Concurrent 1: Distance and Online Learners and Library Anxiety: An Exploration into the Causes, Impact, and Recommendations for Practice
Session Format
In-person Full Paper Presentation
Proposal Synopsis
Academic library services and resources serve a wide variety of different types of patrons; residential and commuting students, first-time and non-traditional students, on-campus and distance students, 2-year, 4-year, and master’s and doctoral granting students; and staff, faculty, and general community members. Individuals needing to use academic library services may feel overwhelmed or unsure about what to do and where to go to complete the information seeking process. This uncertainty has been labeled library anxiety (Mellon, 1986) or with a broader lens - information seeking anxiety (Erfanmanesh, 2012). Library anxiety became a measurable construct when Bostick (1993) created the Library Anxiety Scale (LAS). Since the LAS was released in 1993, there have since been updates from other scholars with other scales being created using Bostick’s (1993) original scale as the foundation. Library anxiety has been studied in a variety of student populations such as graduate students, community college students, off-campus students, international students, non-traditional students, and at-risk students. However, few studies center on exploring library anxiety with distance learners or online learners and no studies exist exploring distance and online learners and the broader construct - information seeking anxiety. This paper will explore the construct library anxiety and its relationship to information seeking anxiety, how distance and online learners may experience library anxiety and information seeking anxiety, considerations for fiscal and library management decision making, recommendations for how to minimize its impact on students, and areas for future study. Participants will be engaged throughout the presentation by the presenter inviting them to share their experiences with students and library and information seeking anxiety and how they work to minimize its impact at their libraries.
Location
WALC 1018
Start Date
27-7-2022 9:00 AM
End Date
27-7-2022 9:50 AM
Concurrent 1: Distance and Online Learners and Library Anxiety: An Exploration into the Causes, Impact, and Recommendations for Practice
WALC 1018