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This paper aims to present recently published resources on information literacy and library instruction through an extensive annotated bibliography of publications covering all library types.

This paper annotates English-language periodical articles, monographs, dissertations and other materials on library instruction and information literacy published in 2017 in over 200 journals, magazines, books and other sources.

The paper provides a brief description for all 590 sources.

The information may be used by librarians and interested parties as a quick reference to literature on library instruction and information literacy.

This paper aims to establish the level of use of the electronic resources at the University of Venda, which is one of the previously disadvantaged universities in South Africa. It identifies the different electronic resources used at the university, determines the level of awareness and training in the use of these resources and suggests ways in which electronic resources may be enhanced. The rapid changes in the information and communication technology (ICTs) have influenced service delivery in academic libraries in terms of how information is gathered, accessed, retrieved and used. Hence, electronic resources are invaluable research tools in academic libraries in the twenty-first century.

A qualitative research methodology was adopted, and semi-structured interviews were conducted with each participant to get in-depth information. The target population was all third-year students registered with the School of Human and Social Sciences at the University of Venda. The third year undergraduate students from this particular school where chosen because statistics revealed that these students where ranked among the top in the use of computers.

The findings revealed that the level of usage of these resources by undergraduate students is elementary and limited to SABINET and EBSCO host. Undergraduate student’s level of awareness of the different electronic resources is low. They confused electronic resources to Web-based internet sources. It also revealed that the level of awareness and training in the use of these resources is still generic, as training is mostly a once off orientation at the first year.

This paper focuses on third year undergraduate students who were using computers because the researchers were interested in finding out whether students using computers were also using electronic resources. It excluded other profiles such as age, gender and computer usage behaviour of electronic resources.

Adequate use and knowledge of electronic resources at universities is instrumental towards realisation of the country’s ICT Strategy and the outcome-based education (OBE) model of teaching movement. Suggestions are made to the university, the university library, university librarians and the Library Association of South Africa on how to enhance the use of electronic resources.

It establishes the level of use of electronic resources in one of South African historically disadvantaged universities, a point of contact to other previously South African disadvantaged universities and make suggestions on how electronic resources may be enhanced. It adds to the body of knowledge on the use of electronic resources in academic libraries in South African universities.

The purpose of this paper is to understand how information revealed on organic food labels and perceived organic knowledge drive consumer trust and attitudes towards organic foods, which in turn together with subjective norm eventually influence subsequent purchase intentions.

The questionnaire surveys were administered to customers at four urban large-scale supermarkets and three health food stores at three major cities in Taiwan. In total, 693 valid questionnaires were obtained, yielding a response rate of 81.5 per cent.

Trust, serving as the antecedent of attitudes, significantly mediates the relationships between revealing information, perceived knowledge, and organic purchase intentions. Additionally, both attitudes towards organic foods and subjective norm significantly influence consumer organic food choices. However, the impact of perceived organic knowledge on consumer attitudes has been found to be insignificant, indicating that the increase in perceived knowledge cannot create positive attitudes towards organic foods. Thus, a focus on how to use knowledge to enhance consumer trust in organic foods is suggested as an effective marketing strategy for the organic food industry.

The research findings support that trust and attitudes play the mediating roles linking revealed information and perceived knowledge with organic food purchase intentions. This result is consistent with previous studies, indicating that better organic labeling information and related knowledge perceived by consumers have critical effects on consumer trust in organic foods, which in turn will influence their attitudes and intentions to purchase organic foods. However, this study also found that perceived knowledge can generate positive attitudes only when trust can be firmly built. This confirms the essential role of trust in the process of consumer organic buying intentions.

First, providing credible labeling information by displaying how organic agricultural products are grown, processed, and handled, and the percentage of organic ingredients in a product is crucial to stimulate consumer trust and positive attitudes. Second, enhancing consumer trust by providing correct knowledge and credible information through diversified channels (e.g. TV, newspapers, magazines, web sites) to improve consumer organic knowledge has become the most important task for the government, organic food sectors, certifiers, and research institutions to develop positive attitudes towards organic foods. Finally, organic food sectors and marketers could use a word-of-mouth strategy and focus on promoting the benefits and accessibility of organic foods to the general public to raise the common acceptance of organic foods.

Organic labeling has been considered an effective measure to help consumers obtain valid and trustworthy information in the organic food market, particularly for those with limited knowledge. Therefore, the government agencies not only need to take the responsibility to set regulations for organic food/agricultural products, but also need to set labeling requirements for these products. Based on these labeling requirements, the organic certifying agents can certify organic food/agricultural products by offering organic labels that contain clear information and represent quality to consumers.

This study incorporates critical factors based on related theories, including the antecedents and the outcome variables of consumer trust, to develop a more comprehensive model for better understanding of consumer organic choice behaviour. The research findings have provided implications and additional contributions to the existing theories as well as developed effective strategies for the development of the organic food market.

It is evident that human existence is highly dependent on information. Information is considered to be an essential right of every single individual to sustain life and enjoy it as well. The benefits of looking into the information behaviour of people can, therefore, not be overemphasised. However, there is a yawning gap in research conducted into the information behaviour of marginalised groups such as beggars. This study aims to investigate the information seeking behaviour of beggars in Ghana.

Through a case study design, the study used a qualitative approach and interpretivist paradigm to look into this phenomenon. In total, ten beggars were sampled from the beggar population in Accra through the use of convenient and snowball sampling techniques. A semi-structured interview schedule was used as data collection tool to solicit responses from the participants.

The study revealed that beggars in Accra lacked understanding of their information needs, although they were heavily dependent on information for their tasks and survival. Again, the findings of the study showed that beggars were faced with information seeking barriers such as illiteracy, lack of information literacy skills and financial resources. The study recommends the need for stakeholders to look into the social welfare and literacy needs of beggars.

The authors consider the study original both in conceptualisation and design. The main question being interrogated stems from identified gaps in the literature and the study intends to fill these knowledge gaps. The study’s originality also stems from the fact that there is a paucity of information on the subject of study in the context of Ghana.

This study aims to understand the effects of brands’ transparent communication (i.e. production transparency and cost transparency) on consumers’ perceptions of a brand’s perceived transparency and authenticity, as well as how such perceptions impact consumers’ attitude, trust and behavioral intentions.

Two between-participants factorial design experiments (n = 176 for Study 1 and n = 169 for Study 2) were conducted to examine consumers’ responses to a brand’s cost transparency and production transparency.

The results revealed that transparency in the focal brand’s communication of production and cost would increase consumers’ perceptions of the brand’s transparency and authenticity because of its perceived information sensitivity. Such positive effects were found to similarly impact consumers’ attitude, trust and behavioral intention toward the brand.

The results point to the importance of brand transparency in marketing communication, specifically as it pertains to the influence that the inclusion of transparent cost and production information can have on consumers’ perceptions of authenticity, trust and attitude, as well as how these perceptions translate into behavioral intention.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is among the first to explore the differences between production transparency and cost transparency in influencing consumer responses and the underlying mechanisms. The findings also expand to the literature on brand transparency and brand authenticity.

The purpose of this paper is to extend the work of earlier researches relating to insider trading issues in the stock market under a Cournot‐Stackelberg duopoly.

This paper models that the competition among the insiders in the real market be Stackelberg, which reflects that for all outside and inside reasons, the position and influence of a firm may become the leader or the follower as time goes by.

The paper demonstrates that when the listed company with insiders becomes the leader in the industry, the reaction functions of insiders will change as well as the parameters of the market, to signal from real and financial sides, but the amount traded by insiders remains the same; so does the degree of information revelation. In addition, for the information revealed to the public, the stock price reveals more information with Stackelberg real‐leader model than that of the Stackelberg financial‐leader model.

The main contribution of this paper is that market makers can very well observe signals from the real side, and bringing a signal from the real side can help the stock market reveal more information, but once the signal is introduced, it may not further enhance market efficiency.

While a substantial number of studies have examined information behaviour, most centred on choice of information source, student information behaviour, information behaviour of women, environmental uncertainty and scanning behaviour of top-level hotel executives. However, little is known about how the small and medium enterprise (SME) managers scan, seek, gather, document and use information relevant for emerging information and communication technology (EICT) adoption decision-making. This paper aims to examine the key success factors influencing SME manager’s information behaviour on EICT adoption decision-making.

This study deploys a qualitative approach to exploring 16 key success factors shaping SME managers’ information behaviour on EICT adoption decision-making. More specifically, the study adopted both unstructured and semi-structured interviews with 20 small business managers drawn purposeful from Crunch Database.

This study develops an extended technology, organisation and environment framework by incorporating the information context which helped to unravel 16 key success factors influencing small business managers’ information behaviour on EICT. From the technology context, uncertainty driven, compatibility, replacement of legacy technology, relative advantages, lack of technical know-how and perceived affordability fit for purpose influence SME managers’ information behaviour. Users’ acceptance information, efficiency driven, owner’s support shape the organisation context of perceived information need; competitor’s intelligence gathering, customer’s information gathering provider credibility and government policy influence the environmental context of perceived information need; and finally, perceived information sources credibility, herding event, testimonial and openness to other people’s ideas and experiences are shaped by the information context.

Qualitative research is normally subjective, interpretive and limited on the sample used. Because of the limited number of interviews, the generalisation of the framework and the finding is difficult. Therefore, the finding and the framework need to be established across broader population. The findings are vital considering the fact that small business managers are limited in knowledge and the study may improve the way and manner they go about seeking and gathering information relevant in adopting new ICT.

This research provides further insight into SME managers’ information behaviour by developing a framework and identifying main factors influencing SMEs information behaviours on EICT. Therefore, understanding such factors will enrich their knowledge on some of the factors that may shape their decisions during EICT adoption decision to make effective decision.

The advocacy to extend relationship marketing into the management of the exchange processes within retailing and consumer service markets has meant a growing interest in the opportunities which are offered by technology‐based systems of customer management. A prerequisite for the successful translation of the relationship marketing paradigm from organizational to retailing and consumer service markets is customer information. As the technology for collecting customer data has become more sophisticated, so marketing managers have witnessed an increasing concern among consumers about the impact of these new marketing management techniques on their private rights. Discusses different aspects of information privacy and reports an exploratory study of consumers’ different privacy thresholds. The results indicate different levels of involvement towards privacy issues, and different perceptions of the trustworthiness of service sector companies, among consumers. The implications for relationship marketing strategies are discussed.

This paper aims to present the results of a study which was carried out to find out whether the undergraduate students in the College of Health Sciences in Delta State University are aware of and fully utilize the medical databases and other online information resources within and outside the medical library.

A questionnaire and interview methods were used to elicit data from the students.

The results revealed that majority of the students are not aware and do not use the online information resources such as: MEDLINE, HINARI, CINAHL databases, NUC virtual library as sources of information to retrieve materials related to medical literature. This could be as a result of lack of training for information literacy skills and ineffective user education programmes in the medical libraries and medical schools to equip the medical students with necessary skills to use the medical databases and other online information resources. Problems such as lack of skills to use the online information resources, lack of time, poor user education programmes, and slowness of server were mentioned by the students as some factors militating against the effective use of online information resources.

The findings will be useful for medical librarians and faculty in highlighting the need to collaborate in integrating information literacy skills into the medical school curricula in developing countries. Paper type Research paper

This study aims to determine the level of knowledge in searching, evaluating, information management competency and to find differences among research scholars’ in terms of their information literacy (IL) competency with regards to gender and academic designation.

A survey method was conducted to collect the data from the research scholars’ pursuing their doctoral degrees in Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Tamil Nadu, India.

The results of this study revealed that the majority have used simple search and were not using the Online Public Access Catalogue. They were not able to assess the information retrieved and the assistance from the library staff to locate the resources was found to be minimal. This study also highlighted some of the problems faced by the research scholars and provided some suggestions based on the findings. This study highlights the need to adopt a new IL framework and conduct user literacy training programmes for effective use of the resources.

This study also has practical implications in terms of assessing the IL competency among the research scholars and significant variations which identified through demographics and assessment of IL competency will enable policymakers to develop a framework for brand new literacy instructions. The results may help to frame long-term strategies to motivate and train the research scholars in the effective use of technologies for improving their academic performance.

This study used a questionnaire as tool to collect the data. The outcome of the results will help the librarians and authorities to discuss research scholars’ IL competency and take appropriate decisions to improve their IL skills.