Impact of the Internet surfing on reading practices and

choices

Fayaz Ahmad Loan

Ph.D., Documentation Officer, Centre of Central Asian Studies, University of
Kashmir, Srinagar (J&K), India. E-mail: fayazlib (at) yahoo.co.in

Received March 5, 2012; Accepted June 5, 2012

Abstract

Reading in the 21st century networked society is no longer confined to the print reading. The
scope of the reading has extended to the Internet sources that changed the traditional reading
culture of the readers. The present study was conducted to identify the impact of the Internet
surfing on reading practices and choices of the net generation college students. The survey
method was applied to conduct the study and a questionnaire was used as a data collection
tool. A sample of 676 students was selected from different strata based on gender, region and
faculty in the degree colleges of the Kashmir region, Jammu and Kashmir state, India. In the
sample size only 302 confirmed themselves as the e-readers and their responses were analyzed.
Results reveal that the reading behavior of the online readers is in transition as the Internet
surfing has increased non-sequential reading, interactive reading, superficial reading, and
extensive reading and at the same rates is responsible for decreasing concentrated and in-
depth reading. Plus, the Internet surfing has increased reading of the news & views, general
knowledge, selected fields, sexual content, spiritual/religious text and has decreased reading of
literature. To validate the results, the findings were correlated with earlier studies and
hypotheses were formed and tested using the Chi-square test. However, the students have not
experienced any electronic reading device like kindle (of Amazon) or iPod (of Apple) during
browsing the electronic sources and it could be the future area of research.

Keywords

Reading; Online reading; Reading practices; Reading choices; Internet surfing; College
students
Introduction

Reading is one of the oldest habits of human civilization. It has been the passion of
the greatest personalities of all times. One of the first documentary sources for reading
was manuscript, however, accessible only to the elite class of society. Later, the
arrival of the Gutenberg printing press ended such discrimination by making the
printed word available to all. The Gutenberg printing press brought drastic changes to
the fundamentally oral society of the day. It was certainly a great jump in the
humanity's onward march to the reading society. The emergence of the Internet has
created an extraordinary change in the reading culture. It has made its existence, fully
or partially, in the reading behavior of the people. Presently, reading is no longer
confined to the print reading. The scope of reading sources has changed drastically in
the Internet revolution to include web sites, web pages, e-books, e-journals, e-papers,
e-mail, discussion boards, chat rooms, instant messaging, blogs, wikis, and other
multimedia documents. Now the potential reader can access and browse the online
information from the whole web while using his/her terminal at home.

The hypertext and hypermedia technologies allow the e-readers to go from one page
to another by selecting links in various directions popularly known as surfing. The
term Surfing of Internet was first used by Jean Armour Polly in 1992 and defined it as
"browsing the Internet while going from one page to another " ( Polly, 1992). The
Internet surfing enables to navigate a world full of interconnected information,
discover new sites, read up-to-date information, and download things of interest.
Surfing the Internet has become a daily routine of the new generation. The present
generation especially the college students are well versed with the new technologies
and their application in present networked society. Roberts and Foehr (2004) observe
that the Internet has fixed deep roots in the lives of the net generation students than all
other technological innovations.

Williamson (2008) reports that out of 18.0 million college students 17.1 million
(95.0%) go online at least once in a month during 2007 and out of 18.2 million, 17.4
million (95.7%) use Internet once in a month during 2008 in United States of America
(USA). Bowman (2002) reports that students turn to the Internet first, when faced with
a question or an assignment for class. Ramirez (2003) is of the opinion that the young
generation who have more experience with computers and grow up with this
technology will reveal different attitude towards reading in digital environment. This
union of the Internet and students compels researchers to take a new look on their
reading habits. Therefore, the present study is conducted to investigate the impact of
the Internet surfing on the reading practices and choices of the net generation students.

Related literature
The researchers all over the world have discussed the impact of the Internet on
reading at theoretical level via opinions and arguments but very few studies are based
on the research and experiments. Liu (2005) argues that the nature and purpose of
reading seems to deviate from the traditional reading methods, which are brief, linear
and less structured. He further observes that people are less engaged in the extensive
reading and lack the ability to read deeply in the hypertext
environment. Birkerts (1994) observes that the order of the print is linear and the print
material is static whereas the Internet surfing is non-linear and interactive and reader
is free to read in any direction. He also believes that the younger generation growing
up in the digital environment lacks the ability to read deeply and to sustain a
prolonged engagement in reading. He further observes that the digital environment
tends to encourage people to explore many topics extensively, but at a more
superficial level.

Elizabeth (2003) observes that the Internet content has blinking graphics, vivid color,
and lots of eye-catching phrases that can guide or distract from the reading. Liu (2005)
advocates that the screen based reading behavior is characterized by more time on
browsing and scanning, keyword spotting, one-time reading and non linear reading;
while less time is spent on in-depth reading and concentrated reading. Ramirez (2003)
reveals that only 3.7 percent of the respondents do not find it difficult to understand
what they read on screen, and 68 percent finds it easy to understand printed text,
whereas 24.9 percent understands the contents of both formats: printed and
digital. Chartier (2004) believes that reading in front of the computer screen is
generally a discontinuous reading process and is done without the identity or
coherence of the entire text from which the fragment is extracted.

Dykeman (2008) reports that there is no doubt that the way we read the web pages
have a major impact on what we read, how long we read, and how attentively we read
when on-line. However, digital reading is capturing an increasingly large slice of total
reading time. Liu (2005) advocates that the age factor contributes to the reading
behavior on the Internet as the younger people can tolerate more time reading the
screen-based materials whereas Broddason (2006) argues that even the younger
computer users do not enjoy reading from the screen. Behler (2009) also argues that
reading on the computer screen for long periods of time is not most people's cup of tea
and leads to hundreds of pages long printouts. Liu (2005) depicts that over 80 percent
of the participants always or frequently print out the electronic documents for reading
but none of the participants report that they never print out the electronic documents
for reading. Cushman (1986) finds that visual fatigue is significantly higher when
reading texts on a screen than on paper. He also believes that e-book technology has a
long way to go before it can equal the readability and richness of p-books.
Brown (2001) also observes that poor screen resolution has made sustained reading
tiresome and difficult, but now the current technological improvements and reader
software enhancements as well as the promising developments of very bright,
lightweight and power efficient screens bring us one step closer to paper-like reading
experience. Burk (2001) reports that corporate giants Microsoft and Adobe Systems
have developed sophisticated e-book reader software that enhances the electronic
reading experience. Hardware manufacturers such as Gemstar and Franklin continue
to produce new reading devices. Yet despite of numerous advantages offered by
various e-book readers and despite the widespread popularity of personal digital
assistants (PDAs) and pocket PCs capable of reading electronic books, the e-book
market has thus far failed to materialize. In spite of all new technological
developments in screens, text formats, and reading devices like LCD screen, PDF and
Adobe Reader have been designed to make e-reading easy; however, screens are yet
not optimal for the continuous, in-depth, and concentrated reading.

Researchers believe that the Internet has not only affected the reading practices but
reading choices as well. The Internet has become the World Bank of information
containing information on any field of knowledge. It contains a wide range of
information sources from the online versions of print equivalents to born digital
sources, image galleries to multimedia reference works, bibliographic indexes to full
text databases, plain text to digitized facsimile, primary to tertiary documents, local to
global and commercial to open access sources. Lee, Guttenberg and McCrary (2002)
reveal that 93 percent of all the newly produced information is being created on a
digital format. The digital archives like Amazon, Internet Archive, Google Books,
Gutenberg project, Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Directory of Open
Access Repositories (OpenDOAR), Directory of open Access Books (DOAB),
NetLibrary, Questia, ebrary, and many others provide access to the billions of web
pages. The availability of enormous information on varied subjects at one place is
supposed to highly affect the reading choices of the Internet users. Loan (2011) reports
that the Internet has increased access to information, use of foreign sources, contacts
with worldwide readers and time spent on reading, and has decreased dependence on
print sources, contacts with print sources, reading in local languages and reading of
books.

Kaye and Johnson (2004) affirm that the main aim of users accessing the Internet is to
read breaking news and search for up-to-the minute information. Bergstrom (2006)
reveals that users have greatly increased the news reading habits due to the Internet
surfing. The National Endowment for the Arts, USA (2005) estimates that the number of
adults who read no literature increased by more than 17 million between 1992 and
2002. It is also found that 47 percent of American adults read poems, plays or
narrative fiction in 2002, a drop of seven percentage points from a decade earlier.
 Impact of the Internet on reading practices and tastes is widely discussed in both
academic as well as non-academic settings but no systematic research has been
conducted so far. The present study is a step forward in this direction.

Research Design

Purpose of the study

The specific objective of the present study is to identify the impact of Internet surfing
on reading practices and choices of the net generation college students.

Hypotheses

Hypothesis I

H0 = Internet surfing does not change the traditional reading practices.

H1 = Internet surfing has changed the reading practices.

Hypothesis II

H0 = Internet surfing does not change the reading choices.

H1 = Internet Surfing has changed the reading choices.

Scope of the study

The scope of the present study is limited to the students of the degree colleges of
Kashmir, covering the age group of 18-25 years. The population is a unique
occupying a middle ground between childhood and adulthood and between work and
leisure.

Methodology

Sample Size

The statistical sampling formula was applied to obtain the sample size of the
population.

Z2 Npq
n=
Ne2 + Z2pq
 Where,

Z = Probability given under 96.5% reliability

N = Population or universe
E = Sampling error
pq = Proportion of the total population

The population of the undergraduate students in the academic colleges of the Kashmir
Valley was 54,191. The value of the proportion of the total population (pq) was
obtained from rural and urban ratio. Further, to ensure an optimal sample size, the
96.5% confidence level was pre-assigned and a small sampling error (0.04) was fixed.

Z2 Npq (2.1)2(54191)(0.54)(0.46)
n = =
2 2
Ne + Z pq (54191) (0.04)2 + (2.1)2(0.54)(0.46)

n = 676.11 = 676

Using the population allocation method, 676 college students were selected from the
degree colleges of the Kashmir Valley from different strata based on gender, region
and faculty.

Data Collection

The survey method was used to conduct the study and questionnaire was used as a
data collection tool. Before drafting the questionnaire, the relevant literature was
reviewed and analyzed which provided some directions in drafting the questionnaire.
After the questionnaire was drafted, it was pre-tested with 30 students. The
questionnaire was then simplified (some of the terms like interactive reading were
defined/elaborated) according to the responses of the pre-test to make it
understandable. Later, the data was collected from the college students during classes.
The questionnaire was administered personally to ensure the excellent response rate as
well as to avoid any misunderstanding while providing responses.

Data Analysis

Out of 676 students only 302 were e-readers and hence finally the data collected from
the e-readers was properly analyzed using different statistical and quantitative
techniques and presented in simple tabular forms. Besides correlating results with
 earlier studies, the Chi-square test was applied for the testing and verification of
hypotheses.

Results

Impact on Reading Practices

The data (Table 1) reveals that Internet surfing has altered the reading practices of the
students. Majority of the students admit that the Internet surfing increases interactive
reading (77.15%), superficial reading (70.20%) and decreases sequential reading
(62.25%), concentrated reading (60.60%) and in-depth reading (50.99%). The 47.35
percent students also admit that the Internet surfing increases extensive reading
whereas 40.40 percent students believe that it decreases extensive reading (Table 1).

To test the hypothesis I, the chi-square (X2) goodness data test is applied. The
tabulated value of chi-square (X2) at 5% level of significance (=0.05) and degree
level of freedom (r-1) (c-1) = (6-1) (3-1) = 10 is 18.307. Since, the calculated value of
Chi-square (X2= 544.38) is much higher than the tabulated value at 5% level of
significance. Therefore, the null hypothesis (H0) is strongly rejected and alternative
hypothesis (H1) is accepted. Thus, the inference can be drawn from the testing and
verification of hypothesis that surfing strongly impacts on the reading practices. On
analyzing the calculated value of Chi-square (X2) individually, the inference can be
drawn that the highest impact is on interactive reading followed by the superficial
reading, sequential reading and concentrated reading respectively and least on
extensive reading followed by in-depth reading. These results come as no surprise
because several studies have already shown the same trend ( Birkerts, 1994; Ramirez,
2003; Liu, 2005).

Table 1. Impact on reading practices

Impact on Reading Calculated Chi-
Increases Decreases No Change
Practices square
233/302 59/302
Interactive Reading 10/302 (3.31) 194.68
(77.15) (19.54)
32/302 188/302 82/302
Sequential Reading 117.84
(10.60) (62.25) (27.15)
212/302 34/302 56/302
Superficial Reading 124.92
(70.20) (11.26) (18.54)
55/302 183/302 64/302
Concentrated Reading 76.86
(18.21) (60.60) (21.19)
97/302 154/302 51/302
In-depth Reading 18.21
(32.12) (50.99) (16.89)
143/302 122/302 37/302
Extensive Reading 11.87
(47.35) (40.40) (12.25)
 Note: Figures in parenthesis indicate Percentage

Impact on Reading Choices

The data (Table 2) shows that the Internet surfing has affected the reading choices of
the students. Majority of the students agree that the Internet surfing increases reading
of news & views (85.76%), pornography & sexual content reading (74.50%), reading
of selected fields (64.90%), general knowledge reading (61.59%), and decreases
reading of literature (48.01%). The 48.34 percent students also believe that Internet
surfing increases reading of spiritual/religious text whereas 38.74 percent claim that it
decreases reading of spiritual/religious information (Table 2).

Table 2. Impact on reading choices

Impact on Reading Calculated Chi-
Increases Decreases No Change
Choices square
186/302 69/302 47/302
General Knowledge 0.04
(61.59) (22.85) (15.56)
196/302 58/302 48/302
Select Fields 3.22
(64.90) (19.21) (15.89)
259/302 27/302
News & Views 16/302 (5.30) 81.69
(85.76) (8.94)
Literature (Prose/Poetry 93/302 145/302 64/302
128.28
etc.) (30.79) (48.01) (21.19)
146/302 117/302 39/302
Spiritual/Religious Text 39.01
(48.34) (38.74) (12.91)
Pornography & Sexual 225/302 54/302
23/302 (7.62) 42.63
content (74.50) (17.88)
Note: Figures in parenthesis indicate Percentage

To test the hypothesis II, again the chi-square (X2) goodness data test is applied. The
tabulated value of chi-square (X2) at 5% level of significance (=0.05) and degree
level of freedom (r-1) (c-1) = (6-1) (3-1) = 10 is 18.307. Since, the calculated value of
Chi-square (X2=294.87) is much higher than the tabulated value at 5% level of
significance. Therefore, the null hypothesis (H0) is strongly rejected and alternative
hypothesis (H1) is accepted. Thus, the inference can be drawn from the testing and
verification of hypothesis that surfing strongly impacts on the reading choices. On
analyzing the calculated value of Chi-square (X2) individually, the inference can be
drawn that the highest impact is on literature followed by news & views, pornography
& sexual content and spiritual/religious text and least on General knowledge followed
 by select fields. The results are supported by earlier studies like Nielson (2003); Kaye
and Johnson (2004); National Endowment for the Arts (2005) and Bergstrom (2006).

Discussion

In an increasingly networked environment, the new generation readers gradually

develop the new reading behavior and increasingly change their traditional reading
practices. The students believe that the Internet surfing increases interactive reading,
superficial reading and extensive reading and at the same rates decreases sequential
reading, concentrated reading and in-depth reading. The alarming factor is the
decrease in the concentrated and in-depth reading. It indicates that the online readers
have to use print sources for the in-depth and concentrated reading. These practices of
reading are very essential for actual consumption of information and knowledge to
qualify educational as well as competitive examinations.

The possible reasons for decline in the concentrated reading during the Internet
surfing are hyperlinks embedded in the web resources, blinking images on the Web,
opening of unwanted web sites and scrolling & turning of pages. These problems need
to be solved for reading with full concentration during surfing. The possible solutions
are to take printout of the web documents for reading or save them on computer and
read offline. Opening of unwanted web sites should be dealt technologically. The
firewalls should be installed to block them. The students should also avoid clicking on
unwanted web sites, blinking pictures, attractive screen savers, irrelevant headings,
etc. to be more focused while surfing. This will definitely help them to browse the
Internet with full concentration. Moreover, the new technological reading devices like
kindle of Amazon can make e-reading easy for the continuous, in-depth, and
concentrated reading. The other possible factor responsible for decrease in the in-
depth reading is that the students are possibly surfing on the free portion of the web
where the subjects are not discussed deeply but extensively. Moreover, they may not
be aware about the deep web and open access web resources. The need is to make the
Internet users aware about the deep web collection and its search tools where they can
find the qualitative documents for in-depth reading. The other possible solution can be
to subscribe the qualitative web resources for the college students as well through
consortia and other means.

The students admit that the Internet surfing increases reading of news & views,
general knowledge, selected fields and spiritual/religious text. This is positive sign
that students are reading more in online environment. However, at the same time
majority of the students believe that the Internet surfing increases pornography &
sexual content reading/viewing as well. This negative use should be dealt
diplomatically. The awareness raising programmes can play a better role in this
regard. Moreover, the web sites providing access to pornographic material and
 information harmful to national integrity, etc. should be blocked using the
technological solutions like firewalls. The other concern is decrease in reading of
literature. The possible reasons are lack of awareness of literary collection, lack of
adequate literary collection and lack of access to literary collection. The need is to
aware students about literary collection on the Web like Gutenberg Book Project
which gives free access to literary collection of famous writers like William
Shakespeare. The copyright owners of the literary works should also make their
electronic editions available on the Web as it will enrich the literary collection on the
Internet. The other solution could be to subscribe the literary collection for increasing
literature reading habits of students.

Conclusions

The study reveals that that the Internet surfing has a great impact on the traditional
reading practices. The reading practices are in transition:

From To
Sequential reading Non-sequential reading
Passive reading Interactive reading
Concentrated reading Superficial reading
In-depth reading Extensive reading

Indeed, the Internet offers a great wealth of information for readers on any branch of
knowledge under the Sun. The reader is free to read any kind of information on any
topic of interest as the Internet provides access to hundreds of hits in a fraction of
seconds. Therefore, the online readers especially students need to be cautious and
focused while the Internet surfing so that the Internet can be used as an enhancement
reading tool. However, despite providing meaningful insights on the impact of the
Internet surfing on the reading practices and choices, the study suffers from some
caveats. One major limitation of the study is its sample size and sample frame which
consists of the college students. This makes it difficult to generalize the results across
the different sections of the society. Secondly, the students have not experienced any
electronic reading device like kindle (of Amazon) or iPod (of Apple) during browsing
and that could be the future area of research.

Acknowledgement

The author is greatly indebted to his praiseworthy teacher and supervisor, Prof. S. M.
Shafi, Head, Department of Library & Information Science, University of Kashmir,
J&K (India) for his enthusiastic guidance, constructive criticism, sound advices and
valuable suggestions during the accomplishment of the present study.

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Bibliographic information of this paper for citing:

Loan, Fayaz Ahmad (2012). "Impact of the Internet surfing on reading practices and
choices." Webology, 9(1), Article 94. Available at:
http://www.webology.org/2012/v9n1/a94.html

Copyright 2012, Fayaz Ahmad Loan.

Abstract The Internet plays a significant role in the lives of young people today. Previous research points
to advantages as well as disadvantages of the use of the Internet in a formal educational context. The
aim of the current study was to investigate the influence of the use of the Internet on planning and
instruction. Five upper secondary school teachers were interviewed face-to-face. Five recurrent themes
were identified in the interview data: general opinions on and experience of the Internet, attitudes to
teaching and learning, opinions on the use of the Internet as a planning and teaching resource, effects of
the use of the Internet on students and teachers, and drawbacks of the use of the Internet in the school.
It was found that the teachers think that the Internet is a valuable source of information and an
important additional teaching tool. The Internet can e.g. motivate the students, make teaching more
fun, and allows variation in teaching. Four major drawbacks of the use of the Internet were reported by
the teachers, viz. students' cheating, unreliable information, technical problems, and students'
extracurricular activities during lessons. Key words: the Internet, the qualitative interview, young
people, upper secondary school, English teachers, recurrent themes, additional teaching resource. Table
of contents Introduction 5 Aim and research questions 6 Thesis statement 7 Theoretical framework 8
Benefits and drawbacks of the use of the Internet in formal education 8 Practical guidelines for teachers
on the use of the Internet in the school 11 Student and student teachers' opinions of the use of the
Internet 13 Previous studies on teachers' opinions on the use of the Internet 14 An American
perspective 15 A British perspective 16 A Canadian perspective 17 A Swedish perspective 18
Preconditions for teaching and learning in the Aland Islands 20 The curriculum at the upper secondary
school level 20 Internet-based learning and teaching 21 Method 22 The research procedure 22
Methodological concerns 24 The informants 26 Discussion of the results 27 The analysis of the
interviews 27 General opinions on and experience of the Internet 27 Attitudes to teaching and learning
29 Opinions on the use of the Internet as a planning and teaching resource 30

A Comparative Study of use of the Library and the Internet as Sources of Information by Graduate
Students in the University Of Ghana 1 A Comparative Study of use of the Library and the Internet as
Sources of Information by Graduate Students in the University Of Ghana Abstract This study was
conducted to compare Internet use and library use among graduate students. It was based on the
assumption that graduate students use the Internet more than the library. Literature on library and the
Internet were reviewed. The researcher adopted convenient sampling technique to select the sample
for the study. Data was collected using questionnaires. Collected data was statistically analyzed and
interpreted using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences. Findings of the study indicated students
do not bypass the library in satisfying their information need. They use both the library and the Internet,
although Internet usage was more than the library, hence the Internet was the most preferred source of
information. It was recommended that the library should be upgraded to meet recent advancement in
research. 1.0 INTRODUCTION Information is a vital and an indispensable component of any academic
environment. It makes for effectiveness in any academic system. Both faculty and students need to use
information daily in their various academic endeavors. For decades, faculty and students have actively
used the library and its resources as their main information source. Alemna, (2000) states that for
centuries libraries have served as repositories of information and knowledge that have provided the
vital underpinnings for socio- economic, political and cultural development in any civilization. Their
relationship with cultural progress has been so interdependent that it is needless to argue whether
mans cultural advancement merely produces libraries as by product. According to Robinson (2006)
simplistically, libraries and archives came into being to provide a central location for hard-to-find,
scarce, expensive or unique material. Scarcity of information is the basis for the modern library. In
countries where information continues to be scarce, a library's role is still unambiguous. In some
countries where access to information is now akin to access to electricity or water, the reason to have
freestanding storehouses of a subset of all information is harder to articulate. Libraries in such countries
can provide access to more information than any user could want or need. Rangathan's rule "for every
reader, his or her book," might be now redefined as "for every reader, huge amounts of free-floating
content, anywhere, anytime. We now live in the information age where access to many Internet
resources is just a few clicks away. The Internet is a technology, which has gained more popularity in
many countries across the world and Ghana, is no exception. The Internet as a medium of
communication and source of information has enabled students, researchers, business information
seekers and information professionals to access information to enhance their work and communicate
effectively. A Comparative Study of use of the Library and the Internet as Sources of Information by
Graduate Students in the University Of Ghana 2 Robinson (2006) states that in 2004, seventy million
American adults logged onto the Internet in a typical day. Over 95 percent of U.S. public libraries
provided Internet access. Students, many faculty, and laypeople turn to online information sources
before print or the library. As a result, library use, especially for walk-in reference questions and
preparation for school and college reports has declined. 1.1 Statement of the Problem The University of
Ghana has a number of libraries on its campus. The Balme library is the biggest and the central library of
the University. In addition to the Balme library there are various departmental, school, institution and
hall libraries on campus. The collections of these libraries are subject specific. Almost all the
departments under the faculties and schools of the university have their own libraries. The University
gained full Internet connectivity in the early part of 1998 to enhance the opportunities available to the
academic community Alemna and Adanu, (2005). The Internet was not meant to do away with research
in the library. Although the Internet has a lot of advantages, it cannot be compared with that of the
traditional sources. Graduate students have adopted and continue to use the online information
retrieval for their academic and research work at the expense of or without considering the importance
and the quality of the traditional information centers as observed by the researcher. However, merely
using the Internet was not guarantee quality and good information. Even though the Internet has large
amount of information, the relevance, quality, and authenticity should not be neglected. The question
to ask then is why do the graduate students continue or preferred using the Internet to the library as
sources of information? Should the importance, quality, and authentic information derived from the
library be relegated in place of the Internet? The researcher had observed that graduate students spent
a lot of time at the Graduate Center searching the Internet than in libraries. The Graduate School
computer laboratory looked like it was taking over from the libraries on campus. It was observed that
graduate students attributed research for a paper to searching for information online. The main purpose
of the study was to compare graduate students use of the library and the Internet as sources of
information. This paper is an extraction from Kumah (2007). 1.3 Objectives The study seeks to
accomplish the following objectives: 1. To determine the factors that encourage or discourage the
students from using libraries. 2. To investigate the frequency and purpose of Internet use. 3. To find out
the extent to which the Internet helps graduate students in their academic work. 4. To determine the
extent to which graduate student use the Internet more than the library. A Comparative Study of use of
the Library and the Internet as Sources of Information by Graduate Students in the University Of Ghana
3 5. To find out what type of need influence the selection of one information source over the other. 6.
To determine problems students face when using the Internet and the library. 7. To make
recommendations for effective use of these sources. 1.4 Significance of the Study This study brought to
bear the services found in the library and the services available on the Internet. It is hoped that results
of the study will help to improve service delivery to graduate students in the University of Ghana. In
addition, the study adds to existing literature on students information behavior patterns and
information needs. The rest of the paper is organized as follows; related literature, methodology,
results, discussions and conclusions. 2.0 Related literature 2.1 Framework This study is based in the
broader field of information behavior. More specifically in the context of information seeking behavior
as defined by Willson (2000) as the purposive seeking for information as a consequence of a need to
satisfy some goal. In the course of seeking, the individual may interact with manual information systems
(such as a newspaper or a library), or with computer-based systems (such as the World Wide Web). The
study therefore focuses on how students interact with both manual and computer based systems. It also
investigated which system they prefer using and the motivation to select one system to the other. 2.2
The library and library use Reding (2005) indicates that from a social, cultural and economic point of
view libraries play a fundamental role in our society. They are the collectors and stewards of our
heritage; they are organizers of the knowledge in the books they collect adding value by cataloguing,
classifying and describing them; and, as public institutions, they assure equality of access for all citizens.
They take the knowledge of the past and present, and lay it down for the future. Adele and Milheim
(1995), argue that Libraries are not simply storehouses of books but provide proactive services to their
users both from within the librarys stock and from a wide range of external sources. Some of the
services according to them are enquiry services, bibliographic assistance, library instruction, interlibrary
loans, photocopying, and computer facilities. According to Boakye (1998), university libraries like those
of the University of Ghana library system, play very important roles in supporting the universitys
academic work. Without a library the universitys academic work will not be successful, because the
libraries provide services that help in teaching, research and learning. A Comparative Study of use of the
Library and the Internet as Sources of Information by Graduate Students in the University Of Ghana 4
2.3 Use of libraries and Internet among students A research conducted by Niels (2006) found that
students do not bypass the physical libraries and it is also evident that the use of physical libraries and
digital resources complement each other. The place of google in the students information is prominent
and positively correlated to use of traditional library resources. In a multi-disciplinary study conducted
by (George et al, 2006) which explored the information seeking behavior of graduate students found
that students rely heavily on the Internet as well as the university libraries' online resources for
information, though still using the physical library for hard copy materials such as books, journals and
papers. Few graduate students in the study mentioned influences such as difficulty in locating
information or the need for convenience and speed when using the Internet. Friedlander (2002)
indicated that library directors, college and university administrators face an increasingly complex
institutional and informational environment. Faculty and graduate students, in particular, seem to be
omnivorous in their appetite for information, creative in their strategies for seeking and acquiring
information in all forms, and very independent. Most faculty, graduate and undergraduate students
seem to prefer a hybrid information environment in which information in electronic form does not
supplant information in print but adds to the range of equipment, resources, and services available to
teachers and students. Liew et al. (2000) study of graduate student end-users current use and
perception of e-journals compared with their print counterparts indicated a growing interest in
ejournals. There was a strong acceptance of and high expectation and enthusiasm for future e-journals,
although with some reservations Bao (2002) surveyed 1998 and 2001 findings showing that the Internet
continues to be an important component of library services in today and tomorrows library. The
majority of the respondents used the Internet on a daily basis in 2001 as opposed to less than half the
respondents in 1998. The data showed the librarians major challenge in the new century remains that
of how to help library users find what they are looking for through the Internet. In another study
Baruchson- Arbib and Schor, (2002) found that students prefer general search engines and it seems that
they have difficulties distinguishing between internet resources and library resources. Teachers
recommendations and how they put forward requirements and demands are very important for the
students use of information. When high-quality electronic collections are made available, people use
them. Use of electronic journals increases every year. Among faculty members, graduate students, and
other professionals, higher use of electronic journals is accompanied by a decrease in visits to the
physical library Tenopir (2003). Research has confirmed that in terms of information seeking, today's
researcher seems to be comfortable with using a wide variety of sources for information. Internet
search engines, e-print servers, author websites, full-text databases, electronic journals, and print
resources are all used to some degree by most users. The relative amounts of use and enthusiasm for
use vary as described above, but today's users are mostly flexible and adaptable.