JOURNAL OF EPISTEMOLOGY (LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY)
Year:2009 | Volume:1 | Issue:3|Papers Count:9

The aim of the present research is to study the information seeking of faculty members of Islamic Azad University, Firoozkooh Branch. Data were collected using a questionnaire. They were distributed among 294 faculty members. By means of Krejcie and Morgan’s table 165 samples were selected. Research findings indicate that faculty members’ important aims are preparing scientific articles, updating their professional knowledge. So, they use books, Internet and scientific journals. They also evaluated the currency and updatedness of university library less than average. The most common problems of respondents in the time of seeking information are: lack of time, unavailability of information materials in the library and unfamiliarity with search strategies in online information seeking. Finally, research hypotheses are confirmed by Chi-square test.

This research aims to analyze indexed articles in Atomic Energy Organization of Iran for INIS database and compare the citation behaviors of their authors during the years 2002-2006. Then, it tries to determine the core journals. The research is a survey study done using citation analysis method. The method of compiling data is by taking notes from the resources of these articles. The results of the research revealed that there were totally 4351 citations in 300 analyzed articles, so the average number of citations for each article was 14.5. Most of articles with 20.33 percent were in “Nuclear Radiology and Medicine” subject. The Bradford Law comes true with the Latin journals used by authors and there were three core journals named “Physics Review”, “Physics Review Letter”, and “Physica” in the analyzed articles. Also, 9 most used Persian and 18 Latin books were determined. Authors of the articles, in total, have the most range of using journals with 70.44 percent citation and least range of using electronic resources with 1.01 percent citation. The half-life of the cited resources in the analyzed articles is 7.2 years overall. The half-life of the Persian cited resources were 4 years and the half-life of the Latin cited resources were 9.6 years, in average. In analysis of the language of cited resources, English resources have the first rank with 93.82 percent of citations. After that, Persian resources were in second rank with 5.03 percent of citations.

The research aims to do a survey on librarians’ information literacy rate in public libraries of Tehran, affiliated to the Board of Iranian Public Libraries. The research is a descriptive survey. For collecting needed information, a questionnaire was prepared and distributed among 131 librarians of Public libraries in Tehran. The questionnaires were including 41 closed questions and 1 open question. In order to analyze collected data, using descriptive statistical methods, SPSS software was applied. Research findings showed that 74 percent of personnel are women and only 26 percent are men; 140 computers are specified for librarians and 66 computers for users; there is one computer available for each librarian per capita; software used by all libraries is Namayeh; rate of familiarity with computer courses by librarians is low and librarians need to pass educational courses in this field very much. Also, personnel of the field of librarianship with average of 3/50 have more information literacy compared to personnel of other subjects with average 3/23 and with those who have no university studies with average 2/93. Generally, lack of enough skills in the application of computers, language barriers especially English, and relative familiarity with research tools were the most important obstacles for accessing information resources. Finally, in line with research hypotheses it was found that there is a correlation between study field of librarians and their information literacy, and it was concluded that librarians’ information literacy level is intermediate.

Using indicators and statistics of ISI, this paper comparatively evaluates Iran indexed scientific productions through 2006 to 2007. According to the number of indexed scientific production in WOS, Iran is in a good situation in terms of the growth rate. Tehran University had the most scientific productions in WOS in 2007. Also, according to the statistics of ESI, Iran is in the second place after Turkey among Islamic countries and is in the fortieth place in the world, during the last ten years. Most of the scientific productions of Iran was indexed in SCIE section of WOS and published in English “article” formats. Based on JCR statistics, three Iranian Journals in 2005 were indexed in SCI section of this database and three more journals were added to it in 2006. Shiraz University had the most journals in JCR in 2006.

This survey has been done to show the citations of articles published in Persian librarianship periodicals and also to analyze citations used by Persian articles presented in scientific librarianship meetings and conferences from 1996 to 2006. The research population includes all citations (6288 citations) of articles published in six journals of library and information science during this period. The results show that the citations of articles presented in meetings is 293 which is %4/66 of total number of articles citations. The comparative analysis of the 6 library journals indicates that “Faslname-ye Ketab” has the maximum rate which is 168 case, or (%57/32) citations were cited articles that are presented in domestic conferences and 125 (%42,66) citations were cited articles that have been presented in international conferences. These scales prove the research hypotheses namely “Faslname-ye Etlaresani” has maximum average of citation per published papers from domestic conferences (0/268); “Faslname-ye Etlashenasi” has minimum average (0/05); “Faslname-ye Ketab” has maximum average (0/186) of international conferences, and “Faselname-ye Etlashenasi” has minimum average (0/04). Regarding half-life of citation in journals, it is concluded that “Faslname-ye Ketbdari - va - Etlaresani” with 4 years and 8 months keeps the high record in half-life of citation of articles presented in domestic conferences and “Faslname-ye Payame Ketabkhaneh with 5 years and six month has the high record of international conferences.

The present project has been performed to study attitudes of university libraries of the country towards a draft code of professional ethics of Iranian librarians and information specialists and provide a model for planning final code of ethics. For collecting date in this study questionnaires have been used. These questionnaires have been designed on the basis of draft code of professional ethics of Iranian Library and Information Science Association, Qom Branch. It is notable that this draft codified according to complied and written ethical code of librarianship for 38 countries available in the IFLA site and published as a book. For accepting or rejecting of research hypotheses, Mann-Whitney U-test and Kruskall-Wallis test, and for answering to the project questions, Friedman test have been utilized. Result of Friedman test showed that preferences of code of professional ethics based on academic librarians’ viewpoint are responsibility to self, society, user, colleagues, field, organization, and profession, respectively.

After the emergence of the Internet, we have observed the appearance of new trends in the World Wide Web. One of the most outstanding events that has become so widespread during recent years is “Weblog”, a new medium, which recently came to existence and became familiar all over the world. Today, thousands of weblogs, with different topics and millions of visitors exist, exchanging a great amount of information and thoughts. It has been recently announced that one weblog is made per second. However, using this informative and communicative technology makes a big challenge in the issues related to the editor’s rights. In fact, free access to the sources violates the laws concerning the editor’s rights. Now, this question is put forward: How is copyright in weblogs as a member of the big family of Internet? And also how are the webloggers rights observed? There are various perspectives regarding the necessity of observing editors’ rights in weblogs and how to force bloggers to consider this point. Therefore, in the present article, in addition to defining weblog, editor’s right and perspectives in this regard, we also aim to provide probable solutions.

The purpose of this project is doing a feasibility study and designing a comprehensive system for acquisition, processing and dissemination of scientific information in the field of Nanotechnology in Iran. In this project, Nanotechnology institution, its directors and about 3230 experts and researcher in Nanotechnology served as statistical population. In first stage, situation of Nanotechnology information system is investigated by observation and interview. Then, the users’ information needs are investigated with questionnaire and in second stage, suitable information system is designed. The result of research indicates that 58% of users, to fulfill their information needs refer to academic centers and 31% of them refer to research centers and 11% of them refer to other centers; 85% of users donۥt have access to scientific information in suitable time and place; 89% of managers agree with collecting digital resources to fulfill and meet users' information needs. There is no institution or body in the country to collect, process, organize and disseminate Nanotechnology information. Based on users’ information needs, organizational goals and managers’ demands, the Nanotechnology digital library network is designed according to human resources, budget, electronic online sources, and software and hardware equipment standards.