Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Curious Instance Of The Library's Travelling Poll: Determining Obstacles In The Research Process, Lucia Schoombee

Proceedings of the IATUL Conferences

The role of libraries in co-facilitating timeous and successful completion of postgraduate studies and increased research output is accentuated in the current, competitive academic environment. Faced with this challenge, libraries need to probe new territory, expand boundaries of service delivery and collaborate with academic support services. This paper describes an unconventional, visual method to explore service needs of researchers and research students. The method consists of an interactive poll which visually depicts the research lifecycle and allows respondents to point out arduous aspects in the research process. The poll is a collaborative project between the Library and the Information Technology …