Information-Seeking Behavior of International Graduate Students vs. American Graduate Students

Information-Seeking Behavior of International Graduate Students vs. American Graduate Students: A User Study at Virginia Tech 2005
Yan Liao, Mary Finn and Jun Lu

College & Research Libraries (Jan. 2007)

Yan Liao served as Cataloging Librarian at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Library and currently works at Georgetown University Law Library as Head of Cataloging; e-mail:[email protected].

Mary Finn is Head of Expedited Cataloging at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Library and Jun Lu is Assistant Professor of the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at American University; e-mail:[email protected], [email protected], respectively.

Abstract
This is a comparative study on information needs and information-seeking behavior of international graduate students and American graduate students. This user study is based on empirical data collected from an online survey conducted between April 7 and May 28, 2005, at Virginia Tech. The goal of this comparative study is to investigate how graduate students from diverse ethnic groups discover, select, and use various information sources and to obtain insights into international graduate students’ information-seeking behavior, especially its similarities and differences compared with the information-locating patterns used by their American peers.”

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