Awareness and Use of Social Media Platforms for Information Dissemination By Librarians in Benue State Schools of Nursing and Midwifery, Makurdi

ABSTRACT The study examined awareness and use of social media platforms for information dissemination by librarians in Benue State Schools of Nursing and Midwifery, Makurdi-Benue State, Nigeria. Four (4) objectives with corresponding research questions guided the study. The study adopted descriptive survey design. Questionnaire was the instrument used to collect data for the study. The population of the study comprised of 4 professional librarians in school of Nursing and 4 librarians in school of Midwifery library, Makurdi which gives a total population of 8 library staff for the study. A census of all librarians in the schools was carried out since the population was small and can conveniently be handled by the researcher. Data was collected and analyzed using frequency counts and mean scores to answer the research questions. The findings study revealed that, librarians in Benue State Schools of Nursing and Midwifery Makurdi are aware of social media platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and Blogs for information dissemination to a high extent. Findings of the study also revealed that, Facebook and WhatsApp are the type of social media platforms mostly utilized by librarians in Benue State Schools of Nursing and Midwifery, Makurdi for information dissemination. Also, the extent of utilization of Facebook by librarians for information dissemination is high extent. But there is low extent of use of social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, Blogs as well as Pinterest for information dissemination by librarians in Schools of Nursing and Midwifery, Makurdi. However, findings further revealed that, lack of social media skills, poor support from ministry of health and school management, lack of internet access, unreliable power supply, inadequate training opportunities for SONM library staff, among others were the problems militating against effective use of social media platforms for information dissemination by librarians in Benue State Schools of Nursing and Midwifery, Makurdi. Finally, the study made recommendations based on the findings