Abstract
Purpose: Everyday life information seeking (ELIS) is essential for the mastery of life and plays a central role in the daily problem-solving activities of all human beings. This study aimed to investigate the everyday life information seeking of female university students residing at hostels in Lahore, Pakistan. Design/methodology/approach: A quantitative research approach using a survey method was adopted to identify the dimensions of ELIS and to fill the paucity of research on the topic. Two-hundred and forty-eight female students living in various university and private hostels in Lahore, Pakistan, were surveyed, and the collected data was analyzed using Statistics Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21. Findings: Results of the study revealed that hostel living expanded the social circle of students, as it offered exposure to diverse multicultural social groups. Female students living in hostels required information related to their academic needs, safety concerns, social life, and self-help issues. They relied mainly on mobiles phones, the internet, social media, and inter-personal relationships for everyday information. Cultural differences, natural hesitation, language barriers, time concerns, and difficulty in identifying reliable information were the primary obstacles in meeting everyday life information needs. Originality/value: The findings of this study can be used as a premise for developing interventions and information services for female students that allow them to live comfortably in a safe environment in hostels and achieve their educational goals. The study results may also provide useful insights for university administrations to establish libraries in hostels to better cater to their female residents’ information needs.
Highlights
An understanding of people’s information behaviour is essential before designing a needs-based information delivery system for them [1,2,3,4,5,6,7]
The results concerning the obstacles that resident students faced in seeking everyday life information are presented, which include the answer to third research qestion
An analysis of the data showed that a slightly higher number of female students (n = 132; 53.2%) resided in private hostels as compared to those who lived in university hostels (n = 116; 46.8%)
Summary
An understanding of people’s information behaviour is essential before designing a needs-based information delivery system for them [1,2,3,4,5,6,7]. This perception resulted in a great amount of research focusing on individuals from various contexts, e.g., academia, workplace, and everyday life [8]. Everyday life information seeking (ELIS) has been investigated using individuals and groups from different fields (e.g., investors, historians, grocery shoppers). A perusal of published ELIS research indicated that only a few studies [8] appeared to have been conducted so far investigating the ELIS of students moving from either small cities or rural areas to large cities.
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