Home Publications College & Research Libraries News index.xml November Information Literacy Student Behaviors

Information literacy student behaviors: Potential items for the National Survey of Student Engagement

C&RL News, November 2005
Vol. 66, No. 10

by Bonnie Gratch-Lindauer

The Institute for Information Literacy’s College Student Surveys Project Group is nearing completion of its charge to identify potential items to recommend for consideration to the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE).¹ The project grew out of interest from some ACRL members in studying the national college student engagement surveys for items related to information literacy.² The charge evolved to include an analysis of seven national standardized college student surveys (primarily first-year surveys) for content relating to information literacy, then focused on NSSE, since it is used by more colleges and universities. George Kuh and Robert Gonyea (Center for Postsecondary Research, Indiana University) have served as resources to the project and have provided much useful information throughout the process.

The process
After initial investigation of the seven surveys, a chart was compiled that compared items related to information literacy. After the 2004 ALA Annual Conference, the project group decided to concentrate on one survey, examining it in-depth, and studying the research methodology and other documentation about how the subscores of NSSE are calculated. Several conference calls moved the work ahead, with a revised focus on developing survey items related to how academic libraries contribute to student learning—a broader approach that would include aspects of information literacy, but would not be limited to them.

We then looked at some locally developed surveys and reviewed two articles relating information technology use and library use behaviors with student engagement areas. The article by Laird and Kuh looked at a set of information technology items piloted on the 2003 NSSE to analyze their relationship to aspects of student engagement.

The second article was an exploratory study by Kuh and Gonyea, which used findings from the 1984-2002 College Student Experiences Questionnaires (CSEQ) relating student experiences with the academic library to their engagement with effective educational practices. Among other findings, are these two:

“the relative strength of the positive relationships between academic uses of information technology and engagement, particularly academic challenge, student-faculty interaction, and active and collaborative learning, suggest that, at the very least, there is overlap between these constructs.”³ 

“….library experiences of undergraduates positively relate to select educationally purposeful activities, such as using computing and information technology and interacting with faculty members. Those students who more frequently use the library reflect a studious work ethic and engage in academically challenging tasks that require higher-order thinking….”⁴ 

At the 2005 ALA Midwinter Meeting, the project group’s discussion centered on Kuh’s suggestion to focus our item development work on student behaviors that contribute to what we define as information literacy, “in addition to student interactions with librarians or their library experiences.”⁵ Since there was plenty of time to prepare these items, we decided to seek broader input from academic librarians and library school educators about what they think some of these behaviors might be.

This broader input was obtained from a six-month, adapted Delphi process to gather evidence and support from a polling of library and information science educators and practitioners. A request for participation in two QuickTopic forums was made to six different electronic lists between February and May 2005. The first invited participation in describing behaviors or activities that college students might engage in that would support development of information literacy competencies. From the first round, 56 postings were reviewed by project group members, who deleted the clearly redundant ones and organized the remaining behaviors and activities into nine broad categories. These student behaviors/activities became the content for the second QuickTopic theme. A posting to the same lists requested a review and ranking of the behaviors and activities. The 37 unique postings were compiled and the results are depicted in the table on these pages. The number before the behavior is the number of respondents selecting the behavior/activity among their top three to five.

Review and endorsement
At its summer ALA Annual Conference meeting, the project group reviewed these findings from the field along with the items currently on the 2005 NSSE to determine the final items for submission. The resulting items were reviewed and endorsed by the Executive Committee of the Institute for Information Literacy and the ACRL Executive Board. In mid-August, six new items were submitted to the NSSE staff for consideration. The project group also identified 22 items currently on the 2005 NSSE Web survey that support or relate to information literacy behaviors. If the new items are accepted as experimental items on the 2006 NSSE, they could be analyzed along with the 22 current items as part of a set of information literacy related behaviors. As an example, the chart on the following page illustrates one current item that asks students how frequently they have done specific things. The left column lists three student behaviors the project group have submitted for consideration as experimental items. The right column identifies current items that we believe should be considered as part of the set of information literacy contributing/related items.

Of course, we are aware that this type of survey research does not provide evidence of causality, but it can help to identify the strength of relationships among specific information literacy-related behaviors and a set of behaviors strongly associated with engaging in effective educational practices.

Project group members want to thank all our colleagues who took the time to respond to one or both of the QuickTopic postings.

Notes
1. Project Group members are: Bonnie Gratch-Lindauer, chair; Elizabeth Dupuis; Colleen Boff; Polly D. Boruff-Jones; Lisa Hinchliffe; Ilene Rockman; Kwasi Sarkodie-Mensah; Scottie Cochrane; and Margit Watts.

2. As sometimes happens, a couple of serendipitous events occurred along the way. The project group learned of two related activities: a Council on Library and Information Resources’ Academic Libraries Advisory Committee project to submit some items to NSSE and interest in a similar task among members of the Oberlin Libraries Group, facilitated by Tom Kirk.

3. Thomas F. Nelson Laird and George D. Kuh, “Student experiences with information technology and their relationship to other aspects of student engagement,” Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Association for Institutional Research, June 2004: 18.

4. George D. Kuh and Robert M. Gonyea. “The role of the academic library in promoting student engagement in leaning,” College & Research Libraries 64, no. 4 (2003): 269-270.

5. E-mail from George D. Kuh, Nov. 21, 2004.

Bonnie Gratch-Lindauer is coordinator of instructional services at City College of San Francisco, e-mail: bgratch@ccsf.org

© 2005 Bonnie Gratch-Lindauer