Library and Information Science Research
Year:2011 | Volume:1 | Issue:1|Papers Count:15

The determination of the relationship between structure and action is a fundamental issue in social sciences and understanding something about the world. Taylor, based on structuration theory of Giddens, believes that the information use environment (IUE) is the social context or setting within which people live and work. Based on the works by Taylor and Giddens, this paper examines the information behavior models. Findings revealed that one important concern in information science is to understand the social context within which the use of information takes place in organizational settings. Information is generated, searched, acquired, evaluated, organized, disseminated and used in a social context.

The present study aims to survey the feasibility of implementing knowledge management in academic libraries of Isfahan based on Bukowitz and William's model. A survey- descriptive method was used, and the population under investigating included all librarians in the academic libraries of Isfahan in 2009-2010. To determine the sample size, 138 librarians were selected based on Cochran formula. Sampling method was random stratified sampling and the tool for collecting the research data was a researcher- developed questionnaire with the Likert scale.The face validity of the questionnaire was approved by experienced teachers and in order to determine the reliability Cronbach's alpha coefficient it was used (0.80). Findings revealed that the possibility of implementing knowledge management in academic libraries of Isfahan based on Bukowitz and William's model is lower than the average (19.36) and it was impossible to implement it equally. Also there was not a significant difference among the average of subjects based on demographic variables i.e. gender, measure of study, background of employment, academic degree, type of work in library, and library type (P>0/05); But in terms of academic degree there was significant difference in contributing and assessing knowledge (P<0/05). In other words, librarians with the diploma degree compared with librarians holding bachelor and masters degree found the more possible contributing and assessing knowledge.

This study identifies the conflict management styles used by university library managers in relation to demographic variables (gender, education, academic vs. administrative status, part-time or full-time involvement in library administration, and experience). Thomas’ model of conflict management styles (i.e. domination, avoidance, accommodation, compromise and collaboration) was used as the theoretical framework. Data were collected using a questionnaire designed by the researcher. The questionnaire was sent to 145 university library managers selected randomly from the higher education zones.Findings shows that majority of managers prefer the cooperative style. Their next choice is domination and compromise. Accommodation and avoidance styles come last. Gender, Education, and status show no impact management conflict style. Non-academic managers tend to use the accommodation style. Full-time managers use the avoidance style more than part-time managers. Experienced managers tend to use the avoidance style less. Gender does not show a difference in the tendency toward a specific style. However, experienced male managers expressed a tendency toward using the domination style. The academic library managers need to receive education about the types of organizational conflict, conflict management, and conflict management styles.

This research aims to investigate the use of post-graduate theses in library and information science in Isfahan libraries. Research populations consist of 26 managers and librarians and 54 theses and dissertations. Sampling was not considered. Semi-structured interviews were carried out. The technique of continual comparison proposed by Grounded Theory methodology was used for analysis of data.12 categories were explored. Use was the basic category.Other categories identified include: recognition, information and communication system, management, content and structure of theses, legal, organizational, and financial support issues. Each category influences the use. Research priorities also affect the use. Relationships among categories were found to be direct, indirect, and combined.Findings showed that suggestions and results in theses are not used in libraries investigated. Managers proposed the following as barriers: weakness of information and communication channels, weakness of management systems, legal issues, cultural, financial, organizational, and professional problems and problems related to content and structure of theses.

Little is known about how Persian Wikipedians are attracted to Wikipedia or discouraged contributing to it. This paper attempts to bridge this gap. A sample of 15 active users of Fa.Wikipedia was selected in a non-random fashion according to availability and convenience of the users.Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 2 methods: face to face interview and email interview. Strauss and Corbin’s method was used for coding the collected data. After analyzing the data, 4 grounds namely editing incentive, writing incentive, stimulant and deterrent motivations were extracted. Findings indicate that lots of motivations can affect Wikipedian’s collaboration. We divided these factors into internal and external motivations.Internal motivations could be individual or cognitive motivations or related to Wikipedia structure. Besides, some factors like permanent access to the Internet can be considered as external motivations. After extracting the motivations of collaboration, we extracted stimulant and deterrent motivations. Analysis of the data shows content production and enrichment of Fa.Wikipedia is the strongest reason for contributing to this project. In contrast, entertainment is considered as the weakest motivation. Conversely, the feedback from other users can be the strongest motivation that simulates users to stay in Wikipedia and continue their contribution. On the other hand, internal and external challenges that Fa.Wikipedia is exposed to are effective enough to influence the contribution of Persian Wikipedians. In addition to improvement of the Fa.Wikipedia status, identifying the motivations and challenges can have a great role in improvement and expansion of Persian Web content too.

This article's aim was to investigate the critical factors affecting publication of scientific papers among Iranian women researchers 1993 to 2009. The research employed document study and survey methodologies. The WoS (Web of Science) database of Thompson Scientific (formerly ISI) was employed to identify Iranian women researchers and their attitude towards critical factors was collected by a researcher-made questionnaire which was sent to 100 woman researchers. Findings indicated that women assess three critical factors (scientific improvement, intuitive abilities and assiduity scored) as the first priority and behind them factors such as social effectiveness, occupational improvement, patronage by family members scored as second set of factors. Based on the main findings of the research some notions were proposed to empower women researchers in scientific production.

This research used documentary method and citation analysis to analyze the collected data. The statistical society of this research was formed by the indexed scientific documents of 117 researchers of institutions of Shahid Beheshti University in WoS, Scopus and Google Scholar databases. H and g indexes and m parameter of researchers were calculated through the combination of data gathered from these three databases. For this statistical society, the average numbers for h and g indexes were 0.85 and 2.66. Also the average number for m parameter was equal to 0.41. H-index, g-index and m parameter show a higher number in men’s group rather than women’s group. The highest measured h-index number in men's group was 23 and in women’s group, it was 18. Also the highest measured g-index in men’s group was 33 but in women’s group, it was 27. The highest m parameter for men’s group was 2.5 and for women’s group it was 2. H and g indexes and m parameter of 60 researchers (51.3% of the statistical population) were equal to zero. Total outcome of this study indicates that the majority of researchers in research institutions of Shahid Beheshti University have low h-index, g-index and m parameter. Also this study indicates that the researchers in Medical plants and drugs, Environmental Sciences and Laser and plasma research Institutions have a higher h-index, g-index and m parameter than researchers of Family research Institution and Quran miracle research Institution.

According to Piaget, a child can construct and develop his cognition while interacting with objects and individuals. By providing interactive concrete objects, Children's websites can have educational and entertaining roles in children's cognitive development. Based on Piaget's, cognitive development consists of three stages.Since children at Concrete Operational Stage (COS), i.e.7-11 years old, are interested in using electronic and web-based devices, if websites provide concrete operational experiences and deal with thinking challenges, they are suitable tools for enhancing their cognitive development.This paper attempts to investigate the extent to which children's websites are capable of providing a context for developing concrete operational thinking abilities in children. A qualitative research as well assurvey and content analysis were methods for carrying out this study. Eleven Farsi websites and a sample of 30 English websites, which are selected through systematic random sampling from the list of "Great Websites for Children", were considered as population of this research. A checklist was the instrument for data gathering. Four fundamental features of concrete operational thinking, i.e, Classification, Seriation (Ordering), Conservation and Reversibility, provide the basis for designing the checklist.Findings indicate that the children's websites are moderately capable in enhancing classification and conservation skills in children; they are not well designed in fostering seriation (ordering) and reversibility. It can be concluded that such tools are not well prepared to provide 7-11 aged children with the opportunity to develop their cognitive abilities.

The aim of this research was to investigate the scientific productions by researchers at Ferdowsi University of Mashhad over a period of twenty years in order to assess the scientific collaboration among researchers at this university via measuring the frequency of received citations. Scientometrics indicators such as Lutka law, Bradford Scattering law and citation analysis were used to analyses the data gathered from the Web of Science database. Findings show that FUM researchers have published 2318 documents in this database. The collaboration frequency in this university matches Lutka law, also the frequency of core subject documents published by these researchers is in accordance with Bradford law. Results also indicate that Ferdowsi University of Mashhad has an increasing growth rate of 34/2% regarding global science production. Citation analyses show that there is a positive relationship between frequency of journal publishers with received citations and collaboration of a researcher with frequency of published documents as well. Scientific structure of this university is mapped and analyzed with HistCite Software according to the number of global citations and it shows that science map of this university covers 9 clusters.

The aim of this article is to investigate the influence of bibliotherapy on hearing-impaired students ' internalized and externalized syndromes decrease in Birjand Vesaal Exceptional Elementry School in 1388-1389 (2009-2010). The approach adopted was semi-experimental and of applied type. The research population included the school's B-age-group hearing-impaired students. The data collection tool in this research was the Child Behavior Checklist and Teacher's Report Form, which Data were organized based on the Achenbach's psychiatric test. In this research, first, the inventories were completed for each entry by their parents and teacher. Then, the bibliotherapy procedure was conducted using the opted books for B age group as well as the CDs containing the sign language of these books.Also post-test was carried out by parents and teachers. The results from the pre-tests and post-tests entries were compared by the researcher using the dependant T-test in SPSS software platform and plotting the psychographs with regard to each entry in pre-test and post-test with Excel. As expected, the obtained results from this research demonstrated that bibliotherapy with use of appropriate books for children decreases the internalized syndromes including: anxiety/depression problems, withdrawal/ depression, physical complaints and externalized syndromes including: offensive and Aggressive behaviors and social problems and attention and thought effected too. Bibliotherapy will decrease behavioral and social problems among these students.

This research aims to compare the capabilities of a thesaurus and an ontology for representation of knowledge in Library and Information Science (LIS), in the domain of Indexing and Persian language. The research also has developed a methodology of ontology construction by implementing domain analysis methodology.The present work developed a prototype ontology named ASFAOnt by reengineering a current thesaurus in Persian language named ASFA.The ontology was evaluated by a retrieval test in which the usability and the performance of the ontology were investigated. Usability and performance were compared with ASFA thesaurus. The evaluation was carried out as a controlled experiment in which a group of information searchers, LIS master students, used the thesaurus and ontology to extract three keywords. The evaluative study was followed by a qualitative analysis of the nature of concepts, individual relationships and the textual and visual display so as to provide an understanding of and insight into the quality of the ontology as well as to gather ideas for further development. In order to gather more validated data on users’ performance and satisfaction, a thinking aloud technique was used. Also the experimental retrieval test regarding the usability test was followed by a questionnaire survey, constructed on the basis of the ONTOMETRIC approach.The result of the study indicates that ontology structure is useful and provides valuable inspiration for the user. Fundamental differences of domain knowledge representation between them were then identified.Relationships such as broader term (BT) and narrower term (NT) in the ASFA could support a capacity for reasoning based on generation and specification, assuming the relationships themselves are valid. However, ASFAOnt ontology supports the deduction of conclusion based on domain knowledge described in the ontology. We conclude that ontology can provide a better representation of the domain knowledge and more advanced power of reasoning based on the underlying knowledge representation.

The main aim of this research was to investigate the status of book publishing in Iran during the last three decades (1979 to 2008). Documentary and descriptive as well as analytical methods were used to carry out the survey. All published books were identified and analyzed in terms of their subjects, authors, publishers, and city of publication. Findings show that in total, 560339 books have been published during the studied period of time. The rate of publication increased from 1863 in 1979 to 56893 tiles in 2008. Abouh 77 percent of books were authored while the rest (23 percent) were translated ones. Also 51 percent of publications were first edition works.Approximately 77 percent of books were published in Tehran and the rest were published in other provinces. The number of publishers increased approximately 10 percent each year. Regarding the subject of books, religious books, computer sciences, information and general works had respectively the highest and lowest rates. With respect to the first hypothesis findings showed that there was a meaningful relationship between the average price and the total circulations, and regarding the second hypothesis, it was found that there was a meaningful relationship between the number of active publishers and total circulations of books.