Library Web/Online Information Services to the Needs and Behavior of Students

Abstract

Introduction For a library serving a self-financed higher education institution, such as the College of Professional and Continuing Education (CPCE) Libraries, there have to be tangible needs to justify the provision of new initiatives. The prevailing of electronic resources makes the library collection have more electronic materials than physical items. With students' persistent demand for more electronic books, electronic materials will continue to increase. All in all, online information services become increasingly important that drives the CPCE Libraries to look into how well its online information services are in meeting the needs of the users and how the services can be improved. Primarily, online information services are provided through the library website which is highly regarded as the services delivery platform (Bao, 2000) and the surrogate librarian-instructor (Cockrell & Jayne, 2002). One initiative that must be considered is the provision of a library website for mobile devices. It is generally considered that mobile revolution has dramatic impact on library services (Murray, 2010). Many academic libraries have already provided mobile web services (Bridges, Rempel, & Griggs, 2010; Vila, Galvez, & Campos, 2010; Wilson & McCarthy, 2010). To the users, the possession of internet capable mobile devices is the pre-requisite to using mobile services; to the libraries, the users' adoption of mobile services in general is the pre-requisite to providing mobile library services. This paper discusses and shows how the CPCE Libraries improved its online information services with respect to the behavior and needs of the users. Literature Review Adoption of Mobile Devices and Mobile Services Mobile service subscribers in Hong Kong reached 12.48 million in 2010, representing a penetration rate of 178%, one of the highest in the world (given that the population of Hong Kong is about seven million). Short messages (SMS) were commonly used, with each Hong Kong citizen old enough to use mobile devices on average using it more than twice daily (Office of The Telecommunications Authority, Hong Kong, May 2010; Office of The Telecommunications Authority, Hong Kong, Oct 2010). To learn how the youths adopt and use mobile services, the Hong Kong Youth Association conducted in 2010 a phone interview with 512 youths of ages 12-34 selected through random sampling. The interview found that 78.5% of the interviewees, in particular those of older ages, possessed internet capable mobile devices (including mobile phones and laptops). On average each youth spent 3.45 hours using their mobile devices. It was also found that 65.5% of the interviewees read news on the internet, 43.0% uploaded or viewed social current affairs short videos at Youtube, and 33.6% voiced their opinions on the internet. Besides, 22.5% of them used blogs or social networking sites to keep in touch with friends and 14.1% always used SMS to communicate with friends. Of all the interviewees, 72.3% engaged learning on the internet on various aspects, with 49.3% engaging quite frequently and 11.1% very frequently (Youth Research Centre, Hong Kong Federation of Youth Groups, 2010). The situation of the United States is used as a comparison. Mobile Access 2010, a study of the Pew Internet & American Life Project, reported that in the United States, nine out of ten youths of 18-29 years old owned cell phones and 95% of them (representing 85% of this group) used text messages. Seven out of ten youths owned laptop computers. While 65% of the youths accessed the internet with their cell phones, 84% went online using either cell phones or laptops (A. Smith, 2010). The ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, on the other hand, focused on undergraduate students of the United States to see how they used information technology in daily life and their studies. …