USE OF ELECTRONIC RESOURCES BY GRADUATE STUDENTS OF THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY AND LIBRARY SCIENCE, UNIVERSITY OF UYO

The study surveyed the use of electronic resources by graduate students of the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo. Based on a detailed literature review, a total of three (3) research hypotheses were formulated and tested on a sample size of 36 representing the total population of graduate M.Sc and PhD students of the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo. The instrument employed for the collection of data was the questionnaire. t-Test analysis and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) were used in analyzing the data collected. From the data analysis the following findings were advanced. That majority of the respondent’s access electronic resources from the internet via Cybercafé .There is a high frequency of usage of electronic resources by both male and female postgraduate students of the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo.


INTRODUCTION
While progress has been made in the past few years, much remains to be done to secure the future of the libraries and maximise their potentials for providing electronic research sources to support their Universities.The growth of research in all fields of human endeavour is becoming increasingly detailed and sophisticated, faculty members and graduate students are aware that the library has great roles to play in the provision of electronic information necessary for their day to day research.Moreover, the library acts as a medium of getting the latest scientific and technological information either in print or electronic form.
University libraries collect a variety of materials for preservation and use of the library patrons.These resources include not only traditional printon-paper media like books, journals, newspapers, and maps, but also audiovisual materials like records, audiocassettes, video cassettes and projectors.
Informed library users know that libraries have resources that are more comprehensive and scholarly than most web sites provide.Libraries provide access to scholarly literature that, as a rule, is not freely available on the Web.Often, it is in the University that students become aware of libraries resources, usually while having to write research papers.Assuming that on average, most students face the same number and type of papers and assignments during their college career, it is critical to understand what makes one student use the library's electronic resources while another will not think of the library as a place to find specialized resources for their assignments.Therefore, not only do students have to find the relevant citations, but they also have to know how to locate the article after that.This means juggling many screens, many technologies, multitasking electronic jobs, and of course, knowing where to look for all this necessary information is important.There is the additional confusion that more and more library databases use Web-based technologies.Because the interface is seamless there does not seem to be a visible, on the screen, difference between Web-based library resources and general Web-based resources.All of the above also assumes the student is proficient.

Statement of the Problem
It has been proven that the quality of the University library resources depends to a large extent on the quality of its collections.The academic health, intellectual vitality and effectiveness of any university depend largely upon the state of health and excellence of its library, which most researchers have considered as its lifeblood.The thriving growth of electronic publications is reshaping the nature of collections and the mode of delivering and accessing information in libraries is changing.The traditional print resources nowadays face challenges from their electronic counterparts in faster and timely delivery of information as well as in improved access (Bandyopadhyay and Chu, 1999).This explains why the uses made of these libraries that serve higher education are many and diverse, hence, the general claim that graduate students can receive quality education if the University library has adequate electronic resources, even if they have poor or no teachers at all.
There has been a reduction in reading habits of students generally.Graduate students who are supposed to be acquiring broad based knowledge through the use electronic resources to enable them engage in a collaborative learning process towards enhancing their studies at higher levels seem not to be involved in use of electronic resources.Various reasons have been advanced for this seemingly low patronage of electronic resources by graduate students with regards to their use of University library resources.While some are of the opinion that libraries do not provide the necessary electronic resources accessibility for use like the internet, cyber café and University café, others are of the notion that graduate students use of the library is influenced by their gender and internet access competence provided for in their various University libraries.This contradiction therefore gives rise to this study which attempts to examine how graduate student use electronic resources?The office of university librarian provides data for planning, budgeting, control and co-ordination of the entire library.

Scope of the Study
The study focuses on the use of electronic resources by graduate students of the department of educational technology and library science, University of Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.From the Universities, polytechnics, and other higher institutions found in the state only University of Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, has a library school.Consequently, this study was carried out within the department of educational technology and library science, University of Uyo and the respondents of interest to the study were graduate MSc/MLs and PhD students of the department.

Review of related literature
Previous studies on graduate student s use of electronic resources are numerous, but only a few of them will be reviewed as seen below.Writing on the importance electronic resources by students, Igabaria, Guimares & Davis, (1995) observed that there are several ways in which web experience can be defined and conceptualized.In general, web experience can be considered to be an act where users engage in applications that are often centered on web.In addition, web experience also can be defined in two different ways as perceived use and variety of use."While perceived usage refers to the amount of time spent interacting with the web and the frequency of use, variety of use refers to the importance of use and the collection of web package/program use.Dutton (1990), Brophy (1993) and Blandy & Libutti, (1995) believe that in order to utilize the growing range of electronic resources, students must acquire and practice the skills necessary to exploit them."For students using a variety of on-line databases, it is as though they were parking lot attendants, where every vehicle is not only a different make and model but has a different configuration.
The ability to find and retrieve information effectively is a transferable skill useful for future life as well as enabling the positive and successful use of the electronic resources whilst at a University.Brophy argues that libraries must "reach a position where the acquisition of information skills is acknowledged as one of the key learning objectives for every student entering a University, so that no student leaves without being fully equipped to cope with the information intensive world -the information society -as an end-user" (Brophy, 1993) The gender dynamics relating attitudes about the Internet and actual utilization of the medium have not been adequately studied to date (Busselle, R., J. Reagan, B. Pinkleton, and K. Jackson, 1999).Nevertheless, research regarding computer use more generally has highlighted the significance of interest and stereotyping about computers, as well as selfperception of ability in explaining gendered patterns of behaviour vis-à-vis this technology (Campbell, 1990;Levin and Gordon, 1989;Reinen and Plomp, 1997;Shashaani, 1993).Investigations with elementary and high school students as well as adults reveal a significant gulf between male and female interest in computers (Campbell, 1990;Levin and Gordon, 1989;Reinen and Plomp, 1997;Shashaani, 1993).For example, drawing on representative national samples of elementary, lower, and upper secondary school students from 20 countries in 1989 and 10 countries in 1992, Reinen and Plomp, (1997) find that females enjoy using the computer less than do male students.In addition, research has found that men and boys have significantly more positive attitudes toward computers and more stereotyped attitudes regarding who is capable of using them (Levin and Gordon, 1989;Whitley, 1997), while female students' attitudes and attributions toward computers discourage them from using the technology (Campbell, 1990).The inference drawn is that gendered attitudes are central to discrepancies in use.Beyond attitudes, the literature points to another important factor that influences technology use: Internet access competence, which the literature has revealed that internet, has become the most extensively used information source that empowers the average person to get in roaming with the latest information.The internet has emerged as a powerful educational tool.With the increasing impact of information and communicative technologies on higher education, all those concerned with teacher education are attempting to grasp how ICT could help in modernising the process of teaching, learning and research.This implies that in this era, teachers and students can carry forward their work on the internet in ways that are similar to and tightly intertwined that in this era,on the internet in ways that are similar to and tightly intertwined with the traditional ways that they learn, teach and study in libraries, classrooms, laboratories, seminars, and conferences.Thus, the internet can provide access to essentially unlimited resources of information not conventionally obtainable through other means.Bandura (1977) beliefs revolve around one's capability to organize and execute the courses of action required to manage prospective situations'' and includes both anxiety and enactive and vicarious experience regarding task-specific competencies.
Recent literature on technology presents a complicated picture of the relationship between gender and Web use.While most scholars agree that the gender gap in internet use has narrowed significantly in the college age group (Goodson, McCormick, & Evans, 2001;Odell, Korgen, Schumacher, & Delucchi, 2000) as well as the general population (Brenner, 1997;Jackson, Ervin, Gardner, & Schmitt, 2001;Newburger, 1999;Ono & Zovodny, 2003), some gender differences have been found in attitudes toward technology, intensity of Internet use, online applications preferred, and experience in cyberspace.Investigations of college student Web use have proven especially insightful, as research on this group allows for an examination of gender differences within an institution in which men and women generally have equal access to the Internet (Odell et al., 2000).The scholarship on gender and Web use sometimes seems contradictory, demonstrating the dynamic nature of the interaction, as well as the need for continued investigation.In a study of college students' attitudes toward technology, Smith and Necessary (1996) found that males had significantly more positive attitudes toward computers than females did.Jackson et al. ( 2001) also found that females in general reported less favourable computer attitudes.Other literature, however, contradict these findings.Similar findings have revealed that gender had no significant effect on any of the dimensions of computer attitude studied (Jennings & Onwuegbuzie, 2001;Shaw & Gant, 2002).Furthermore, Zhang, (2002), Bimber (2000) both argue that the gender gap in the Internet is larger where more intensive Web use is concerned.Ono and Zovodny (2003) also found women to be less frequent and less intense users of the Internet.Concern about gender inequality has now shifted from access to intensity.
The most pronounced gender difference in Web use is found in the online applications used by males and female.Male college students are more likely than their female counterparts to use the Internet for recreational purposes, while females are more likely to use the internet to talk to family and friends (Goodson, McCormick, & Evans, 2001;Jackson et al., 2001).These findings appear to reinforce the widespread assumption that men prefer to use the Web for information gathering and entertainment and women prefer to use the Internet for communication (Shaw & Gant, 2002).

Methodology
The survey method was used, with a questionnaire designed to obtain the opinions of students at the department of educational technology, University of Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria.During the last two weeks of January 2011, the researcher along with penultimate undergraduate students in the department of educational technology and library science distributed 36 questionnaires in all, for about two hours daily to the graduate students who were mostly resident off campus.Attempts were made in asking each graduate to fill a questionnaire and return it to the office assistant on duty at the departmental general office.The time of distribution varied in order to obtain a wide distribution of graduate students.During this two weeks period, 36 students returned their questionnaire to the office assistant.Thus, the return rate was 100% in all.
The data collected reflected the population of graduate students who use the University of Uyo libraries.The concerns of undergraduate students were not considered, in January 2011 there were 42 registered library users drawn from among Masters and PhD students of the department of educational technology and library science, University of Uyo.The breakdown of the student population is as illustrated in table 1 below.The questionnaire first considered each graduate students general background information on items 1-5, before questions that enquired about their use patterns.Items 6 of the questionnaire enquired from the students their accessibility of electronic resources through internet, cyber café and University café.Items 7 enquired about their level of use of electronic resources between male and female while items 8 enquired of their internet access competence.The questionnaire structure was adopted with few modifications from Okon s (2011) questionnaire which was found to be valid and reliable for the collection of data for this study.The data collected was subjected to t-Test and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) which were displayed in tables.

Findings and Discussion
A total of 36 questionnaires were distributed to respondents and were successfully retrieved giving a 100% return of rate.The analyses of the distribution were as presented below.The null hypothesis states that there is no significant accessibility of electronic resources by the graduate students of the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo.In order to test this hypothesis, t-test analysis was used to analyze the data which showed sample t-Test analysis of the accessibility of electronic resources by the graduate students of the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo.The

USE OF ELECTRONIC RESOURCES BY GRADUATE STUDENTS
above table presents the t-Test value as (46.720).This value was tested for significance by comparing it with the critical t-value (2.030) at 0.05 level by means of the 35 degree of freedom.The obtained t-value (46.720) was greater than the critical t-value (2.030).Hence, the result was significant.This therefore means that there is significant accessibility of electronic resources by the graduate students of the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo.The above indicates that majority of the respondent access electronic resources from the cybercafés.This corroborates Obuh, (2007) report which stated that cybercafés are the most readily available access to the electronic resources by users.The null hypothesis states that there is no significant difference in the level of utilization of electronic resources between male and female postgraduate students of the Department of Educational Technology and Library Science in the University of Uyo.In order to test this hypothesis, Independent t-test analysis was then used in comparing the mean score of the two independent groups (male and female); see table 2 above.The above table presents the t-test value (6.693).This value was tested for significance by comparing it with the critical tvalue (2.042) at 0.05 level with the 34 degree of freedom.The obtained t-value (6.693) was significant.The result therefore means that, there is significant difference in the level of utilization of electronic resources between male and female post graduate students of the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo.From the figure above a majority of 19 (53%) with a standard difference of 1.68034 respondents were females.This is in agreement with Adomi (2000) who reported that there are more females than males in Library Schools in Nigeria.This invariably means that female postgraduate students utilize more electronic resources than the male postgraduate students.Dutton (1990) and Brophy (1993) that students do not often appreciate the skills required to search electronic sources, stating that they are deceptively easy to use.

Summary of the Study
In this study, the Use of Electronic Resources by Postgraduate Students of the Department of Educational Technology and Library Science in the University of Uyo was examined.Based on literature review, research hypotheses were formulated and tested on a sample size of 36 representing the total population of postgraduate MSc and PhD students of the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo.The instrument employed for the collection of data was the questionnaire.t-Test analysis and analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used in analyzing the data collected.From the data analysis the following findings were advanced.
That majority of the respondent s access electronic resources from the internet via Cybercafé .There is a high frequency of usage of electronic resources by both male and female Postgraduate Students of the Department of Educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo.In other words gender gap in electronic resource usage is quite negligible.Issues like large mass of irrelevant information, the need to filter the results from search, download delay, failure to find information, inadequate/lack of search skills, high cost of access, power outages, inaccessibility of some electronic resources, difficulties in navigating through electronic resources and so on are problems encountered when using electronic resources by graduate students the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo..

CONCLUSION
It has been determined in this paper that graduate students of the department of educational technology and library science in the University of Uyo need high level of usage of electronic resources even as evident among both male and female gender which is an indication to the fact that even without the expertise knowledge of manipulating information in an electronic environment, students are still getting satisfaction from the little they could get out of electronic sources although handicapped by their low level of accessibility.This high level of use is also as a result of their perception of ease and usefulness of electronic sources such as the web.

Recommendations
Based on the findings of the study the following recommendations were made by the researcher; • Government should equip schools with the enabling infrastructure such as adequate power supply, effective internet connectivity etc. that will encourage the usage of ICTs by students.• ICT centres with well trained personnel should be established in the universities where students can have free access to computers, the web and other electronic sources.

USE OF ELECTRONIC RESOURCES BY GRADUATE STUDENTS
The university is committed to the development of highest academic standards both at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels.The University library has an active collection of 46,745 volumes and handles about 409,977 lending and reference enquiries annually.Current journals stand at slightly higher than 271 representing all disciplinary interests.The library is equipped with modern computers and has a reading space of 970.51 metres with seating capacity for 698.Currently, there are four main divisions which include acquisition, lending, processing and research.The Research Division comprises reference, serials, special collections and government collections.The Special Collection is comprised of Nyong Essien, Africana and government collections.Acquisition and processing selects and orders library materials and organises them for effective use.The Public Service Division deals directly with readers and regulates the use of library materials.It also handles reference questions.

Table 1 :
Population Breakdown for the Study

Table 2 :
Level of accessibility of Respondents

Table 3 :
Use between male and female of the Respondents

Table 4 .
One-way Analysis of variance of the difference in the level of utilization of electronic resources based on the media (internet, cyber café, phone internet and University cafe) used.