Barriers to and facilitators of information-seeking behavior of medical students of West Visayas State University

Abstract

This study aimed to determine the barriers to and facilitators of information seeking behavior of medical students. It sought to determine if there are relationships that exist among the respondents’ personal characteristics and perceived barriers or facilitators to their information seeking behavior. This research is a descriptive relational study. It was conducted using a survey questionnaire utilizing items used by researchers who have conducted similar studies on the areas covered in this research. The instruments used were content validated by experts and was scrutinized by the West Visayas State University Unified Biomedical Research Ethics Review Committee. The subjects of the study were 182 medical students from among 333 first year to third year medical students enrolled at the West Visayas State University College of Medicine in the second semester, academic year 2015-2016. Frequency counts, percentage analyses, mean, cross tabulation, Gamma and Chi square were highly utilized and all statistical computations were processed via Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 17. All inferential computations were set at 5% level of significance. Of the characteristics involved, only year level was significantly related to library needs. Likewise, age and year level were related to perceived adequacy of library resources and services. Furthermore, amount of time spent in the library, library need, skills in locating and searching for information were all found to be significantly related to information seeking behavior. Similarly, perceived adequacy and accessibility of library resources and services were also found to be significantly related to information seeking-behavior of the medical students.