فهرست مطالب mansoor koohi rostami

The purpose of this research is to identify and extract the professional competencies of the librarians of Iran’s public libraries, and to determine the importance of each of them in order to prioritize and rank them.

This research is an applied study employing a mixed research methodology. The study divided in two distinct stage. In the initial phase, a purposive selection of 61 Persian and English articles was analyzed using the meta-synthesis method. Then 104 codes were extracted using experts’ opinions, and the validity of these codes was confirmed through their content validity and their reliability was measured and confirmed with Cohen’s Kappa test. During the quantitative stage, each factor was ranked by distributing the questionnaire among 62 experts and using Shannon’s entropy method.

This research reveals a pioneering exploration into the professional competencies of librarians in Iran’s public libraries, resulting in the identification of four crucial factors, 10 main components, and an extensive 72 sub-components that categorize these competencies. The ‘Ability’ factor, consisting of specialized ability and thinking ability, emerges as a cornerstone with conceptualizations across 9 sub-components. The ‘Feature’ factor, consisting of occupational and behavioral characteristics, was conceptualized by 19 sub-components. The ‘Skills’ factor, including managerial, social, occupational, and technological skills, was conceptualized by 32 sub-components. Lastly, the ‘Knowledge’ factor, comprising knowledge related to society and specialized knowledge, was conceptualized by 12 sub-components. Quantitative analysis, using the innovative Shannon entropy method, provides a nuanced understanding of the significance attached to each competency. The results of this analysis shows that ‘knowledge’ holds the highest weight (0/2575), establishing it as the most critical competency for librarians in Iran’s public libraries. Following closely, the ‘Skill’ factor secures the second position with a weight of 0/2545. ‘Ability’ and ‘Characteristics’ factors, with weights of 0.2498 and 0.2382, respectively, are ranked third and fourth.

Originality/value: 

This research stands out in its original contribution to the field of library science by systematically identifying and prioritizing the professional competencies of librarians in Iran’s public libraries. The comprehensive validation process, including content validity and reliability assessments, ensures the robustness of the identified competencies. The emphasis on specialized ability, thinking ability, occupational and behavioral characteristics, managerial, social, occupational, and technological skills, as well as knowledge related to society and specialized knowledge, shows a nuanced understanding of the multifaceted nature of librarianship. In summary, this research breaks new ground in the systematic exploration, categorization, and prioritization of professional competencies, offering a valuable framework for improving the competencies of librarians in the unique context of Iranian public libraries. These findings not only contribute to the academic understanding of librarianship but also offer practical insights for enhancing the proficiency of librarians in this context. Furthermore, the nuanced categorization and prioritization presented in this research provide a valuable framework for the ongoing development of professional competencies and qualifications in this field.

Human life has always been exposed to crises, but what is important in crisis management is the adequate response to them. The rise and development of information technology has provided its operators with the best possible potential and capabilities for crisis management. One of the applications of information technology in crisis management is "crisis informatics". Considering that information forms the link between crisis management, crisis informatics and information science, the present study was conducted with the aim of elucidating the role and functions of the field of information science in crisis informatics.

The study was directed via library method with an analytical approach. After reviewing previous studies with the intention of identifying the dominant concept of crisis informatics.

The results showed that, despite the commonality between crisis computing and the field of information science, no independent research has yet been devoted to this topic. While the common point between information science and computer science is the crisis, the main topic of both information. Information science specialists can play an essential role in crisis computing due to their skills in producing reliable information, verifying information, managing and building information systems, creating databases, facilitating and accelerating information recovery.

Crisis informatics is an emerging field that clarifies the role of information science specialists in times of crisis or pre-crisis to reduce disaster risk to minimize vulnerability or to increase the knowledge of people in society to prevent or mitigate harm limit when dealing with a crisis. With the rise of technology and the flourishing of social networks and the ease with which a large amount of information is distributed to people, information specialists will play an effective role in crisis situations using social networks in conveying the "correct" information to the "correct "person at the "appropriate" time.

Today, in addition to their traditional role in accessing books, and providing a place for reading and other recreational and recreational purposes, public libraries are considered as spaces of society that also have important social roles and functions. This research was conducted with the aim of identifying and ranking cultural factors affecting the role of Iran's public libraries as community centers, and in order to provide a conceptual model in this field, based on Jürgen Habermas' theory of the public sphere.

This research is applied in terms of its purpose; In terms of data collection, survey; And in terms of the nature of the data, it is a mixed research of an exploratory type, which was carried out with a systematic approach of database theorizing. In the qualitative part, effective factors were identified by conducting 33 interviews and 2 focus groups (each group has 4 people and a total of 8 people). The validity of these factors was confirmed by using the content validity ratio (CVR) index, and their reliability was confirmed through the Fleiss' kappa coefficient test. In the quantitative part, the reliability of the tool was confirmed using a questionnaire consisting of 16 items and with Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.91. Finally, factors were ranked by Shannon's entropy method.

The findings showed that three cultural factors, including local discourse, the arena of understanding and cultural diffusion, are effective in playing the role of public libraries as community centers. Meanwhile, the field of understanding is considered the most important factor and cultural diffusion has the least effect in this field. All factors had content validity higher than 0.33 and Kappa coefficient higher than 0.7, so all of them have the necessary validity and reliability. Finally, the conceptual model of the research was designed and drawn in six sections.

Jürgen Habermas' theory of the public sphere is one of the sociological theories, which is close to the goals and mission of public libraries. On the other hand, the culture factor is a fundamental factor for playing the role of public libraries as community centers. In this regard, many people may still think that public libraries are a place only for reading, but a review of the various actions and activities of public libraries shows that these places carry out various activities that advance the cultural development of societies. In this way, public libraries play a prominent role in carrying out cultural activities. In order to fulfill its role as a community center, public libraries need to promote the native discourse of the society, be a safe arena for free discussion and understanding of different sections of the society, and spread culture in local communities.

The purpose of this research is to investigate the effect of sociological factors (including age, gender, cultural capital and economic capital) on the reading habits of undergraduate students of Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz.

The current research is a descriptive-correlation survey. The research population is the undergraduate students of Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz in the academic year 1401-1402, whose number is estimated to be 7495. According to the table of Karjesi and Morgan, the sample size of the research is 384 people. Also, the proportional stratified sampling method was used to select the subjects. The research tools are Bourdieu's cultural capital questionnaire, economic capital questionnaire and Abdul Karim and Hassan's reading habit questionnaire. In order to analyze the data from S. P. S. S. Version 25 and Pearson's correlation coefficient, Spearman's correlation coefficient, and two-string point tests were used.

The research findings have shown that except for age, other research variables including gender, cultural capital and economic capital affect the components of reading habit and have a positive and significant relationship with each other.

This study proved that sociological factors such as gender, cultural capital and economic capital have an effect on students' reading habits. As a result, in order to develop the habit of reading in students, first of all, in addition to paying attention to gender, we should pay attention to students cultural and economic conditions, such as allocating a part of the income to buy cultural tools, the family's attitude towards reading, and educational methods in order to be able to achieve one of the important tasks in reforming educational programs with the aim of strengthening students' skills in a suitable cultural and economic situation by developing the habit of reading.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of professional ethics on job performance by the mediation of the ethical climate in university libraries in Ahvaz.

The present study was applied research in terms of purpose and a quantitative study in terms of method, which has been done by the descriptive-correlation method. The statistical population of the study was librarians of university libraries in Ahvaz, 87 of whom participated in the research by census method. In this study, questionnaires on ethical climate, job performance, and professional ethics have been used. Analyses of instrument reliability using Cronbach's alpha coefficient for the ethical atmosphere questionnaire (0.86); the job performance questionnaire (0.80), and the professional ethics questionnaire (0.95) were calculated. To analyze the data, tests such as frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, and structural equation modeling (SEM) using the partial least squares method have been used.

The results showed that professional ethics has a significant effect on the job performance of librarians of university libraries in Ahvaz and the ethical atmosphere of libraries. On the other hand, the moral atmosphere has a significant effect on the professional performance of librarians in university libraries in Ahvaz. The results also indicated that professional ethics through the ethical atmosphere has a significant indirect effect on the job performance of librarians in academic libraries. According to the results, all four research hypotheses have been confirmed.

The existence of ethical frameworks and guidelines in academic libraries can provide the basis for the emergence and consolidation of the ethical atmosphere in these libraries. A librarian can only perform well if he or she can demonstrate his or her moral and behavioral abilities in a favorable ethical environment and thus, can reach a wide range of clients tailored to their needs and characteristics.

Information behavior includes intentional and unintentional behaviors. One of the unintentional information behaviors is the serendipitous acquisition of information. This type of behavior, which complements the inquiry, has an important role in the learning behaviors and everyday information acquisition by researchers. The occurrence of this type of behavior is influenced by the factors that the present study was conducted to identify.

 This systematic review employs the eight-step process of the Okoli review method. The research population includes English articles indexed in the Web of Science (WOS), Scopus, and Persian articles indexed in the Islamic World Science Citation Database (ISC), Scientific Information Database (SID), MagIran, Normagz, and Ensani. After applying the search strategy, the retrieved articles were imported to the EndNote 20 software and duplicate articles were removed. Then, based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria, 40 related articles were studied in order to identify the factors affecting serendipitous acquisition of information.

Results :

The history of the study of the serendipitous acquisition of information goes back more than three decades. The serendipitous acquisition of information is influenced by internal factors, external factors, and environmental characteristics. Internal factors are influenced by person's psychological and personality characteristics and can be created or managed by the person her/himself. Internal factors include information need, topical knowledge, Sagacity, curiosity, sensitivity, conscientiousness, extroversion, emotions, self-confidence, information literacy, enjoyment of the search process, and education. External factors such as time, status, and place are separate from psychological and personality characteristics of the person and can facilitate serendipity. Some environmental characteristics enables exploration and discovery, ease of access, connectivity, stimulus-richness, enables connections, trigger rich, highlights triggers, variety, contrasts, incompleteness, multi-reachability, and slowability cultivate serendipity. Despite the importance of serendipity in information seeking, it has not attracted the attention of Iranian researchers

Recent advances in information technology and the emergence of Web2 have created new horizons in the ways of obtaining information and have caused an increase in unintentional acquisition of information. Therefore, the way that such behavior occurs, and its effects and results should be investigated. Recognition and control of factors affecting successful acquisition of information could help the search process.

This study Accomplished to evaluate the adequacy of psychometric properties and validate the Isaacson Reading Attitude Questionnaire. Isaacson et al. (2016) designed The Attitude Towards Academic Reading Questionnaire.

To validate this tool, apparent and content validity indices were measured. Also, confirmatory factor analysis was utilized to evaluate the validity of the structure. Multi-value question-answer models were used to analyze the questionnaire items and to assess the reliability of Cronbach's alpha index were used.
Fundings: In the development of this tool, using a structure with three factors has been, which are: academic reading behaviors, self-efficacy in academic reading, and evaluation for academic reading. The appearance validity of the questionnaire items was confirmed, and the content validity test showed a logical relationship between items and factors. Confirmatory factor analysis for these three factors showed that this model creates proper structural factors to measure the attitude to academic reading and exists a good fit between this proposed model and experimental data. The items of this questionnaire, while having a good fit with the multi-valued answer question models, have the appropriate clean power at different levels of people's attitudes. Examination of the reliability coefficient in this questionnaire showed that both the factors individually and the questionnaire, in general, are at a desirable level of stability and reliability.

There is no suitable tool in the Persian language that can assess the attitude towards academic reading well. Therefore, can be seen the vacancy of appropriate tools in this area. This tool can be used in educational research to assess the causes of academic achievement or decline of students, as well as to study their study and learning styles. The most common use of this tool in tests is to measure reading ability at the beginning of reading improvement courses in schools and universities or other reading education intervention programs.

Effective library services for children require a wide range of professional librarian skills. Therefore, it is important to identify the competencies of child librarians. In this study, a comparison has been designed and validated to assess the competencies and requirements of child librarians in public libraries. According to Tetens theory, the personality and character of every human being is composed of five areas, the first three areas are called internal areas and the last two areas are called external areas. The three inner realms include the realm of ideas and beliefs, the realm of feelings, and emotions, and the realm of wills and desires, and the three outer realms are the realm of speech and the realm of action.

The method of the present study is applied in terms of purpose and descriptive in terms of data collection method. In this research, structural equation modeling and confirmatory factor analysis have been used. To determine the content validity of the designed questionnaire, experts and librarians of public libraries were used. The sampling method in this section was purposeful sampling. The research community in the validation section of the research tools was librarians of public libraries in Khuzestan province. A simple random sampling method was used to distribute the research tools among the target population. A researcher-made questionnaire based on the research of Akbari, Shaghaghi, and Asnafi (1400) was used to collect data. Data analysis was performed using inferential statistical indicators including structural equation modelling.

The findings showed that the competencies of a secretary have three factors: beliefs, feelings, emotions, desires, and wills and 44 items; And action requirements have 2 factors of speech and behaviour and 34 items. The results of fitting the secretary competencies model of child librarians showed that the factor load of 44 paths is greater than 0.5 and also the calculated significant numbers are greater than 1.96 which indicates the confirmation of all paths. The results of confirmatory factor analysis of child librarians' action requirements model show that the calculated factor loads for all paths are greater than 0.5 and also the calculated significant numbers are greater than 1.96 which indicates the confirmation of all paths. Confirmatory factor analysis of the instrument showed that the instrument has a good fit and the combined reliability of all factors was higher than 0.90, which indicates the optimal reliability of the instrument. Also, the correlation of the scores of the components of the questionnaires is positive and significant, which indicates the convergent validity of the questionnaire.

In this scale, the competencies of a child librarian's secretary were constructed and validated with three dimensions of beliefs, feelings, emotions, desires and wills, and a scale of behavioral competencies of child librarians with two dimensions of speech and behavior. Secretary competencies refer to what is in the child librarian's mind about the child and services to children, and secretary competencies focus more on operational skills. This scale provides a benchmark for recruiting a child librarian. It will also be an indicator for strengthening and enhancing the secretarial and action skills of child librarians through educational programs.

the purpose of this study is to construct and validate a crisis information behavior questionnaire in Iranian society with an emphasis on public crises.

This research is of mixed type (qualitative and quantitative) which has been designed with the tool making approach. The present study population was citizens of Ahvaz. Four hundred ten people participated in this study. Questionnaire construction methods such as apparent validity, content, and confirmatory factor analysis used to assess the validity of the structure. Cronbach's alpha also used to examine the internal consistency of the factors.

Impact score index for the apparent validity of all items contained an acceptable value of more than 1.5 and for the content validity index the optimal value scale was 0.92. In factor loading, all factors were confirmed with a good explanation in factor analysis and Cronbach's alpha for all factors was acceptable values of 0.7 to 0.9.

The results indicate that there are four main factors of crisis information behavior. The scale designed to study the information behavior of the Iranian community in times of health crisis considered appropriate and recommends its use to measure information behavior during health crises.

Information poverty indicates a situation in which groups and individuals do not have adequate and equal access to quantitative and qualitative information or the ability to use it. The purpose of this article is to develop and validate the information poverty assessment scale in Ahvaz.

The present research is an applied study and has been done by "exploratory mixed" method. First, in the qualitative section, the components of information poverty were collected by reviewing the texts and using the opinions and views of experts by Delphi method. Factor analysis was used in the quantitative section to validate the scale. The present study population was all people in 15 years old and above in Ahvaz.

The results of the factor analysis confirmed 31 items, which were categorized using exploratory factor analysis in 5 factors: media information literacy, Internet access, book access, cultural behavior, and information access skills.

An examination of the various definitions of the various dimensions of information poverty has shown that this phenomenon categorized into four basic dimensions, each of which can have its own subsets. Thus, it seems poor access (to books and internet), digital skills, behavioral factors and media and information literacy can form a situation that leads to information poverty. In the present study, the existence of the same dimensions in explaining information poverty was confirmed and the components of access (to books and Internet), access skills, use (including information-media literacy) and behavioral factors were confirmed. The study of this phenomenon confirmed 31 items that used to measure this phenomenon. Thus, the scale created showed that information poverty related to information-related infrastructure, increasing the number of libraries and their resources, strengthening Internet access, and teaching information literacy.

To identify and prioritize the factors affecting innovation and creativity in public libraries from the perspective of public librarians in Khuzestan province.

The present research is an exploratory and mixed study in terms of purpose. The statistical population in the qualitative section included 22 university professors who were selected by purposive sampling. The research population in the quantitative section included all librarians of public libraries in Khuzestan province. The data collection tool was a questionnaire. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics including frequency and frequency percentage and inferential statistics tests including t-test, structural equation modeling, heuristic factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis using SPSS and Wimos software.

Qualitative section of research involved the identification of 50 components affecting creativity and innovation in public libraries in Khuzestan province. Based on the findings of the quantitative section, the factors affecting creativity and innovation in public libraries from the perspective of librarians of public libraries in Khuzestan province can be classified into 8 general factors, which are: organizational culture, individual factors and personality traits, organizational structure, organizational strategy, organizational management and leadership, organizational climate, organizational motivation and reward, and organizational resources.

In order to develop creativity in all organizational elements, there must be an atmosphere in which employees feel free in the way they perform their duties and have control over their work, and their authority and choices should be supported in achieving goals, and the control over individuals’ work should be reduced to a minimum. Motivation and reward, as an effective factor in fostering creativity and innovation, is the driving force of employees’ creativity. Motivations such as welfare and financial issues, self-preservation, curiosity, convenience, ambition and the need for success make employees strive to provide comfort for themselves and others. Identification of the factors and components affecting creativity and innovation had not been carried out in Iran thus far. Therefore, the factors identified in this study can be used in the process of planning and managing public libraries as well as in improving the quality of services. Furthermore, the results of this case study can be generalized to public libraries in other provinces, and also can be used in similar organizations.

This study investigated the factors contributing to the attraction and development of public participation in public libraries from the donors' perspective in the library building. In terms of the research objectives, the present study is exploratory research that was carried out using a mixed research method, a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods. In the qualitative part of the research, 15 active donors were interviewed using the targeted and snowball sampling technique. The research population in the quantitative part consisted of active donors of public libraries in Iran, and a questionnaire was distributed and collected among 246 of them. Inferential tests, including the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, exploratory factor analysis, and confirmatory factor analysis were used for data analysis. Besides, spss22 and pls3.8 software were run for data analysis. Given the research findings, cultural, economic, social, and structural factors were identified as effective in attracting public participation. The results obtained from the confirmatory factor analysis showed that among the factors affecting the attraction of public participation in public libraries from the donors’ point of view, cultural factors with an impact factor of 0.868 had the highest impact, followed by economic factors with an impact factor of 0.845, respectively. Furthermore, social factors with an impact factor of 0.824 and structural factors with an impact factor of 0.628 were in the third and fourth priorities, respectively. Given the severe challenges of the financial resources of Iran's public libraries, it is quintessential to identify ways to attract more public and donors’ participation, to provide opportunities for participation in public libraries, and to promote this idea among other people. Utilizing donors' experiences in identifying the factors contributing to the attraction of public participation in public libraries can provide a suitable planning environment for the development of public participation in public libraries.

Librarians in public libraries are trying to effectively disseminate diverse information to a wide range of people. Since librarians interact with a large number of potential and actual members, it is more important to address the issue of communication skills. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to do a strategic analysis of effective factors and barriers in applying communication skills among managers and librarians of Khuzestan's public libraries.

The study is applied one and in terms of nature and method of data collection is a descriptive survey and was done using SWOT model. The research population consisted of 381 managers and librarians of Khuzestan's public libraries. After distributing the questionnaire, 277 items were returned. The tool used was a researcher-made questionnaire designed with a review of the literature. Different methods of descriptive statistics were used to analyze data.

The results indicated that seven dimensions of internal factors including acceptance and trust, nonverbal communication and body language, job properties, honesty, empathy and sympathy, quantity and quality of communication, complain and anger, individual effort, as strengths and weaknesses of applying skills communicational; 5 dimensions of external factors including community and environment, managerial attitudes, training and promotion system are opportunities and threats that the librarians face in applying communication skills. Out of 36 components that were evaluated as strengths and weaknesses in 7 dimensions of internal factors, 6 components of strengths and 8 components of weaknesses were identified and the remaining 22 components were in the average condition and the mean rate was 2.986 for internal factors. Also, out of the 21 factors investigated in 5 external factors, there were 2 opportunities and 15 threats and the other 4 were in average condition and the average rate was 2.29 for external factors.

The results indicated that communication skills status among managers and librarians of Khuzestan's public libraries was in a "relatively desirable" state. So, it is worthy that remove weaknesses and take advantage of opportunities to overcome threats. In this way, public library managers and planners should seek to enhance librarians' communication skills through in-person and online courses, developing continuous training programs, developing a promotion code based on communication skills, along with persuading librarians to improve their salaries and benefits. As librarians' communication skills increase, we can see the growth in the quantity and quality of public library services.

This study aimed to investigate the effect of gender on the amount and type of reading. This study was descriptive. The research population consisted of people over 15 years of age in Ahvaz city. A multistage random sampling technique was used, and the data were collected using a questionnaire. The independent t-test and contingency table were used to analyze the data. The results indicated that gender could affect reading, and women had more reading time than men. Also, there were differences in reading interests based on gender. Women were more likely than men to read popular books. Still, men were more elitist and were more likely to read nonfiction books than popular works. Men were more likely to read intellectual and cultural magazines, while women tended to read more popular ones. Besides, women and men had different reading interests in different sections of the newspapers. The deep familiarity of readers with discovering the level and type of reading and defining a developmental plan for reading can provide a valuable guide to policymaking for promoting reading by trusted institutions

Information behavior in knowledge and information science is seen as a fundamental human behavior that has been studied extensively thus far. This study include different approaches and perspectives that examined information behavior. The purpose of this article is to investigate the paradigm shift in information behavior by using the texts of this research ground.

The study was directed via library method with an analytical approach. After reviewing previous studies with the intention of identifying the dominant paradigms of information behavior.

Findings show that information behavior studies fell into two main paradigms of old and new. The old paradigm focuses on Shannonchr('39')s theories of information, and the new paradigm emphasizes interdisciplinary relationships. In the new paradigm, cognitive, sociological, and multifaceted approaches could be defined.

Information behavior is an innate behavior that occurs in the social environment. It is influenced by various factors. like many human characteristics, is a behavior that does not occur in a vacuum. This behavior can be defined in interaction with information, human beings and society. Thus, it can have a wide and multifaceted aspects. This behavior is also a division of social sciences that can be examined under different paradigms. In social sciences, unlike natural sciences many meta-theories may go hand in hand. Sometimes a meta-theory simply disappears, and other times it may grow, evolve, and rekindle the interests of researchers. So, the evolution of information behavior research shows the combination of disciplines and interdisciplinary theories and new relationships in understanding human information behavior.

The aim of this study was to identify structural and technological barriers to implementing knowledge management in public libraries in Khuzestan province.

In the present study, a descriptive survey method was used. The population consisted of 230 public library authorities, heads of cities and experts working in public libraries in Khuzestan province. The statistical sample of 140 people was calculated based on Morgan table. A simple random sampling method was used to distribute the questionnaire. The data collection tool was a questionnaire examining the technological and structural barriers in knowledge management. Exploratory factor analysis, single-sample ttest and Friedman have been used for data analysis.

Based on the results of exploratory factor analysis, 5 factors of technological, organizational structure, resource allocation, evaluation and sharing of knowledge were identified as the most important technological and institutional barriers to implementing knowledge management in public libraries in Khuzestan province. The situation of these agents in the Khuzestan Public Libraries is in poor condition. The results of the Friedman test showed that technological barriers are the most important obstacles to implementing knowledge management in public libraries in Khuzestan province.

The results show that all indices studied in this research have an impact on the failure of knowledge management in the public libraries of the province. To successfully deploy knowledge management, the organization's managers must take actions to address these barriers.

This research evaluates the collections of the central libraries of comprehensive universities under the supervision of the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology of Iran according to the standards for university libraries. The aim is to study the status of the collections of these libraries based on the “standards for university libraries of Iran”. The research population includes all the central libraries of the universities. The data was collected using a checklist prepared based on the standards for university libraries of Iran. From a total of 25 checklists distributed, 19 (76 %) were returned. The research has been conducted using the evaluative survey method. Findings of data analysis show that on average 62.4 % of the central libraries of the universities studied meet this standard in terms of the qualitative approach. In terms of the quantitative approach, only 19.97 % of the central libraries studied have the collections required according to the standards. This means that in terms of collection standards, the libraries studied face acute shortage of resources and are in a very bad condition