IL and Student Research

Habits in the Social

Sciences: a view from

Kazakhstan

Celia Emmelhainz

Social Sciences Data Librarian

Colby College

ANSS Discussion

ALA Midwinter

30 January 2015

Location: Inner Asia

Astana, Kazakhstan’s Capital

“Atameken” University

The University Library

Research questions

How do post-Soviet students in the

social sciences conduct research?

What factors impact their research habits?

What tools do Kazakhstani students need

to effectively access the academic

literature, and how can librarians help?

Social Science

Students…• Orient themselves with Wikipedia and Google

(Colon-Aguirre & Fleming-May 2012)

• Spend 1-5 hours getting materials and 1-4 hours

writing any short paper (Head 2008)

• Students use some resources well and miss others

entirely (Cheney 1971)

• Seek friends before consulting librarians (Fleming-

May & Yuro 2009)

• Main challenge is figuring out what the professors

want (Leibiger 2011)

“I go to the databases and click on the collection of JSTOR… and there I enter the keywords for my assignment… I mean, that are relevant for my thesis”

- Quralai, third-year in literature

“First, a plain Google search helps me to define foreign aid… and this helps me to understand the topic to a broader extent… and then when I have some ideas in my mind… [I have] the narrower research topic I would like to focus on.”

- Zhanar, second-year in economics

“I just google the topic first, and for example I read Wikipedia just to have some background information. Then I start looking for sources again using the library databases. Sometimes I use Google Scholar, but it’s not really helpful, you know?” - Nursultan, third-year in politics

“First of all, I discuss it with my friends, like

maybe ask them, what is the relationship

between these two? …and when I just come to

the internet, there is more ideas coming

because some people [are] sharing what they

think about it”

- Anel, first-year in economics

“Sometimes I may write

something but at the end I may

write contradicting things… ”

“You may ask some people… and then you

just start searching for opinions of reliable

people… and [then] you can start writing your

research.

“And only after I did my research did I try to

find an opposing view.”

- Anel, first-year in economics

Research questions

How do post-Soviet students in the social

sciences conduct research?

What factors impact their research

habits?

What tools do Kazakhstani students need

to effectively access the academic

literature, and how can librarians help?

“If I want to find information on western problems it is easy, but to find information in this society is hard.”

- Aigerim, in international relations

Central Asia as a library research location

“It’s really cool that we have access to these documents, because in high school when we studied history of Kazakhstan, I mean… the textbooks didn’t have all these primary sources in them.”

- Quralai, third-year in literature

Summary: Strengths of a Eurasian Location

Access to research archives

Access to primary sources

Good coverage of Post-Soviet topics

“I went to ask my relative where I can find information relevant to Kazakh banks and statistics” rather than to the library.

- Assel, second-year in economics

“Usually when there’s no statistics… I just [give] this survey to Atameken University students… just to get some data usually, to have one example to the whole society.”

- Aigerim, third-year in politics/IR

“It’s really necessary for literature majors to have books… and we don’t have them. I had to buy books myself. I mean… I had to go to the book store in Dubai and buy these books that we have to read. The job of the library is to provide us with books. It’s sad.”

- Quralai, third-year in literature

Central Asia as a library research location

“I go to Google Scholar and entered some keywords and I stumbled upon a really good article but they’re closed. I mean, the access is limited and one would have to pay for them and be a professor… through the institution they were in.”

- Quralai, in literature

Summary: Challenges of location

o Limited access to books

o Paywalls on journal articles

o Lack of reliable local sources

o Lack of published information

o Systemic issues; not the fault of Atameken U. or Kazakhstan

A way around?

• Downloading PDFs from public sources• Torrents, download sites, buying books abroad• Google Scholar, Google Books, Amazon previews• Old university logins and US/UK connections

“My friends…are also sources of information, because they look for other sources… They also help me to understand how to construct my argument. Because when I have a lot of ideas in my head, and I don’t know how to construct them in clear places, I have friends to talk to.”

- Quralai, third-year in literature

Librarian as a key information source

Research questions

How do post-Soviet students in the social

sciences conduct research?

What factors impact their research habits?

What tools do Kazakhstani students

need to effectively access the academic

literature, and how can librarians help?

Students and their faculty want help with:

1. Searching for information

2. Evaluating information

3. Understanding information

4. Citing academic resources

“The librarian teaches this system of boollett[Boolean] or something, where for example in JSTOR you write something –and – or –something, you use brackets – and – or –symbols.”

- Nursultan, third-year in politics

1. Searching for information

“[I teach] what a database is, that there’s a separate codec that was developed by a commercial company, and that we actually pay money for this. And that’s why there is a different of quality… I start with, what is a database: it’s a collection of scientific papers that are peer-reviewed.”

- Ameli, Kazakh instructional librarian

2. Evaluating information

“Sometimes we find a bunch of information but we don’t know how to absorb it, we don’t get the idea of how to analyze it. For example, we get a lot of tables, numbers, numbers, numbers… what is the right one to choose?’ So this kind of stuff is difficult to analyze.”

- Assel, second-year in economics

3. Understanding information

4. Citing information

“The worst kind of junk I ever encountered [was a student who cited Yahoo! Blog posts in her paper]… I was very upset about that, in part because the rest of the paper actually was quite good.”

- Alex, Atameken faculty member

What help can colleagues give?

* Professors rely on colleagues for research

* Students also… but peers not as informed

What should you cite?

* Students told to cite everything

* But like professors, they use Google and Wikipedia to orient their research

Emerging Tensions for Students

Addison and Meyers 2013

Three frameworks for information literacy:

1) acquire information-age skills

2) cultivate scholarly habits of mind

3) engage in information-rich social practices

Information-Seeking Skills

1. starting with good orientation sources

2. networking with librarians for ideas

3. accessing sources in multiple ways

4. extracting resources strategically

5. differentiating quality of resources

6. understanding and citing resources

“You would need to rebrand the librarians as experts in particular areas… Thinking coaches, research coaches... It’s really about the thinking that goes along with the searching.

“That’s what [students] need, and I think they can really benefit from a librarian who can help them think.”

- Nathan, Atameken faculty member

The Kazakhstani Faculty-Librarian

Thank you.

назарларыңызғарахмет!