Keywords

Federated searching, College students, Internet searching

Abstract

Randomly selected undergraduates at Brigham Young University, Brigham Young University-Idaho and Brigham Young University-Hawaii, all private universities sponsored by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, participated in a study that investigated four questions regarding federated searching: (1) Does it save time? (2) Do undergraduates prefer it? (3) Are undergraduates satisfied with the results they get from it? (4) Does it yield higher quality results than non-federated searching? Federated searching was, on average, 11% faster than non-federated searching. Undergraduates rated their satisfaction with the citations gathered by federated searching 17% higher than their satisfaction using non-federated search methods. A majority of undergraduates, 70%, preferred federated searching to the alternative. This study could not ultimately determine which of the two search methods yielded higher citation quality. The study does shed light on assumptions about federated searching and will interest librarians in different types of academic institutions given the diversity of the three institutions studied. 15 p, 3 charts, 2 graphs.

Original Publication Citation

College & Research Libraries, Nov27, Vol. 68 Issue 6, p472-486.

Document Type

Peer-Reviewed Article

Publication Date

2007-11-01

Permanent URL

http://hdl.lib.byu.edu/1877/608

Publisher

Association of College and Research Libraries

Language

English

College

Harold B. Lee Library

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