Awareness and use of electronic resources in special libraries of Delhi NCR

Abstract

The advent of Information and Communication Technology has shown a great impact on the library services. The position of the libraries and information centres has immensely changed during last decade due to the appearance of electronic resources. It has provided many possibilities and opportunities for providing faster and quicker access to information at the global level. The objective of the present research paper is to study about the awareness and use of electronic resources by the users of selected special libraries of Delhi NCR. The study also explores the purpose and problems in using e-resources and satisfaction level of the users with the available electronic resources. The study shows that 58.5% users visit library daily. 87.1% users are aware of search engines, 84.2% aware about e-journals and 80% users are aware about e-books. 75.4% users are using search engines followed by e-books (71%) and e-journals (64.7%). Majority of the respondents (61%) use e-resources for their course work/ study material followed by research work (57.7%) and to get current information (55.9%). Slow speed of network, lack of awareness about e-resources, and lack of guidance regarding availability of e-resources are some of the problems being faced by the respondents in accessing e-resources. It has been found in the study that 49.2% respondents are satisfied whereas 40.3% respondents are partially satisfied with the available e-resources.