Evidence Based Library and Information Practice (Journal)
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Significant Value Found in Mentoring Programs for Novice Tenure-Track Academic Librarians
No full textA Review of:
Goodsett, M., & Walsh, A. (2015). Building a strong foundation: Mentoring programs for novice tenure-track librarians in academic libraries. College & Research Libraries, 76(7), 914-933. http://dx.doi.org/10.5860/crl.76.7.914
Objective – To examine the effectiveness of mentoring programs for novice tenure-track academic librarians, and to identify critical elements that define a successful mentoring program in various academic library settings.
Design – Survey questionnaire with a voluntary phone interview.
Setting – Academic libraries in the United States of America.
Subjects – 283 librarians participated in a survey questionnaire. Researchers conducted additional interviews with 6 out of the 12 librarians who had volunteered on the survey questionnaire and who met the inclusion criteria.
Methods – Researchers recruited participants through two professional e-mail lists: the Information Literacy Instruction Discussion List (ILI-L) listserv and the American Library Association’s New Members Round Table (NMRT) listserv. Interested participants completed a secured online survey that was hosted using SurveyMonkey. The researchers then coded and analyzed the collected survey data using the same software. At the end of the online survey, participants were given the opportunity to volunteer for an additional interview. Potential interviewees were selected if mentoring programs were available for tenure- track librarians at their institutions. Once selected, researchers contacted potential interviewees and conducted interviews. The interviews were transcribed, the data anonymized, and original recordings deleted. Researchers coded the anonymized interview data to identify common themes.
Main Results – Researchers identified six themes from the survey data and interview transcripts: traits of an effective mentor; configuration of mentoring programs; elements of effective mentoring programs; mentoring partnerships within or beyond the library; role and training of mentors and mentees; and the mentor/mentee relationship. Overall, the survey and interview data suggest that mentoring programs provide valuable assistance with professional tenure-related activities, and facilitate less-tangible effects such as an increased understanding of an institution’s culture and an improvement of communication and time-management skills. The data also provides insight into effective program elements and areas for improvement.
Conclusion – This study suggests that there is significant value in implementing a mentoring program. The results from this study can be used by academic libraries that are considering implementation of a mentoring program or improving an existing one
Open Access Papers Have a Greater Citation Advantage in the Author-Pays Model Compared to Toll Access Papers in Springer and Elsevier Open Access Journals
No full textA Review of:
Sotudeh, H., Ghasempour, Z., & Yaghtin, M. (2015). The citation advantage of author-pays model: The case of Springer and Elsevier OA journals. Scientometrics, 104(2), 581-608. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11192-015-1607-5
Abstract
Objective – To investigate the citation performance of open access (OA) and toll access (TA) papers published in author-pays open access journals.
Design – Longitudinal citation analysis.
Setting – Publications in Springer and Elsevier’s author-pays open access journals.
Subjects – 633 journals published using the author-pays model. This model encompasses both journals where the article processing charge (APC) is required and journals in which authors can request open access and voluntarily pay APCs for accepted manuscripts.
Methods – The authors identified APC funded journals (journals funded by mandatory author processing charges as well as those where authors voluntarily paid a fee in order to have their articles openly accessible) from both Springer and Elsevier, and analyzed papers published in these journals from 2007 to 2011. The authors excluded journals that adopted the APC model later than 2007. To identify Springer titles, the authors created a search strategy to identify open access articles in SpringerLink. A total of 576 journals were identified and double checked in the Sherpa-Romeo database (a database of copyright and open access self-archiving policies of academic journals) to verify their open access policies. The authors then downloaded the journal content using SpringerLink, and using Springer Author-Mapper, separated out the open access articles from the toll access articles.
In order to identify the Elsevier APC funded journals, the authors referred to “Open Access Journal Directory: A-Z,” which contained 35 OA journals (p. 584). Once the authors consulted “Sponsored articles” issued by Elsevier and verified titles in Sherpa-Romeo, they identified 57 journals that fit the “author-pays” model. The bibliographic information was downloaded and OA articles were separated from TA articles. The authors confirmed that all journals were indeed OA publications by downloading the full-text from off-campus locations; they also verified that the journals were using the APC model by visiting each journal’s website.
Because of the large number of subject areas of the identified journals, the researchers decided to classify the journals into four broader categories: Health Sciences, Life Sciences, Natural Sciences, and Social Sciences and Humanities. To calculate the impact of OA papers, citation per paper (CPP) was calculated for each subject area. Impact values were calculated on an annual basis as well. The researchers calculated the citation advantage of OA articles as the “difference between the open access and toll access impacts in terms of a percentage of the latter” (p. 585).
Main Results – The authors categorized their findings according to three themes: the growth of APC funded OA papers, the number of OA papers by discipline, and citation advantage of OA vs. TA in general and by subject area.
Together, Springer and Elsevier published 18,654 OA papers in the APC journals; this number represents 4.7% of the 396,760 papers published between 2007 and 2011. While the number of OA and TA papers has been growing annually, the number of OA papers has been growing more rapidly compared to the TA papers.
In terms of subject areas, Life Sciences had the largest number of OA and TA papers (184,315), followed by Health Sciences (149,341), Natural Sciences (121,274), and Social Sciences and Humanities (42,824). Natural Sciences had the most OA papers (5.7%) in terms of the number of papers in this subject area being OA papers, followed by Social Sciences and Humanities (5.2%), Health Sciences (4.6%) and Life Sciences (3.6%).
Overall, the researchers found that the impact values of OA papers were larger than those of the TA papers for each year examined. In considering subject areas, in all disciplines except Life Sciences, the most highly cited paper in the field is an OA paper. In Life Sciences, the most highly cited TA paper had 2,215 citations, compared to the OA paper, which had 1,501 citations. Even though the TA paper had more citations, overall, the OA papers had a higher impact (citation advantage). In Health Sciences, the most highly cited OA paper received 1,501 citations, which is 1.2 times the most highly cited TA paper, with 1,252 citations. The citation advantage for the OA group is 33.29% higher than the TA group. In Natural Sciences, the number of citations from the highest cited OA paper is 1,736, or 2.52 times higher than the most highly cited TA paper. The OA papers in this discipline had a 35.95% citation advantage. In Social Sciences and Humanities, the most highly cited OA paper had 681 citations, compared to the TA paper, with 432 citations. For this subject area, the citation impact of the OA paper is 3.14% higher than the TA paper.
Conclusions – In sum, the number of article processing charge funded open access papers has grown tremendously in recent years. Furthermore, open access papers have a citation advantage over toll access papers, both annually and across disciplines
Identifying and Classifying User Typologies Within a United Kingdom Hospital Library Setting: A Case Study
No full textObjective – To identify available health library user typology classifications and, if none were suitable, to create our own classification system. This is to inform effective future library user engagement and service development due to changes in working styles, information sources and technology.
Methods – No relevant existing user typology classification systems were identified; therefore, we were required to create our own typology classification system. The team used mixed methods research, which included literature analysis, mass observation, visualization tools, and anthropological research. In this case study, we mapped data across eleven library sites within NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde Library Network, a United Kingdom (U.K.) hospital library service.
Results – The findings from each of the NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde Library Network’s eleven library sites resulted in six user typology categories: e-Ninjas, Social Scholars, Peace Seekers, Classic Clickers, Page Turners and Knowledge Tappers.
Each physical library site has different profiles for each user typology. The predominant typology across the whole service is the e-Ninjas (28%) with typology characteristics of being technically shrewd, IT literate and agile – using the library space as a touch down base for learning and working.
Conclusions – We identified six distinct user types who utilize hospital library services with distinct attributes based on different combinations of library activity and medium of information exchange. The typologies are used to identify the proportional share and specific requirements, within the library, of each user type to provide tailored services and resources to meet their different needs
Cataloguers May Tend to Have Learning Styles Different from Other Library Job Responsibilities
No full textObjective – To determine whether relationships exist between academic librarians’ learning styles and their professional work responsibilities.
Design – Self-selecting survey.
Setting – Email listservs.
Subjects – 1579 academic librarians.
Methods – The authors used the Index of Learning Styles questionnaire, based on the Felder-Silverman Learning Styles model consisting of eight dimensions on four scales: Active/Reflective, Sensing/Intuitive, Visual/Verbal, and Sequential/Global. The multiple choice survey was distributed online to 23 email listservs for academic librarians in 2011, and to 14 additional listservs in 2013 targeting technical services librarians. 1579 responses were received in total, which were analyzed using ANOVA with a Tukey-Kramer post-hoc mean separation, and descriptively using observed frequencies.
Main Results – In examining the relationship between positions and learning styles, the study revealed there to be five statistically significant p-values when the data were analyzed. Catalogers (n=145) were found to be more reflective learners compared to Administrative (n=321) and Instruction librarians (n=228) at the p = 0.009 level. Administrative, Instruction, and “Other” librarians were found to be more intuitive learners than Catalogers, who are more likely to be sensing learners, at the p = 0.0004 level. Digital librarians (n=40) are more likely to be visual learners and Catalogers more likely to be sequential learners when compared to several other librarian categories, at the p = 0.020 and p = 0.001 levels respectively.
Conclusions – The authors concluded that there were some statistically significant differences between librarians’ learning styles scores according to job responsibilities. Catalogers were found to have different learning styles than other types of librarians for three out of four scales. Based on these findings, the authors indicate that further research into how librarians’ work responsibilities impact learning styles is justified
Educating Assessors: Preparing Librarians with Micro and Macro Skills
No full textAbstract
Objective – To examine the fit between libraries’ needs for evaluation skills, and library education and professional development opportunities. Many library position descriptions and many areas of library science education focus on professional skills and activities, such as delivering information literacy, designing programs, and managing resources. Only some positions, some parts of positions, and some areas of education specifically address assessment/evaluation skills. The growth of the Library Assessment Conference, the establishment of the ARL-ASSESS listserv, and other evidence indicates that assessment skills are increasingly important.
Method – Four bodies of evidence were examined for the prevalence of assessment needs and assessment education: the American Library Association core competencies; job ads from large public and academic libraries; professional development courses and sessions offered by American Library Association (ALA) divisions and state library associations; and course requirements contained in ALA-accredited Masters of Library Science (MLS) programs.
Results – While one-third of job postings made some mention of evaluation responsibilities, less than 10% of conference or continuing education offerings addressed assessment skills. In addition, management as a topic is a widespread requirement in MLS programs (78%), while research (58%) and assessment (15%) far less common.
Conclusions – Overall, there seems to be more need for assessment/evaluation skills than there are structured offerings to educate people in developing those skills. In addition, roles are changing: some of the most professional-level activities of graduate-degreed librarians involve planning, education, and assessment. MLS students need to understand that these macro skills are essential to leadership, and current librarians need opportunities to add to their skill sets