Awareness and Use of Open Access (OA) Initiatives in Ensuring Free Access to Information Among Librarians in Academic Libraries in Nigeria (Published)
This study was carried out to investigate the Awareness and Use of Open Access Initiatives in Ensuring Free Access to Information in Academic Libraries in Nigeria. The descriptive survey research design was adopted for this study. Five research objectives and five research questions were formulated to guide the study. The population of this study comprised librarians in academic libraries in South-South, Nigeria. Data for the study was collected using a structured questionnaire developed by the researcher and was administered online using Google forms. 62 forms were filled and submitted from the professional platforms. The study used frequency counts and percentages to analyze the data. The findings revealed that librarians in academic libraries in South-South, Nigeria understand OA initiatives to be free availability of online information resources and promotion of free access to scholarly literature. Findings also revealed that Institutional repository, Open access publishing, open access journals and Directory of Open Access Journals are the initiatives that librarians are mostly aware of. The study also found that the OA initiatives mostly utilized by Librarians included open access journals, Institutional repository and DOAJ. Further findings also showed that most librarians felt that the relevance of OA initiatives included: It enables researchers’ access relevant materials, wider accessibility, Information is unrestricted, increased author visibility and Information is available 24/7. Lack of awareness, lack of relevant policies and technophobia were the major challenges of OA initiatives. This implies that librarians are mostly aware of OA initiatives and also utilize them. Based on the findings of the study, it was recommended among others that efforts should be made by librarians in keeping aware of OA initiatives and utilize them properly for access to information.
Keywords: Academic Libraries, Librarians, Open Access, Utilization, initiatives