Proceedings of The 7th International Conference on Modern Research in Social Sciences
Year: 2023
DOI:
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Information Seeking Behavior of Students with Disability: A Case Study of Haramaya University, Ethiopia
Mariamawit Tesfaye Belete
ABSTRACT:
The information revolution has resulted in dynamic changes in information dissemination services. Accordingly, the dynamic changes and absence of heed to students with disability lead them to face many challenges. Some social psychology depicts physical, mental, and social differences between the societies may be useful for better understanding the cognitive and social background of human information processing and may have important implications or a likely consequence for information dissemination services and systems. This research was initiated to address the problem of information-seeking behavior on students with disability. Data was collected from different students studying in different disciplines. Different data collection tools (questionnaire, guided interview, and observation) were used to gather information from the target samples. Since the total population of the study size is less, the availability sampling techniques were used. The objective of this research is to identify the possible challenges, identify the type of information services, and examine the factors affecting students’ information-seeking behavior. Hence, it is pertinent to explore the disability differences in information-seeking behavior of university students to better assist them in their information search processes. The students were surveyed by means of a semi-structured interview and guided questionnaires to assess what their information needs were, how they met those needs, and whether the information they found from the institution’s information system met their needs or not. The preliminary research result shows that 66.6% of the participants granted libraries were established to service only non-physically challenged users that the first factor to meet their information needs. Based on the findings of the study it is very clear that disabled students are not benefiting from the ongoing technological revolution thus, Information sources and formats improvement are highly needed.
keywords: Equality, Right to Information, Information seeking behavior, Disability