Information-seeking behavior in multilingual digital libraries: A study of the Saudi Digital Library

A few studies investigate the information-seeking behavior of multilingual digital libraries accessed by Arabic users for academic purposes. This dissertation investigates the user's information-seeking behavior of the Saudi Digital Library (SDL) in terms of successfulness finding Arabic and English resources. The SDL, a consortium of databases and electronic resources, provides services to Saudi universities and their faculty, staff, and students inland and abroad. The dissertation goal is to report the information-seeking behavior, needs, and challenges that the SDL users may face during their searches. Four questions were guiding this research to reflect on the experience the SDL users' search experience. Stimulated Recall method is applied in this dissertation. The sample is a convivence sample of eight SDL users' participants, who completed three imposed search tasks (Arabic search task, English search task, and Arabic & English search tasks), and then were interviewed. The interviews were in Arabic and then translated and transcribed into English. Data were analyzed via NVivo 12, and thematic analysis has been applied. Results reveal a lack of accuracy in finding relevant Arabic resources and a lack of accessibility in English resources. Users faced difficulties while completing the search tasks due to technical and human challenges. Most participants were not able to find related results in Arabic. The dissertation suggests implementing a more robust multilingual search system and provides 24/7 support for SDL users. The study contributes to the literature regarding SDL users' behavior and Arabic users' information-seeking, which is understudied