University of Nebraska - Lincoln

DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal) Libraries at University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Winter 12-12-2021

Impact and Usage of E-Resources: A Literature Review

Konduru Jamuna, Librarian, GFGC, Peenya Research Scholar
Reva University, [email protected]

Dr. M. Dhanamjaya, Research Guide, Vice Chancellor,

Reva University, Bangalore, [email protected]

Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libphilprac

Part of the Library and Information Science Commons

Jamuna,, Konduru Librarian, GFGC, Peenya Research Scholar and Dhanamjaya,, Dr. M. Research Guide,
Vice Chancellor,, "Impact and Usage of E-Resources: A Literature Review" (2021). Library Philosophy and
Practice (e-journal). 6735.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libphilprac/6735
 Impact and Usage of E-Resources: A Literature Review
Konduru Jamuna
Research Scholar, REVA University, Bengaluru
Librarian, GFGC Peenya, Bengaluru
Email: [email protected]

Dr. M. Dhanamjaya
Guide
Vice Chancellor, REVA University, Bengaluru
Email: [email protected]

Abstract

The advent of Information Communication Technology (ICT) has brought radical changes in
all spheres of life in the way in which information is gathered, stored, organized, processed and
consumed. The changing trend in ICT has also impacted the work and working pattern of
libraries. This paper provides a meticulous review of literature on Impact and Usage of E-
Resources. Reviewed the published literature during 2000 to 2019 those reviews reveal that the
use of E-Resources i.e. E-Books, E-Journals, E-Theses, E-Databases, etc. are becoming very
common in this new technological era. As the academic libraries are mainly used by the
teachers, researchers and students, e-resources have a great impact to their academic and
research work. Majority of the users are dependent on e-resources and those resources are also
impacted their reading habit in their walk of life.

Key Words: Electronic Resources or E-Resources, E-Books, E-Journals, E-Databases,

Academic Libraries.

Introduction

Today we are living in the era of information explosion. Information is a dynamic and unending
resource that affects all disciplines and all walks of human life. Since last decade, E-Resources
or Electronic Resources have become a substantial component of the document collection in
academic libraries. The impact of electronic resources in academic world is phenomenal, and
leading to wide spread availability of them. The internet is constantly influencing the
development of new modes of scholarly communication. With the growing popularity of E-
Resources, the existing traditional libraries are now transforming into Electronic Libraries in
which most of the resources i.e. books, journals, theses, and other reading materials are
available in electronic form and also adding more web-based resources to their collection.In
this context, the present paper provides a review of the literature on various aspects of use and
impact of E-Resources or Electronic Resources on the users of libraries i.e. faculty members,
researchers, students and other users.

Sources Consulted: This paper encompasses a selective range of research papers on E-

Resources published in national and international journals, conferences of national and
international repute, commemorated volumes, theses and dissertations, case studies. These
sources cover the time period from 2014 to 2019.

Structure of the Paper: The literature reviewed is organized into two related themes on the
basis of the thought content directly drawn from the literature and presented chronologically
within each theme.

The themes of the present study are as under:

• Usage of E-Resources
• Impact of E-Resources

Usage of E-Resources

Karunarathna, H M P P (2014) article titled Use of Electronic Resources by Law Degree

Students at Anuradhapura Regional Centre of the Open University of Sri Lanka. The findings
revealed that 93% of students have been used electronic resources but most of them were
unaware how to use various electronic resources for their academic activities. Further, findings
revealed that lack of computer skills and English language skills have also been affected to the
usage of electronic resources. Their main barrier was insufficient work station with bandwidth.
So the researcher recommended to increase the computer facility at ARC library and develop
new courses and training sessions to develop their computer skills and English language
proficiency.

Bala, Suniti& Lal, Payare (2016) in their article titled Usage of Electronic Resources and their
Impact on Reading Culture: Study of Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana disclosed that
e-books, e-journals, and electronic thesis are the most commonly used e-resources among the
students, other online databases are less popular among students, most of the students are of
the opinion that e-resources have improved their reading habit and they are friendly with the
use of e-resources. Its use made them more confident and it drove them to learn the searching
skills. The students prefer to use the library resources for their research but they opt to use their
own electronic gadgets as they feel that that the library has inadequate facilities in terms of
infrastructure. On the other hand, most of the students accepted that the library has a
satisfactory internet facility. The students accepted that the training to use electronic resources
is provided by the library staff and they possess adequate skills to retrieve the information from
e-resources.

Tripathi, Bhavana. Sonkar, Sharad Kumar &Rajbanshi, VishwasJeet (2016) in their article
titled Use and Impact of E-Resources among Research Scholars: A Comparative Study of
Agriculture and Technology Universities in Uttar Pradesh. Findings of the study are majority
of the users are aware of e-resources and used e-resources in a month for the learning, study
and research. The most of the scholars preferred e-journals due to ease of searching and
browsing facilities. They are utilizing print as well as e-resources for various purpose. Majority
of research scholars are not satisfied with the availability of electronic journals, internet
connectivity and its speed in the universities.

Ananda, S K. et. al. (2017) The article emphasis the use and awareness of Electronic
Information Resources (EIR) among UG & PG students of T John College, the study identifies
the awareness of electronic information resources among students i.e. 81% opined that they are
aware of Electronic Information Resources (EIR) and 19% opined that they are not aware of
Electronic information Resources. Students use electronic resources for Project Work
i.e.74.07%, followed by preparing class notes 64.19%. The students use EIR for Social
Networking i.e. 56.79%, followed by 55.55% for preparing assignments and 43.02% for
entertainment purpose.

Hosaini, SomayaBinta (2017) studied Use and Impact of Electronic Resources: A study on
Two Selected Academic Libraries. Major findings of the study are maximum users of all the
university libraries are preferred to use electronic journal than any other electronic resources.
Majority of the users’ use e-resources in most days which is a good sign, most of the users use
e-resources for learning and research purpose. The users are highly benefited by using
electronic resources because they get current information and the data can be retrieved quickly,
most of the users get it difficult to find relevant information, which is a major problem of using
e-resources, though some libraries provide orientation program, maximum users required to
get presentation of different resources and IT training. Majority of the users consider that e-
resources save their time and money and they get up to-date information which is a great impact
of using electronic resources. A large number of users indicate that they have a high level of
success in research/academic work for using e-resources, most of the users feel comfortable to
use e-resources.

Singh, Mridula& Srivastava, Rochna (2018) in their titled Use and Impact of E-Resources by
the Users of Private Universities and Institutions. It surveyed the user’s awareness about
available e-resources in these libraries, purpose and frequency of using e-resources by the
users, the factor affecting resource utilization, impact of e-resources and services on the
academic work of the users. It reveals that the use of e-resources is very common among the
user community i.e. faculty, research scholars and student’s majority of these users are
dependent on e-resources to get the required and relevant information. Only few universities
and institution are having the required e-resources as per the running courses, but practical use
of available e-resources is not up-to the worth in comparison to investments made in acquiring
these resources by the authorities of these universities and institutions. Except this,
infrastructure for the proper access of these resources is also not provided to these libraries.
Library staff should conduct orientation and training programs as per requirements of the user
community and make maximum utility of the available e resources in these libraries.

Vilgi, K S & Ray, Shibu, S (2018) The study revealed that 2/5th of them prefer to use both
print and electronic format resources, purpose of 2/5th is to support the academic work, 2/5th
of them opined as easy to use and one third are using electronic resources daily. E-journals are
the most frequently used type of electronic resources, IEEE Explore database is used most
followed by J-Gate, and slow speed is the main barrier in its use. Study suggests some measures
to increase the effective utilization of electronic resources.

Akuffo, Maxwell, N &Budu, Stephen (2019) Their study revealed high awareness levels,
adequate computer competencies, derivation of multiple benefits, use of electronic resources
for academic purposes and inadequate search skills of most respondents because of the dearth
of training. Constraints to electronic resources usage were access problems, search and retrieval
problems and staff-related problems. The results also have shown that postgraduate students
were very much aware of ACI-subscribed electronic resources, from which they derived
multiple benefits, and which they used often for academic purposes. Thus, the extent of use of
electronic resources reflected the multiple benefits derived, as well as the level of awareness.
Girakaduwa, Saman (2019) study revealed that 72.7% of library users aware of the electronic
resources and services provided by the library. But, only 62.2% of the library users used the
electronic resources and services. Most of the respondents used library Web resources, OPAC
and past exam paper downloading facility, respectively as a percentage of 62.2%, 60.9% and
57.8%. In additionally findings were revealed that 46% of respondents used the electronic
journals and Digital Repository System. Compare to the other services E-mail service and
database usage were fairly low. Study has shown that nearly 37.8% of respondents had never
used the electronic resources and services. User satisfaction and usefulness of electronic
resources and services was 62.2% of the participants. Based on the findings, the reasons for
lower usage of electronic resources and services were lack of infrastructure facilities, lack of
user education and user awareness programs, English language barriers, and lack of IT skills
and knowledge. Further researcher suggests to revise the curriculums by adding more practical
sessions and establishing email or mobile alert update service to get maximum benefit of the
electronic resources and services.

Prafulla, Andhe & Chowdappa, N (2019) in their paper quantizes the correlation of the current
engineering curriculum with that of the electronic resource usage by the average engineering
student. This analysis highlights the stages of electronic resource flow, the areas of maximum
impact along with the various factors leading to the increased electronic resource usage and the
highly relevant years in the span of a student's four years of engineering life. A comparison
with the yesteryear's Engineering Curriculum demand and the current demand on the digital
emphasis is clearly brought together to show the pre-dominant mandatory usage of Information
Technology due to various reasons for a student of this generation. The demand vis-a-vis
electronic resource usage based on the needs and policies of the affiliated colleges of VTU and
the autonomous colleges also are seen in this study.

Ramesh, K & Jayaprakash, M (2019) in their article titled “Use and Impact of Electronic
Journals among the Users of Periyar University, Salem, Tamilnadu, India”. This study has
made an attempt to examine the use and impact of e-resources particularly e-journals. Periyar
University Central Library subscribes a number of e-journals to meet the information needs of
its users such as faculty members, post graduate students and research scholars etc. The results
showed that the maximum number of respondents was female with 58.33% whereas the
minimum number of respondents was male. The highest number of age group is between 21-
30 ages. The 40.38% of users was postgraduate students and ranked first. 47.44% of
respondents were preferred to access electronic journals whereas 19.87% of the respondents
preferred print format, and 32.69% of the respondents preferred both forms of journals. It was
found that the majority of respondents (40.39%) were using the central library to access e-
journals by weekly.

Impact of E-Resources

Ajayi, Shorunke&Aboyade (2014) conducted a survey to find the Influence ofElectronic

Resources Use on Students’ Reading Culture in Nigerian universities. The study revealed that
the most commonly used e-resources amongst the students included e-book, e-journal, and e-
news. 88.68% respondents used the e-resources very frequently and 90.57% respondents
agreed that e-resources improved their reading habits. 71.17% respondents agreed that they
would like to prefer e-resources to printed resources. The poor internet connectivity felt by
73.11% respondents is the major hindrance in effective use of e-resources whereas 46.69%
respondents considered that inadequate skill to use e-resources is the major hindrance to make
optimum and effective use of e-resources in the library.

Sivathaasan, Murugathas&Chandrasekar (2014) Attitude towards the usage of Electronic

Information Resources (EIS) in medical library, University of Jaffna, Sri Lanka, conducted a
survey on medical students and academic staff to identify the Impact of Usage of E-resources
on Academic Teachers. The findings revealed that attitude of academic staff and students is
different in the use of electronic information resources (EIS) whereas gender wise and age
group wise there is no difference in the attitude of respondents towards the use of electronic
information resources.

Syed FayyazMohsin, SahimaKhatoon& Shaikh Atique Usman (2014) in their study tried to
analyse the usage and impact of e-resources by the faculty members of Sir Sayyed College of
Arts, Commerce and Science Aurangabad. The findings show that users were using electronic
resources; the awareness about e-resources encourages users to use such resources to the
maximum; and the users are using Department and home more for accessing the information.
The impact of electronic resources was visible from the decrease in number of printed
documents in comparison to the increase in number of electronic resources. The use of e-
resources has increased manifold. The printed material is being quickly replaced by the e-
resources.

Kaur, Gurjeet (2016) studied the impact of electronic Information resources on user of social
science in Gulbarga University. A questionnaire was used to find the answer of questions about
the awareness and usage of electronic resources among users, to identify the level of
satisfaction, to measure the impact of electronic resources and to find out the problems which
are faced by the user. The study found that use of electronic resources was not only affected by
low seep of network and reading direct from computer but also lack of enough computers in
library and paid access of information. The findings of the study indicated that a lot need to be
done to increase the use of electronic resources and librarians should reorient themselves, think
creatively and adopt the new technology to generate services and resources to increase the use
of e-resources.

Natarajan, Manusamy (2017) his article titled “Use and impact of electronic resources by
information science students at Jimma University, Jimma, Ethiopia” This paper aims to
describe the use of e-resources and services provided at the social science library of Jimma
University, Jimma. The paper is focused to find out the use of those e-resources by the students
of information science and how frequently they are using, from where the information is
accessed. Also, they have been requested about their preferences between an electronic and
print journals format. It has been found that the usage of electronic journals is increasing; this
is due to awareness among the students of information science about the electronic resources
and services. Owing to an easy access available at various places in the university, they are
accessing these resources at hostels and departments more as compared to the library. Their
visits to library have decreased day-by-day.

Prafulla, Andhe & Chowdappa, N (2019) in their paper titled “E-Resource usage impact in
direct correlation to the Engineering Curriculum”, quantizes the correlation of the current
engineering curriculum with that of the electronic resource usage by the average engineering
student. This analysis highlights the areas of maximum impact, factors leading to the increased
electronic resource usage and highly relevant years in the span of the student's four years of
engineering life.

Bhat, Nazir Ahmad (2019) in his paper titled Impact of Electronic Resources on the Mindset
of Researchers studied the impact of advent of electronic information resources (EIR) on some
core aspects related to the research activity across agricultural libraries of Northern India. Six
aspects have been covered in this study. The response of the users for each statement under
investigation has been collected through a simple Yes/No option. The majority of respondents
are of the opinion that due to advent of electronic resources and in view of the ICT
developments the literature survey (92.94%) and problem identification (51.81%) has become
easy and fast. The spirit to conduct more and more research has increased among respondents
(86.62%). Moreover, this has also enabled the users to complete (84.31%) and publish
(89.97%) their research work in a lesser time than required in print era. A 46.26% of
respondents also agree that the cross comparison of findings of one's study with those of other
studies has become easy and fast in electronic era.

Conclusion

Today with the huge developments in Information CommunicationTechnology (ICT) the users’
retrieval of information has been changed from traditional to and e-resources. E-Resources are
playing a key role among the information sources amidst academicians, teachers and
researchers etc. The importance of e-resources in academic library is increasing day-by-day.
The above reviews reveal that the use of e-resources is becoming very common in this new
technological era. As the academic libraries are mainly used by theteachers, researchers and
students, e-resources have a great impact to their academic and research work. Adjusting with
changing need and development could enhance the applicability and relevance to the scatter
needs of library users.

References

1. Ajayi, Stephan, A. Oludare, Shorunke, A &Modupe, Aboyade, A. (2014) The Influence

of electronic resources use on students' reading culture in Nigerian Universities: A case
study of AdelekeUniversite Ede, Osun State, Library Philosophy and Practice (e-
journal), http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/ libphilprac /1182.
2. Karunarathna, H M P P (2014) Use of Electronic Resources by Law Degree Students
at Anuradhapura Regional Centre of the Open University of Sri Lanka, Journal of the
University Librarians Association of Sri Lanka, 18(20), June, pp. 41-61.
3. Mohsin, Syed Fayyaz, et al. (2014) Use and impact of e-resources by the faculty
members of Sir Sayyed College Aurangabad: a case study, International Research:
Journal of Library and Information Science, vol.4, no.2, pp.121-124.
4. Sivathaasan, N, Murugathas, K &Chandrasekar, K. (2014) Attitude towards the usage
of electronic information resources in medical library, University of Jaffna, Sri Lanka,
Information and Knowledge Management, vol.4, no.1, pp. 48-57, www.iiste.org.
5. Bala, Suniti& Lal, Payare (2016) Usage of Electronic Resources and their Impact on
Reading Culture: Study of Punjab Agricultural University, International Journal of
Digital Library Services, Ludhiana, 6(3), July-Sept., pp. 59-66.
6. Kaur, Gurjeet (2016) Impact of Electronic Information Resources on user of social
science in Gulbarga University, International Research: Journal of Library and
Information Science, 6(4), Dec. pp. 578-589.
7. Tripathi, Bhavana. Sonkar, Sharad Kumar &Rajbanshi, VishwasJeet (2016) Use and
Impact of E-Resources among Research Scholars: A Comparative Study of Agriculture
and Technology Universities in Uttar Pradesh, International Journal of Library &
Information Studies, 5(2), May-Aug, pp. 108-118.
8. Ananda, S K. et al. (2017) Use and Awareness of Electronic Information Resources
among UG & PG students of T John College, Bangalore: A Study, International
Journal of Library and Information Studies, 7(1), Jan-Mar, pp. 20-25.
9. Hosaini, SomayaBinta (2017) Use and Impact of Electronic Resources: A study on Two
Selectd Academic Libraries, International Journal of Law, Humanities & Social
Science, 1(1), May, pp. 23-59.
10. Natarajan, M. (2017) Use and impact of electronic resources by information science
students at Jimma University, Jimma, Ethiopia, Collection Building, Vol. 36 No. 4, pp.
163-171.
11. Singh, Mridula& Srivastava, Rochna (2018) Use and Impact of E-Resources by the
Users of Private Universities and Institutions, International Research: Journal of
Library and Information Science, 8(3), Sep. pp. 400-410.
12. Vilgi, K S & Ray, Shibu, S (2018) Use of E-Resources by the Students and faculty
Members of Federal Institute of Science and Technology (FISAT), Kerala: A Case
Study, Kelpro Bulletin, 22(1), June, pp. 105-113.
13. Akuffo, Maxwell, N &Budu, Stephen (2019) Use of Electronic Resources by Students
in a Premier Postgraduate Theological University in Ghana, South African Journal of
Information Management, 21(1), May. https://doi.org/10.4102/sajim.v21i1.1026
14. Bhat, Nazir Ahmad (2019) Impact of Electronic Resources on the Mindset of
Researchers, International Journal of Digital Literacy and Digital Competence, 10(1),
Mar, pp. 34-42.
15. Girakaduwa, Saman (2019) Usage of Electronic Resources, Services and Challenges
faced by the Library Users in University of the Visual and Performing Arts (UVPA),
Sri Lanka, People: International Journal of Social Sciences, 5(2), July, pp. 34-43.
16. Prafulla, Andhe & Chowdappa, N (2019) E-Resource usage impact in direct correlation
to the Engineering Curriculum, International Journal of Engineering, Applied and
Management Sciences Paradigms, 54(2), May, pp. 28-33.
17. Prafulla, Andhe & Chowdappa, N (2019) The Usage Index of E-Resources is Factored
by the Engineering Curriculum in India, Journal of Emerging Technologies and
Innovative Research, 6(6), June, pp. 664-667.
18. Ramesh, K & Jayaprakash, M (2019) Use and Impact of Electronic Journals among the
Users of Periyar University, Salem, Tamilnadu, India, Library Philosophy and
Practice, Jan-June.