Sources of Searching S kills of Business Students

1. Sources of Searching Skills of Business Students A research study on

2. Authors • Muhammad Tariq • Incharge Library Information Services • PhD (Scholar), Hamdard University, Karachi • tariqnajmi@ciitlahore.edu.pk • Dr. ShafiqurRehman • Assistant Professor, University of the Punjab, Lahore • Dr. Khalid Mahmood • Deanship, Dammam University, Dammam, KSA • GhulamMustafa • Librarian, Sargodha University, Sargodha

3. Introduction Apart from traditional information resources, internet has emerged as main source of knowledge to attract students. (Kinley, 2010) Pakistan is a developing country and its economic situation is in crisis and stabs to get footing for sustainability (Ahmad, 2010) Intelligent and knowledgeable business students can play a vital role for viable economic situation of Pakistan. Business students who have expert searching skills, can access their data within short time. Needs to know the sources of searching skill of business students at various degree level programs. Also, it is not clear to what extent and in what ways they are taking advantage of this modern media.

4. Background studies • Enormous literature is available on the topic and reviewed under following five categories: • Searching techniques: age factor • Searching techniques: discipline factor • Searching techniques: academic level • Searching techniques: training / library instructions • Conclusion

5. Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate the level and sources of searching skills of business students of various public and private sector universities of Lahore, Pakistan.

6. Objectives of the study • To know the significant different between students of different study levels like under-graduate, graduate and post graduate. • To find out the searching skills level of business students • To know the sources of searching skills of business students. • To examine the searching skill level among the students of public and private sector universities.

7. Research Design • Survey Instrument: Questionnaire • Population: Business students of private, public and semi-government sector HEC recognized universities. • Sample: Convenient • Participants: 24 universitiesof Lahore, where business education were offering at any academic degree level • Data analysis: Data were analyzed through SPSS (V-20)

8. RESULTS Table 1: Demographic Characteristics of Respondents Demographic Characteristics of Respondents

9. RESULTS Table 2: Searching Skills Level of Business Students Searching Skill Level of Business Students

10. RESULTS Table 3: Table 3: Searching skills level of students of public, private and semi-government universities Searching skills level of students of private, public and semi-government universities

11. RESULTS Sources of Searching Skills Table 4: Sources of searching skills

12. RESULTS Start of internet searching Table 5: Start of internet searching

13. RESULTS Use frequency of internet Table 6: Use frequency of internet

14. RESULTS Help frequency, while using the interne Table 7: Help frequency while using theinternet

15. RESULTS General Discussion • Students having expert searching skills get their results within 30 minutes. • Server downtime and network efficiency are the big issues while searching on internet • Phrase, synonyms and suitable key words search technique are used in high frequency • 43% students can get their results as they desire • Google is the most popular search engine among business students. • Power failure, non-connectivity and lack of computer facilities in libraries/institutes are the major hurdles to use the computers

16. Conclusion • The survey shows a satisfactory condition of searching skills of business students. • Many students do not have formal training to use proper searching techniques and strategies to fulfill their information needs. • Short courses and library orientations can be a good learning venues to learn online searching skills to retrieve data from internet • The trends amongst males and females students are nearly alike, so researchers do not make separate analysis.

17. Limitations of study and further research directions • This study have some limitation that only business students at undergraduate, graduate and post graduate level were considered as respondents from public, private and semi-government sector HEC recognized universities of Lahore. • Convenient sampling was used to collect data thus the sample may not be representative of the actual population. • The further research may be conducted to check the searching skills level of the students belong to other subjects like engineering, pure sciences, humanities and social sciences and other geographical area of Pakistan

18. References • Adams, L. E. (2009). Information Seeking Behaviour of Generation Y Students at the Stellenbosch University Library and Information Service (Doctoral dissertation, Department of Library and Information Science, University of the Western Cape). • Ahmed, V., & OlDonoghue, C. (2010). Global economic crisis and poverty in Pakistan. International Journal of Microsimulation, 3(1), 127o129. • Ajiboye, B. A., Oyedipe, W. J., & Alawiye, M. K. (2013). Use of Information Retrieval Tools by the Postgraduate Students of Selected Universities in South Western Nigeria. In Information and Knowledge Management (Vol. 3, No. 5, pp. 53-59). • Bronander, K. A., Goodman, P. H., Inman, T. F., & Veach, T. L. (2004). Boolean search experience and abilities of medical students and practicing physicians. Teaching and learning in medicine, 16(3), 284-289. • Callinan, J. E. (2005). Information-seeking behaviour of undergraduate biology students: A comparative analysis of first year and final year students in University College Dublin. Library Review, 54(2), 86-99. • Chang, N. C., & Perng, J. H. (2001). Information search habits of graduate students at Tatung University. The International Information & Library Review,33(4), 341-346. • Chu, C.B.L., Yeng, A.W.H., & Chu, S.K.V. (2012). Assessment of student information literacy: a case study of secondary school in Hong Kong. Paper presented at CITE Research Symposium 2012, The university of Hong Kong, Hong Kong. • Chu, S. K. W., & Law, N. (2007). Development of information search expertise: postgraduates' knowledge of searching skills. portal: Libraries and the Academy, 7(3), 295-316. • Dinet, J., Favart, M., & Passerault, J. M. (2004). Searching for information in an online public access catalogue (OPAC): the impacts of information search expertise on the use of Boolean operators. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 20(5), 338-346. • Dresang, Eliza T., (1999). More Research Needed: Informal Information-Behavior of Youth on the Internet. Journal of the American society for information science, 50(12), 1123–1124. • Fenichel, C. H. (1981). Online searching: Measures that discriminate among users with different types of experiences. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 32(1), 23-32.

19. Continue… • George, C. A., Bright, A., Hurlbert, T., Linke, E. C., St Clair, G., & Stein, J. (2006). Scholarly use of information: graduate students' information seeking behaviour. Information Research, 11(4). • Kabakçı, I., Fırat, M., & Kuzu, E. B. (2010). Opinions of Teachers on Using Internet Searching Strategies: An Elementary School Case in Turkey. Abdullah Kuzu, 49. • Kamarudin, J. (2001). Information Needs and Information Seeking Behaviour of Students Utilizing Electronic Resources at the Library of UiTM Section 17, Shah Alam by JunaidaKamarudin (Doctoral dissertation, UniversitiTeknologi MARA (UiTM)). • Kinley, K., Tjondronegoro, D., & Partridge, H. (2010, November). Web searching interaction model based on user cognitive styles. In Proceedings of the 22nd Conference of the Computer-Human Interaction Special Interest Group of Australia on Computer-Human Interaction (pp. 340-343). ACM. • Khamsum Kinley , Dian Tjondronegoro , Helen Partridge , Sylvia Edwards, Human-computer interaction: the impact of users' cognitive styles on query reformulation behavior during web searching, Proceedings of the 24th Australian Computer-Human Interaction Conference, p.299-307, November 26-30, 2012, Melbourne, Australia • Mehrad, J., & Rahimi, F. (2012). Online search skills of Shiraz University post graduate students: a survey. International Journal of Information Science and Management (IJISM), 7(1), 1-13. • O'Hanlon, N. (2002). Net knowledge: Performance of new college students on an Internet skills proficiency test. The Internet and Higher Education, 5(1), 55-66. • Ranaweera, P. (2008). Importance of Information Literacy skills for an Information Literate society. • Rosenberg, W. M., Deeks, J., Lusher, A., Snowball, R., Dooley, G., & Sackett, D. (1998). Improving searching skills and evidence retrieval. Journal of the Royal College of Physicians of London, 32(6), 557. • Sasireka, G., Balamurugan, S., Ganasekaran, D., & Gopalarkishnan, S. (2011). Use of e-resources in digital environment among engineering institutions in Tamil Nadu (India): an empirical study. European Journal of Scientific Research, 60 (3), 326-333. • Sutcliffe, A. G., Ennis, M., & Watkinson, S. J. (2000). Empirical studies of end‐user information searching. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 51(13), 1211-1231. • Tahir, M., Mahmood, K., & Shafique, F. (2008). Information needs and information-seeking behavior of arts and humanities teachers: a survey of the University of the Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan. Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal), 227. • Van Deursen, A. J., & Van Dijk, J. A. (2009). Using the Internet: Skill related problems in users’ online behavior. Interacting with Computers, 21(5), 393-402