Correlation among Library Facilities: An Analytical Study

Abstract

Libraries are a central part of the academic system. They are imperatively empowered and enriched by their facilities. These facilities help the users (faculty, students and researcher) not only to loan physically available resources but also help them to browse and search catalogues, access databases and avail services simultaneously. Provision of multiple library facilities and their correlation can have a strong impact on institutional outcomes. Therefore, this study has been conducted with an aim to determine the correlation among the facilities such as Library Automation (LA), Network Infrastructure (NI), Computer Infrastructure (CI), Electronic Resources (ER), and Manpower (MA) and Networked Services (NS) of various National Institute of Technology (NIT) libraries in India that can be exploited in practice. A methodology used for collecting data was questionnaire. The strength of relationship among the library facilities is measured strongly or moderately or weakly using a statistical technique called ‘Pearson Correlation Coefficient’. The scope of this study was confined only to 20 NIT libraries across the country concerning the library facilities such as LA, NI, CC, ER, MA and NS. From the findings the empirical evidences indicate that LA has a strong (87%) correlation with NS. Rest of the pairs such as LA-CI (71%), LA-ER (56%), LA-MA (62%); CI- ER (68%), CI-MA (63%), CI-NS (63%); ER-MA (51%), ER-NS (67%); MA-NS (64%) have moderate correlation among them excluding NI at 5% significance level. The study concludes that the facilities among NIT libraries are positively and linearly correlated with each other except NI. In spite of functional and administration differences, majority of the NIT libraries are at developmental stage in implementing all facilities. Moreover, many libraries have strong hold on library automation and services facilities at their end.