Information Technology Reference
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deeper understanding of the changing nature of participants' general research process
and the patterns of their information-seeking behavior. In order to better understand
how students behave when seeking information for course-related research, we posed
five research questions:
•
How do undergraduates and postgraduates seek and obtain information they
need for course-related research?
•
Who is their best resource for help or advice in the research process?
•
How do they judge the quality of information resources they find?
•
What techniques and routines do students use for fulfilling research
assignments?
•
What are the major issues they face in conducting research?
2
Background and Methodology
Istanbul University is an education, research, and service center with twenty faculties
(two of which are research hospitals belonging to the Faculty of Medicine) located at
eleven campuses, one conservatory, six vocational high schools, and seventeen
institutes. The University offers an integrated education system extending from
primary to PhD level. In order to investigate the research habits of undergraduates and
postgraduates at the university, a descriptive online survey questionnaire was used.
This was the preferred method for data collection due to the large size and wide
geographical distribution of the sample.
The survey used 12 questions adapted from studies previously done by Head and
Eisenberg [3], [4], George et al [5] and Martin [6], allowing this study to be compared
with these and other related studies. Before launching the survey, its wording and
functionality was pre-tested with five undergraduates who were enrolled in the
Faculty of Letters. Based on this feedback, some survey questions were re-worded
and two of them were clarified. The final questionnaire with closed, multiple choice
questions was published on the university's website on June 15, 2013.
The analyzed sample consisted of (N= 87,044) [7] students; 458 replies were
received, but 9 of those were blank. Consequently, the self-selected sample of the
survey consisted of 449 students (n= 449). A sample size of 449 that gives a statistical
accuracy of + or - 5% with 96% confidence can be regarded as reasonable. The
collected data were coded and analyzed by a statistician using SPSS version 11.5 for
Windows. The data were then tabulated using tables and percentages. The chi-square
test was used to compare categorical values. In order to establish the relationship
between two variables, the Pearson correlation test was used, with an accepted level
of significance of p ≤ 0.05 (p= level of significance).
In particular, the survey asked respondents to answer questions about: (i) general
research habits, (ii) resources they use for class projects, (iii) which resource they
preferred to use (library or the Internet) (iv) people whom they ask for help and
advice during the research process, (v) criteria they use for evaluating web resources,
(vi) research styles, routines and techniques they use, and (vii) the major issues they
experience in conducting research.
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