Purpose The purpose of this paper is to discuss the importance of selecting “well-matched” independent and dependent variables in quantitative research to maximize the possibility of detecting impact of library services on indicators of student success. The paper introduces the concept of sensitivity, which is the extent to which a measure will detect change in the thing being measured. Design/methodology/approach To make the case, the authors use the impact of amount of library instruction received on Grade Point Average (GPA) as an example, explaining a correlational research study at their institution. However, the emphasis of the paper is on the conceptual importance of sensitivity in variable selection in quantitative studies of all types. Findings After finding no statistically significant relationship between the amount of library instruction received and GPA, the authors determined that GPA was not a sensitive enough variable to detect the impact of a few class sessions taught by a librarian throughout students entire undergraduate career. Based on the findings and the literature, the authors conclude that the practice of selecting “insensitive” dependent variables that are unlikely to detect impact of the independent variable is a common practice in the library assessment literature. Originality/value In an era where bigger is better when it comes to demonstrating impact of library services, this paper argues that libraries sometimes diminish their ability to illustrate their contributions to student success by choosing large scale indicators of student success as independent variables which fail to detect the impact of library services.
Academic librarians have long been committed to developing their students' abilities to assess the quality and credibility of various types of information. A combination of increasing public discourse about evaluating every day information and librarians' commitment to empowering students to be responsible consumers of information led Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) librarians to develop the #VetYourSources campaign, focused on enhancing undergraduate students' skills for evaluating information in academic and day-to-day contexts through social media. This chapter details the design, planning, and execution of the campaign, as well as future directions.
Objective – This article presents findings about undergraduate student attitudes regarding search data privacy in academic libraries. Although the library literature includes many articles about librarian perceptions on this matter, this paper adds rich, qualitative evidence to the limited research available about student preferences for how libraries should handle information about what they search for, borrow, and download. This paper covers acceptable and unacceptable uses of student search data based on American undergraduate student perspectives. This is an important area of study due to the increasingly data-driven nature of evaluation, accountability, and improvement in higher education, which relies on individual-level student data for learning analytics. These practices are sometimes at odds with libraries’ longstanding commitment to user privacy, which has historically limited the amount of data collected about student use of materials. However, libraries’ use of student search data is increasing. Methods – This qualitative study was approached through interpretive description, a rigorous qualitative framework for answering practical research questions in an applied setting or discipline. I employed the constant comparative method of data collection and analysis to conduct semi-structured interviews with 27 undergraduate students at a large, American, urban public research institution. Interviews included questions as well as vignettes: short scenarios designed to elicit response. Through inductive coding, I organized the data into interpretive themes and subthemes to describe student attitudes. Results – Participants viewed academic library search data as less personally revealing than internet search data. As a result, students were generally comfortable with libraries collecting search data so long as it is used for their benefit. They were comfortable with data being used to improve library collections and services, but were more ambivalent about use of search data for personalized search results and for learning analytics-based assessment. Students had mixed feelings about using search data in investigations related to criminal activity or national security. Most students expressed a desire for de-identification and user control of data. Students who were not comfortable with their search data being collected or used often held their convictions more strongly than those who found the practice acceptable, and their concerns were often related to how data might be used in ways that harm members of vulnerable groups. Conclusion – The results of this study suggested that librarians should further explore student perspectives about search data collection in academic libraries to consider how and if they might adjust their data collection practices to be respectful of student preferences for privacy, while still meeting evaluation and improvement objectives. This study also introduces the qualitative framework of interpretive description to the library and information science literature, promoting use of this applied qualitative approach, which is well-suited to the practical questions often asked in library research studies.
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