Information literacy literature in the social sciences and humanities: a bibliometric study

Pages67-89
Date09 January 2017
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/ILS-09-2016-0068
Published date09 January 2017
AuthorRaj Kumar Bhardwaj
Subject MatterLibrary & information science,Librarianship/library management,Library & information services
Information literacy literature in
the social sciences and
humanities: a bibliometric study
Raj Kumar Bhardwaj
Library, St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi, Delhi, India
Abstract
Purpose This paper aims to map information literacy literature in social sciences and humanities
published during the period of 2001-2012.
Design/methodology/approach The data for the study are obtained from Scopus, accessible at www.
scopus.com. Study used the Transformative Activity Index (TAI) and relative citation impact (RCI) to know
the impact of most productive countries and prolic institutions. The SCImago Journal and Country Rank
accessible at www.scimagojr.com/ was used to determine the SCImago Journal Rank and source normalized
impact per paper.
Findings Thestudy found that 1990 documents originating from 79 countries were published in this study
area. These papers are published in 160 journals with an average 12.51 papers per journal. These papers
have been cited 10,025 times with 5.0. average citations per publication. Study also found that information
literacy literature is published in 16 languages and the majority of the papers are in English, 1,879 (94.4 per
cent). The highest growth of publications (106.7 per cent) was found in 2005. The USA contributed the highest
number, 1,035 (52 per cent) papers. Moreover, of the 15 most productive countries, three recorded TAIs 100,
and 12 countries recorded TAIs 100. In all, 160 institutions worldwide have contributed in information
literacy research. Study also found that maximum literature published on the subject by a single author is 828
(41.6 per cent). Universidad de Granada, Granada, Spain has produced the highest number of papers (24, or 1.2
per cent) and received 61 (0.6 per cent) citations, while University of Strathclyde has the highest RCI (2.7) for
its publications. Pintos, María from Universidad de Granada has published the maximum number of papers
(18) that have been cited 78 times.
Social implications The study endeavors to showcase information literacy research outcomes in social
sciences and humanities. It involves quantitative analysis of the literature in this domain using bibliographic
elements such as keywords, authors, afliation, publication and citations.
Originality/value No study has been conducted so far to map the information literacy literature in social
sciences and humanities. Study will be useful in understanding the progress on information literacy in the area
of social sciences and humanities. The study is signicant for social scientists to foster further research in this
emerging area.
Keywords Information literacy, Quantitative analysis, Bibliometric study,
Information literacy instructions, SCImago Journal Rank (SJR),
Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP)
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Information literacy has a number of characteristics and reveals people’s desire to achieve
educational, social, occupational and economic goals (Crawford and Irving, 2009;Lloyd,
2005;Lloyd and Williamson, 2008). Zurkowski (1974), inventor of the term information
literacy, observed that an information-literate person knows how to apply information
resources to routine work. Information literacy focuses on critical thinking and helps to
search, evaluate and use information adequately. The SCONUL (2011) working group on
information literacy marked out seven pillars of the literacy landscape, and noted that an
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/2398-5348.htm
Information
literacy
literature
67
Received 27 September 2016
Revised 27 November 2016
23 December 2016
16 January 2017
Accepted 16 January 2017
Informationand Learning Science
Vol.118 No. 1/2, 2017
pp.67-89
©Emerald Publishing Limited
2398-5348
DOI 10.1108/ILS-09-2016-0068
information-literate person identies information, denes the scope, plans, gathers,
evaluates, manages and presents the information in a consolidated form. Students in the
Social Sciences and Humanities encounter problems in identifying information needs for
assignments, evaluating resources and producing quality work that comes up to the
expectations of their teachers. The concept of information literacy needs to be understood
properly so that its advantages can be recognized (Head, 2008;Balanskat et al., 2006;
Aharony and Bronstein, 2014). A large number of publications on information literacy have
come out in the past 30 years (Rader, 2002).
The history of information literacy research can be divided into four phases:
(1) the precursor period;
(2) the experimental period;
(3) the exploring period; and
(4) the evolving period.
The rst phase focused on literature about information skills and bibliographic
education. The second phase focused on information literacy education provided by
library and information science (LIS) schools and discussed research issues. The third
phase, i.e. the exploring period, was marked by the identication and exploration of
different paradigms of information literacy. The last phase included the development of
a community of researchers, promoting the growth of information literacy research in
the workplace and community (Bruce, 2000). Undoubtedly, research on information
literacy has increased exponentially over the years. Researchers have shown great
interest in the subject, and 767 theses and dissertations have been submitted to
universities in the USA and Taiwan during the period 1998-2010 (Hsieh et al., 2013).
Prior bibliometric studies on the literature of information literacy do not demonstrate the
growth of literature worldwide in the Social Sciences and Humanities. The majority of
studies conducted using the Library and Information Science Abstract (LISA), the Library
Information Science and Technology Abstract (LISTA), the Educational Resources
Information Centre (ERIC) dataset etc. reect only literature published in library science
journals. The types of documents included in previous studies do not give a clear
understanding of research outcomes in the Social Sciences and Humanities. None of the prior
bibliometric studies have used journal performance metrics such as the journal citations
report, the SCImago Journal Rank (SJR) and the Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP).
Besides these, the relative citation impact (RCI) and the citations per publication (CPP) are
indicators used to calculate the quality and impact of research output. The present study is
designed to make a quantitative analysis of information literacy literature in the Social
Sciences and Humanities. The study endeavors to showcase information literacy research
outcomes in the Social Sciences and Humanities. It involves quantitative analysis of the
literature in this domain, using bibliographic elements such as keywords, authors, afliation,
publication and citations (Chuang et al., 2007;Li and Ho, 2008).
Literature review
Since the inception of the concept, research on information literacy has grown exponentially.
A large number of papers have been published about information literacy competencies,
imparting instructions in information literacy programs and allied areas. Nevertheless, only
a few studies have conducted a quantitative analysis of literature in the eld. A bibliometric
study was conducted using the Web of Science (WoS) data set, focusing on global research
publications on information literacy in the eld of library and information science, by
ILS
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