learning by doing, learning by trial and error, and learning by interacting with other people.
Implementation of modern ICTs in delivering information literacy is growing in many countries, with some being supported by national governments, but a majority being institutional efforts. Availability of the appropriate equipment and knowledge of using them to access information by librarians and lecturers is key to successful implementation of IL on the modern technological stage of higher education. ACRL and other national IL competency standards and frameworks are being translated and adapted across the world. Regions and associations at national level are developing definitions, models and frameworks that are appropriate to their unique contexts and levels of understanding of the information literacy concept. The general focus of the initiatives is empowering the student to be able to find and analyse the information they need to address a given problem.
3.10.1 Gaps in the Literature Reviewed
Although Bruce noted that research in student IL learning experiences greatly informed the design and implementation of information literacy initiatives (Bruce, 1997:157), the present researcher observed from the literature that studies on student learning experiences were generally scarce. According to Bruce, research into students’ experience of learning
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information literacy would strengthen any curriculum developed and expose other learning challenges (1997:157). Some empirical studies on IL learning experiences accessed included Limberg (1999; 2000), Genoni and Partridge (2000), Edwards (2005), Diehm & Lupton, 2012), Maybee (2006; 2007), Lupton (2004; 2008) and Ogunlana, Oshinaike, & Akinbode (2013).
Most of the studies addressed IL learning experiences of undergraduate students from an inter- disciplinary perspective, investigating how students perceived information literacy. Studies on IL in specific disciplines such as psychology were even scarcer. Those disciplines represented in the literature reviewed included nursing (Osborne, 2011), English (Seamans, 2002;
Vaiciuniene & Gedviliene, 2008), business studies (Webber & Johnson, 2000), and environmental studies (Lupton, 2004).
A search done in leading psychology, education and LIS databases, including PsycARTICLES, PsycINFO, ERIC and Library and Information Science Abstracts (LISA), revealed limited studies on student IL experiences. This created a gap in the literature that the present study seeks to fill. There were few case studies involving psychology undergraduate students (Larkin & Pines, 2004), but they were leaning more on pedagogy than on how the students perceived and experienced learning information literacy. The focus for these studies included collaboration between lecturers and librarians (Thaxton, Faccioli & Mosby, 2003;
Paglia & Donahue, 2003; Lampert, 2005; McGuinness, 2006) in teaching information literacy and the challenges that were met in implementing such initiatives. Paglia and Donahue investigated collaboration among psychology and library faculty’s collaborative effort to design, implement and assess an information literacy course. The present author contends that there is a gap in the existing body of research that this study seeks to address.
Whereas there is a growing advocacy for information literacy in higher education in Africa, there is little effort to understand how it is experienced by students. There are limited empirical studies on IL learning experiences in the context of Africa, in general, and Kenya, in particular.
This is even more particular with regard to IL in higher education institutions. Finally, most of the reviewed studies concentrated on students in their first year in universities (Lupton, 2008;
Hayes-Bohanan & Spievak, 2008; Gross & Latham, 2009) and there are limited empirical studies on those exiting universities into the labour market. The significance of studying students exiting university into the labour market lies in the fact that they are expected to be
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ready for the labour market and so they can give a better reflection of the impact of the training received over the years. At the final year also, students are expected to have matured intellectually compared to their entry year and so can give a more reasoned response to issues.
This study therefore makes a contribution in attempting to bridge these gaps and contributing to the information literacy body of knowledge from the perspective of students in the African context. It avails information that could be very significant for information literacy programme developers and instructors, in a manner that meets the ACRL’s Psychology Information Literacy Standards (ACRL, 2010), that aim to:
· Help psychology liaison librarians and psychology faculty design content for IL instruction for students in psychology.
· Make possible evaluation of IL skills of psychology students by stating the expected competencies to be assessed.
· Encourage collaboration between psychology faculty and psychology liaison librarians in the teaching of IL as a component of research methods in psychology
(Thaxton, Faccioili, & Mosby, 2004)
The users’ perspective that the study presents is a key factor for effective curriculum design.
3.10.2 Bridging the Gaps
Creswell (2002:4) discusses four ways that make research important in addressing problems or issues and searching for potential solutions:
bridging the gaps in knowledge by investigating an area of research that fills a void in existing information, expanding knowledge by extending research to new ideas or practices, replicating knowledge by testing old results with new participants at new sites, and adding the voices of individuals whose perspectives have not been heard (2002:4).
This study is expected to bridge the identified gaps by providing information on the information literacy learning experiences of students, which is currently limited in the literature reviewed. By providing this information, the study will be expanding knowledge of the area under study, by providing the student voice on information literacy learning. The new knowledge will be used by teachers, librarians and university administration to improve the IL
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learning experiences of students, thereby ensuring that the goals of IL programmes are achieved.
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CHAPTER FOUR
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY