Awareness, Perception and Use of Social Networking Sites among Library Professionals and Semi-Professionals: A Case Study

Academic libraries are playing an important role in promoting library resources and services. Awareness on Social Networking Sites and their use are very much essential to the library professionals and semi- professionals to promote the library resources and services and for maximum utilization of the same. Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE) has 12 libraries and the current study is limited to 10 libraries. The main objective of the study was to study the awareness, perception and use of Social Networking Sites among library professionals and semi-professionals at MAHE libraries. Questionnaire method was used in the study. It is observed from the study that all the respondents are having awareness about social networking sites and have good perceptions about SNSs. The study recommended MAHE libraries to take the initiative in including social networking sites on their library web sites for building a network within themselves as well as with users to maximize the use of library resources and services and to increase the visibility of the libraries