Information Literacy Search Skills of Students in Five Selected Private Universities in Ogun State, Nigeria: A Survey

ABSTRACT The study investigated the knowledge of information literacy and search skills of students in five selected private universities in Ogun state, Nigeria. It also examined students’ ability to distinguish diverse information sources as well as assess the effectiveness of information literacy programmes of private universities. The sample consists of 359 respondents drawn proportionately from a population of 400 from the selected universities. Descriptive survey method was used to elicit data through the Monash University Library Questionnaire on Information Literacy in this study. The data collected were analyzed using simple percentages. It was found that preponderance of respondents have low knowledge of information literacy skills, showed high deficiency in identifying diverse information sources and the various information literacy programmes of the respondents’ institutions lacked hands-on. The study concluded that sound information literacy skills is a desideratum in knowledge acquisition in the twenty-first century and recommended inter alia; that information literacy skills be integrated into the secondary and tertiary schools’ curricula. Thus, the need for an enhanced and continuous library user education geared towards empowering students to be sufficiently familiar with information sources, mutual collaboration between teachers and librarians to ensure integrated mode of lecture delivery, constant advocacy and sensitization outreaches