13 (a) What are information access tools?

Information retrieval or accessing is concerned with the exploitation and extraction of

information and other contents of documents from different information sources (Akanwa &
Udo-Anyanwu, 2017). Access tools are crucial for retrieving information for educational
outcomes. Information access tools according to Edom (2012) are the simple mechanisms or
apparatuses that aid the library user to locate, retrieve and use the needed documents from the
library or information from a book or document. He further outlined the tools to include;
bibliographies, indexes and abstracts, catalogues, computer filing or websites, subject index,
title index, directories, OPAC, CD-ROMS, online databases, internet search engines, etc.
Presently, there are various tools at students’ disposal to aid them in access the information
they need.

The effectiveness of a library as an instrument of learning is determined by the success with

which it is able to provide the users with the necessary tools capable of accessing and
retrieving the information they seek. Azubuike (2016) listed the library information retrieval
tools to include: reading list, index, abstract, library catalogue, search engine, OPAC,
bibliography, shelf guides, web-based information retrieval systems which are presently, at
students’ disposal to aid them in accessing information.

To surmount the problem of retrieving information, certain skills are required to selectively
retrieve accurate and sufficient information stored in documents instead of all the information
that may not be relevant for the student’s needs. This is in accordance with the assertion of
Alawiye et al., (2013) that the skills for retrieving information needed by the users include
the skill to navigate, select, evaluate and re-use information. These skills involve the ability
to handle the different retrieval tools that abound. This is made possible if the students are
exposed and encouraged to exploit all through various user orientation and education
programmes available to them.

b) Discuss the characters and use of the following information access tools

 Index
The word “Index” according to Adey et al., (2021) denote one of three distinct species of
bibliographic guides, to wit. Indexing is regarded as the process of describing and identifying
documents in terms of their subject contents. Here, the concepts are extracted from
documents by the process of analysis, and then transcribed into the elements of the indexing
systems, such as thesauri, classification schemes, etc.

There is no doubt that indexes have been employed in several ways to help trace information
and without indexes, information cannot be found and retrieved quickly. Most books have
indexes at the end of the pages. There are also indexes on particular subjects which also make
retrieval easier. In fact, it is possible to trace an article by an author or by subject through the
use of indexes.

Furthermore, there are periodical and newspaper indexes on particular subject. It is these
indexes that are often referred to wherever librarians talk about indexes. Indexes, especially
those of periodicals and newspapers are usually published monthly or quarterly. These are
then cumulated yearly for easy reference materials.

Laukens et al., (2018) writes in BUBL Link that in the ideal document retrieval environment,
a document or query statement is represented by a group of distinct index terms as well as the
semantic relationships between these terms, so that retrieval could be bases on a structure of
semantic relationship. Jung et al., (2020) also opined that documents are retrieved on the
basis of the correspondence between search terms expressed in the query and the terms in the
document. Indexing systems designed to assist in the retrieval of documents operate by
assigning index terms to the analysed subject of each document either manually or
automatically.

Uses of indexes

1. To guide to the content of a particular publication.

2. To guide to the content of a particular library.
3. To a guide to what literature exist, say in a given area, or in a given time or period”. It is
on the above premise that the library catalogue is sometimes described as an index to the
content of the library and a bibliography as an index to the existence/ availability or
otherwise of a publication.
4. To prescribe a standard methodology to subject cataloguers and indexers for constructing
subject headings.
5. To be consistent in the choice and rendering of subject entries, using standard vocabulary
and according to given rules and procedures.
6. To be helpful to users in accessing any desired document(s) from the catalogue or index
through different means of such approach.
7. To decide on the optimum number of subject entries, and thus economise the bulk and
cost of cataloguing indexing.

 Bibliography

A bibliography is a list of books, scholarly articles, speeches, private records, diaries,

interviews, laws, letters, websites, and other sources you use when researching a topic and
writing a paper, Ratzon et al., (2022). The bibliography appears at the end. It is also defined
as a well-organized list of written, printed or otherwise produced record of civilization, e.g.,
of books, articles in periodicals, etc. It serves the librarians and users in finding documents
that they are not aware of (or not sure of existence). Usually common in the libraries are
requests for documents by author, title or subject which are served by help of library
catalogue. But this fails when a part of a book is required or a book not available in a library
is required, or when a type of material not available in the catalogue is being hunted for a
user. At times, the author or the title supplied by the user may be incorrect. For all these
problems, the bibliographic tools help in locating the needed materials

Bibliography as one of the following retrieval tools to accessing sources in the library are list
of works, books or shorter works, which help identify sources where information can be
found. It is true that without the aid of Bibliographies, additional works by a certain author or
works on a certain subject cannot be found. There are hundreds of different kinds of
bibliographies compiled for different purposes, and it is with the aid of bibliographies that
your reference librarian can let you know which one might be useful in the topic area of your
research.

However, it is a bibliography that will tell (the clientele) a work exists, but it may not be held
by that particular library. After writing a journal article or a book, the writers usually refer to
the sources he had used. The source could be book or articles that he had used or added to his
own information, thus list is referred to as reference or bibliographies.

The materials listed in bibliographies are usually arranged in alphabetical order of surnames
before other names, the title, place of publication, publisher, date of publication and numbers
of pages. It is important to know that this arrangement is referred to as MPA style. However,
the date comes immediately after the names of the author, it is referred to as Harvard style.

Bibliographies are of particular to those doing research or advanced work without the
assistance of bibliographies these people would not have found it easier to locate what have
earlier been published in the field they are working on which is to enable them identify and
make a choice of materials. It is in fact advisable and important for patrons to consult
bibliographies as a first step to finding the available literature on their chosen topics

Examples

British National Bibliography, British Library Bibliographic Services Division, British

Library, Boston Spa, 1950-.

Cumulative Book Index, H.W. Wilson, New York, 1898-.

Forthcoming Books, R.R. Bowker, New York, 1966 -.

Indian Books in Print, New Delhi, 1967-.

Uses of Bibliographies

1. Make research more efficient.

2. Support research advisory.
3. Separate reliable, peer-reviewed sources from the unreliable or out-of-date.
4. Establish classic, foundational works in a field.
 5. Provide a guide for independent study.
6. Create a course reading and supplemental reading list.
7. Assist with student advisory.
8. Help with collection development.

 Abstract

An abstract is a brief SUMMARY of your work which is capable of being read independently
of it. The abstract is important as it is the first thing that your reader will see and they are
likely to start forming an opinion of your research project based on your abstract.

A lot of authors have defined the abstract from different point of view. Kim et al., (2020)
defines an abstract as a brief but accurate representation of the contents of a document and he
opined that an abstract is different from an extract, an annotation or summary. Aoyagi et al.,
(2020) defines an abstract as a concise and accurate representation of the content of a
document in a style similar to that of the original document. She adds that an abstract covers
all the main points made in the original document and usually follows the style and the
arrangement of the parent document.

Abstract as documentary products always take the form of short texts either accompanying
the original document or included in its surrogate. Abstracts are very similar to indexes. An
abstract gives a title description of the title or research paper listed. It is also states the
objectives, methodology used in carrying out the research and the finding which helps the
user to find it easier to know whether or not to follow a particular articles or publication.

It is pertinent to note here that most popular abstract found in most libraries is the Chemical
Abstracts. Therefore, a good abstract should be accompanied by adequate bibliographical
description or reference to enable the original publications or articles to be traced, retrieved
and utilized. The arrangement of abstracts can be done using any convenient method,
although the most frequent are the alphabetical and classified arrangement.
It can be seen from the foregoing that creation of abstract should not be left for the haft-baked
or incompetent. It is a core operation in document and information processing which requires
good literacy skills and extensive experience in solid information handling skills would
enable the abstractor to construct abstracts that should help in effective utilization of
documents, either in library or elsewhere.

The term abstracting is simply and essentially, the process of producing a brief summary of a
document showing silent issues like the objectives, scope, procedure or methodology,
conclusion and recommendations contained in the document.

An abstract is written after you have finished writing up your research project as it
summarises what your project contains.

It should contain:

 what you set out to do and why (hypothesis and research questions)

 how you did it (methodology)

 what you found (results and conclusions)

 recommendations (whether you have any will depend on the type of research project)

Examples

This study investigated information retrieval tools and library environment as correlates of
library utilization by students of Rivers State University, Port Harcourt. Three research
questions were posed and two hypotheses were formulated for the study. The study adopted a
correlational design. The population of the study consisted of 682 registered undergraduate
library users out of which a sample of 227 was drawn using YaroYamene’s statistical
formula. The instrument used for data collection was researcher-made rating scale. The data
collected for the research questions were analysed using the Pearson Product Moment
Correlation (PPMC) and hypotheses tested at 0.05 level of significance using t-test. The
result revealed that, students make use of the various information resources to a high extent;
information retrieval tools are provided in the library to a high extent, there is a very strong
and positive relationship between information retrieval tools available and students’ use of
the library, which is also significant and a strong, positive and significant relationship exist
between the library environment and students’ use of the library. It was recommended that
students should be sensitized more on the use of periodicals and fiction for relaxation; even
though the relationship between retrieval tools and use is significant, there is still need for
students to be sensitized on how to use the library through adequate orientation on
information retrieval tools. University management should ensure that the good library
environment be maintained and sustained.

 Library Catalogue

Catalogue is a very crucial saint information source in the library. In fact, for the proper,
efficient and effective use of the library, a reader cannot bypass or totally ignore the
catalogue, Mishra et al., (2020). Going straight to the shelves without consulting the
catalogue to pick books may have its own little advantages, but it does not however give the
user or the readers the opportunity to know very well the library’s complete and
comprehensive holdings. The catalogue indicates where the books are on the library shelves.
Apart from indicating the where about or location of every books in the library, it will also
indicate whether or not the library has a particular book on a particular discipline.
Nevertheless, the precise purposes of the library catalogue vary, they can be broadly
summarized thus:

To help a library user to find a book which:

 The author is known.

 The title is known.
 The subject is known.

To show the library holdings:

 By a given author.
 On a given subject and related subject.
 In a given form of literature.

To help in the choice of books:

 As to its edition.
 As to its other characteristics.
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