Editorial

Citation

Oberhelman, D.D. (2006), "Editorial", Reference Reviews, Vol. 20 No. 8. https://doi.org/10.1108/rr.2006.09920haa.001

Editorial

One of the great benefits of working with Reference Reviews is the opportunity gives to learn about the wide array of new reference titles and online resources that are now available to libraries. Working in an academic library, I am very aware of how much the lay of the land has changed since I was an undergraduate in the mid-1980s. The wealth of tools, both print and online, that students today have at their fingertips is most impressive to a library user of the 1980s who had to fumble through print indexes, the earliest online catalogues on “dumb” terminals, and had to be largely satisfied with the collections of a single institution.

It is thus sobering to review the findings of OCLC’s recent report, “College students’ perceptions of libraries and information resources” (available online at www.oclc.org/reports/perceptionscollege.htm). The report contains results from surveys conducted of over 3,000 university students from the USA, the UK, Australia, Canada, India, and Singapore in May and June 2005. It was designed to measure the extent to which library resources and services, including online offerings, were having an impact on the students’ lives, along with the influence of search engines such as Google upon their information-seeking behaviour. For those of us aware of the wealth of riches libraries offer today in both print and web-based formats, this report reveals that we are not making as great an impact upon our students as we may like to think.

Here are some of the key figures from the report: 72 percent of students are extremely familiar, very familiar, or somewhat familiar with the use of search engines for their information needs (45 percent said they were extremely familiar with them), but only 20 percent describe themselves as extremely familiar with online library resources, less than the number that are extremely familiar with online bookstores such as Amazon for meeting their searches. When asked where they first go to get information on an unfamiliar topic, 89 percent turn to search engines and a meager 2 percent say the library website. Thirty-nine percent of students report using the library less since they started using the internet, and 64 percent say that search engines fit into their information-seeking lifestyles whereas only 30 percent can say the same for libraries. Search engines received a 50 percent overall favourable rating for giving them the information they need, but the library’s online resources only received a 30 percent favourable rating. The study also measured the function of the library in the academic campus community, and in that area libraries are still regarded as centres for education and research. Eighty-six percent of students said it was a place to learn; 82 percent view the library as a place to access the internet (libraries fare far better than bookstores in providing free internet access, at least!); and 81 percent see it as a place to read. Eighty percent added that the library is meant to support research. What is somewhat distressing, however, is that despite the perception that libraries are the centres for research and learning, most students still turn to Google and other less reliable resources to answer questions.

The report does not contain any shocking revelations about the research habits of university students. It confirms what most of us in the library field have long suspected about what our patrons actually do when they begin their research. Yet we must also realize as we peruse all of the reviews of valuable reference resources in this issue that no matter how useful or detailed any given book or database may be, they are irrelevant if no one turns to them to unlock the information they contain. We have to let people know that quality matters and that even though search engines appear to be easy and efficient, they have many great limitations. We have to change perceptions, and need to remember that although we can see the vast advances libraries have made in the last 20 years, we have to let our patrons know all they can find in those tools they never think to use.

David D. OberhelmanNorth American Regional Editor, Reference Reviews, and Associate Professor, Edmon Low Library, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, Oklahoma, USA