AVAILABILITY AND UTILIZATION OF ELECTRONIC LIBRARY RESOURCES FOR TEACHING AND RESEARCH IN UNIVERSITIES IN SOUTH EAST NIGERIA

Abstract

The study examined availability and utilization of electronic library (e-library) resources for teaching and research in universities in south east Nigeria. Descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. The population for this study comprised 29,540 students and lecturers in universities in South east Nigeria. This was made up of 24,268 students and 5,272 lecturers. The sample for the study comprised of 2,954 lecturers and students which included 2,427 students and 527 lecturers who were assigned using cluster and stratified random sampling techniques. A researcher-designed questionnaire titled “Availability and utilization of e-library resources for teaching and research (AUETR)” was used for the study to gather relevant information. The instrument had two sections, section A contained demographic information of respondents, while section B contained information in two (2) clusters on availability and utilization of e-library resources for teaching and research. It was structured along a four-point Likert scale, strongly agree (SA)- 4, Agree (A)- 3, Disagree (D) – 2, and strongly disagree (SD) – 1. The face and content validity of the instrument was determined by three experts, two from department of curriculum and teacher education and one from measurement and evaluation unit from Abia state university. The reliability of the 10-item instrument was carried out using twenty lecturers who were not part of the study. Cronbach’s alpha reliability statistic was used and an alpha coefficient of 0.78 was obtained which meant that the instrument was reliable for the study. Data collected was analyzed using the statistical packages for the social sciences (SPSS, V23). Mean and standard deviation was used to answer research questions, while ANOVA was used to test hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The finding from the study revealed that electronic library resources were available and also utilized in universities in South east. The study recommends among other things that stakeholders in the university should ensure that electronic library resources are made available at all times with required subscriptions, and that lecturers and students should be encouraged to utilized more resources which may be available for their research and teaching activities.