Document Type : Original Article
Authors
1 Department of Knowledge and Information Science, Payame Noor University, Iran
2 M.A. in Knowledge and Information Science, Payame Noor University
3 Payame Noor University
Abstract
Purpose: The purpose of the current study was to investigate the Copyright literacy of public librarians in Kermanshah province, Iran.
Research method: The current study is a descriptive-survey. The statistical population of this research is all librarians of Public Library in Kermanshah (N=170). Based on Cochran formula, 118 individuals were selected as sample. The sampling method used in this study was stratified random sampling. Four standard questionnaires to assess librarians' copyright literacy developed by Todorova et al. (2017) were used for data collection. Then to analyze the data and answer the research questions from descriptive indices (frequency distribution table, mean and standard deviation), chi-square test, one-sample t-test and independent sample t-test and one-way analysis of variance test in SPSS software was used.
Findings: The results of data analysis demonstrated that the level of familiarity of librarians with copyright issues in Kermanshah province is low. Moreover, the results showed that Kermanshah Public Librarians' awareness of copyright policies and procedures of the country and its libraries is at a low level. In their view, there is no one in their organization responsible for dealing with copyright issues. The results also indicated that the overwhelming majority of librarians in Kermanshah province agree with the inclusion of copyright issues in academic curricula and its teaching, especially at undergraduate level. Finally, results showed that there is no significant difference between librarians' familiarity with copyright issues in gender, fields of study (librarianship and non-librarianship) and level of education.
Conclusion: According to the results of this study, it can be said that the absence of issues related to copyright and its rules in the curriculum of the students of librarianship and information science in the universities are extremely bold. Moreover, it seems that public libraries did not perform well on teaching copyright issues to their staff, especially librarians, as they could teach these workshops and courses. The managers of public libraries in Kermanshah province should have better planning for their organization's librarians. It is recommended that, in hiring librarians, library managers and policy makers should also be aware of the amount of copyright literacy of applicants.
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