Identify Factors Affecting the Increase of Users of the Libraries of Astan Quds Razavi Based on the Marketing Mix 4C

Objective: The aim of this research was to identify factors influencing the increase of users at the libraries of Astan Quds Razavi based on customer-focused marketing model "4 C's" from the point of view of librarians. Methodology: The research method is descriptive-survey. Data were collected through a questionnaire survey from 163 librarians out of 243 employees. And given the small size of population, sampling was conducted and questionnaires were distributed among the population. The questionnaire consisted of 40 closed questions in four sections. The research population included all of library managers and librarians working in the library. According to the non-normality of the data, to test the hypotheses, regression and chi-square test for the relationship between variables and Spearman correlation coefficient was used. Results: The results showed that elements in the marketing mix 4 C's are effective to attract users to the libraries of Astan Quds Razavi. Its components, that is, convenience and cost, respectively, were considered to have a major role in attracting users to the libraries of Astan Quds Razavi. Conclusion: Customer/consumer value has no effect on attracting users. The results also showed the elements of the marketing mix 4 C's can be helpful to attract users to the libraries of Astan Quds Razavi

Identify Factors Affecting the Increase of Users of the Libraries of Astan Quds Razavi Based on the Marketing Mix 4C

Objective: The aim of this research was to identify factors influencing the increase of users at the libraries of Astan Quds Razavi based on customer-focused marketing model "4 C's" from the point of view of librarians. Methodology: The research method is descriptive-survey. Data were collected through a questionnaire survey from 163 librarians out of 243 employees. And given the small size of population, sampling was conducted and questionnaires were distributed among the population. The questionnaire consisted of 40 closed questions in four sections. The research population included all of library managers and librarians working in the library. According to the non-normality of the data, to test the hypotheses, regression and chi-square test for the relationship between variables and Spearman correlation coefficient was used. Results: The results showed that elements in the marketing mix 4 C's are effective to attract users to the libraries of Astan Quds Razavi. Its components, that is, convenience and cost, respectively, were considered to have a major role in attracting users to the libraries of Astan Quds Razavi. Conclusion: Customer/consumer value has no effect on attracting users. The results also showed the elements of the marketing mix 4 C's can be helpful to attract users to the libraries of Astan Quds Razavi

Reported causal factors for research misconducts in Iranian research

Substantial concerns about the research integrity in Iran have caused research misconducts to be an issue for studies. But adequate recognition of causal factors is a necessary part of clear and explicit policy in order to manage the research misconducts and supply the research integrity. This study attempted investigating the available evidence on the reported research misconducts in Iranian research and its causal factors. Therefore, 30 studies on Iranian research misconducts were studied. The detected factors to research misconducts based on the reported evidence included: 1. Structural factors such as publication pressure, scientific promotion policies, research funding, and job preservation; 2. Organizational factors such as research environment, regulatory-control activities on research and teaching research activities; 3. Personal factors such as research skills, degree orientation, financial benefits, understanding, and moral judgment. The analytical model of causal factors was designed. Therewith, cultural and situational factors have received less attention in the literature and they have a major focus on the obvious types of research misconduct (data fabrication, Falsification, and Plagiarism), especially plagiarism

Identifying the criteria of institutional repositories: examining the institutional repository of Al-Zahra University

Objective: The purpose of this article is to identify the institutional repository evaluation indicators and to evaluate the compliance of the institutional repository of Al-Zahra University with it. Methodology : This research has used the qualitative method., the meta-combined method has been used to create the indicators. And the panel of experts has been identified to refine the criteria and a last part of the researcher-made checklist has been used to check the realization of the selected criteria using descriptive statistics. Findings: The findings showed that a total of 70 elements divided into six categories (technology, policy, content, marketing, personnel and user application) are among the evaluation indicators which was obtained from the meta-synthesizing and the institutional repository of Al-Zahra University was evaluated according to these criteria. Conclusion: According to the research findings, institutional repository indicators were conceptualized in 6 dimensions of technology, procedure, content, marketing, personnel and user, which serves the analysis of institutional repositories. The result is that the condition of Al-Zahra University repository corresponds to 3/4 standards in terms of standards. And a slight weakness is seen in some areas such as procedure and line and policy and content management and technology and personnel. Which should be carefully reviewed in weak areas and try to improve the quality of the institutional repository such as Spark

Archival literacy of archives' users in Tehran

Archival Literacy is a set of abilities requiring individuals to 'recognize when archival information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed archival materials.' The purpose of this study was to investigate the level of archival literacy among the users of the archival centers in Tehran, Iran. The research method was surveyed. The statistical population of the study was 80 people from the users of archival centers. Data were collected using literature and also a questionnaire. Since the community size was less than the sampling could be done, a census was used to collect data. At first, the components of archival literacy were extracted from the literatures, and then a questionnaire was designed based on them. Questions were constructed in the Likert five-point scale. The reliability of the questionnaire was 0.881 using Cronbach's alpha. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistical methods by utilizing the SPSS software. The findings of this study showed that the level of archival literacy among users of the archives centers is relatively well-suited. The findings of this study also showed that the variables of archival literacy are: knowledge, evaluation and analysis, rules, location, culture and use in a relatively desirable situation, the level of originality in the desirable level, as well as the role of archivist and advanced skills in an unfavorable situation. The conclusion of the hypothesis test was that there was a direct relationship between archival literacy with the level of education and the period of familiarity with the archival center, but there was no relation between the level of library literacy and the academic field of the users

Investigating User Interfaces of Non-Iranian Digital Libraries based on Social Bookmarking Capabilities and Characteristics to Use by Iranian Digital Libraries

Current study aims to investigate the status of user interfaces of non-Iranian digital libraries’ based on social bookmarking capabilities and characteristics to use by Iranian digital libraries. This research studies the characteristics and capabilities of top digital libraries’ user interfaces in the world based on social bookmarking used by library users. This capability facilitates producing, identifying, organizing, and sharing contents using tags. Survey method was used with descriptive-analytical approach in this study. Populations include non-Iranian digital libraries interfaces. Top ten digital libraries’ interfaces were selected as the sample. A researcher-made checklist prepared based on literature review and investigating four distinguished websites (Library Thing, Delicious, Amazon, and Google Book). Faced validity evaluated by 10 experts’ viewpoints, then reliability calculated 0.87.Findings of this study are important because of two reasons: first, it provides a comprehensive and an unambiguous vision for recognizing user interfaces’ basic capabilities and characteristics based on social bookmarking. Second, it can provide a base for designing digital libraries in Iran. The results showed that the majority of digital libraries around the world had not used web 2.0 characteristics such as producing, identifying, organizing, and sharing contents except two digital libraries (Google Books, and Ibiblio)

Requirements Analysis for Creation of Personal Archives of Artists in Tehran

Objective: Personal Archiving is a branch of archival science and genealogy, focusing on the capture, classify, maintain, store, retrieve, use, archive, preservation, dispose, and management of an individual's personal documents and other documentary output, generally by the individuals concerned. A personal archive is an archive created by a person with personal goals, needs and interests. The lack of personal archives, especially for artists, can disperse their artworks throughout their lives, increasing the lack of coherence of their artworks and personal information. A personal archive is established through identifying, capturing, collecting, organizing, indexing, storing, integrating, retrieving, and sharing of personal works, documents and information. Personal archives are an important cultural heritage of a country, because they represent the cultural heritage of individuals and their individual, social, economic and cultural activities in the society. Therefore, the present research seeks to study the requirements for the creation of personal archives of artists in Tehran. Methodology: The statistical population of this study included 271 artists from the Institute for the Development of Visual Arts, in three fields of painting, sculpture and graphic art who has held at least two individual exhibitions. Participants were selected by snowball method and introduced by previous participants. The research method was mixed. First, the literature were analyzed and reviewed. Second, the interviews have been conducted. Third, the contents of interviews were analyzed descriptively and qualitatively, using thematic analysis and the MAXQDA software. Forth, the requirements for creating personal archives of artists were extracted. Finally, in the second phase, according to the requirements extracted from the interviews, a questionnaire was developed and was filled out by participants. Findings: The result of chi-square test based on the degree of freedom of each factor showed that there was a significant relationship between the mentioned factors and the creation of the artists' personal archives. The mean of conservation factor was 3.679 with a factor loading 0.94, the mean of storage factor was 3.636 with a factor loading of 0.92, the mean of factor of acquisition (collecting) was 3.447 with a factor loading of 0.86, the mean of factor of retrieval and access was 3.17 with a factor loading of 0.81; and the mean of organization factor was 2.791 with a factor loading of 0.79. Conclusion: The results of analysis of questionnaires' data revealed that the requirements and priorities to create personal archives for artists in order of importance include: conservation, storage, acquisition (collecting), retrieval, access, and organization. In analyzing these essentials, physical and digital protection of personal information as the underpinnings of the protection agent, is vital for the artists of Tehran. It is worth noting that protecting the physical archives is harder than protecting digital archives. It is suggested to create a database of artists' personal archives to allow them sharing their personal archives and experiences

Consistency between descriptors, author-supported keywords and tags in the ERIC and Mendeley databases

The purpose of this study was to identify the language consistency between indexers, authors and taggers in the ERIC and Mendeley databases. This survey was conducted using content analysis methods and techniques to evaluate the language consistency between indexers, authors and taggers in the ERIC and Mendeley databases and also to determine common keywords. The sample for this study was comprised of top twenty journals in the field of Educational Research based on the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) of Web of Science, indexed in the ERIC database in 2014. Finally 499 articles published in the above-mentioned journals in 2014 were chosen as the sample base for the dataset. Note that only articles with author-supported keywords, indexed in the ERIC database and also tagged in the Mendeley database from January 2014 to August 2016 were eligible to be assessed. Descriptors assigned to the articles on the ERIC database and tags associated to the articles on the Mendeley database for the period from January 2014 to August 2016 were extracted. Also author-assigned keywords assigned to all 499 articles were collected. Finally we created a software based on object-oriented programming (OOP) in C++ to analyze the search results. Descriptive statistics and measures, and thesaural term comparison show that there are important differences in the context of keywords from the three groups. This study demonstrated that there were differences between the tagger, author and professional indexer views of the words used as tags, descriptors, or author-assigned keywords. The results showed that the consistency between the author-supported keywords and user tags of the 499 articles in the Mendeley was 15 percent; while the consistency between descriptors designated to the articles in the ERIC database and user tags associated to the articles on the Mendeley were three percent. On the other hand, the consistency between descriptors assigned to the articles in the ERIC database and the author-assigned keywords were 4 percent. Finally, the language consistency between the three above-mentioned groups was 1.1 percent. Also note that the presence of descriptors in the ERIC thesaurus was 34 percent, which were more than the author-supported keywords and tags. The findings showed that the consistency between the keywords used by authors and taggers were more than the keywords chosen by indexers and authors, and by indexers and taggers. This means that three sides of the information representation triangle, i.e., indexer, author and tagger are unfamiliar with each other’s language. It is worth noting that tags are useful supplements to controlled vocabularies, since the former provide a means for social organization of knowledge outside the framework of the latter. The low consistency between tags and descriptors in this research indicates that Mendeley users do not use the same terminology as subject specialists who maintain descriptors in the ERIC thesaurus. Further research involving semantic analysis of Mendeley tags may reveal an emerging vocabulary suitable for inclusion in the ERIC thesaurus as a controlled vocabulary

Designing an OER Production Pattern for the E-Learning System of university of Tehran

Objectives: The purpose of the research was conducted to design a model for producing open educational resources (OER) for the virtual education system of University of Tehran. Methodology: The research method of this study was a survey. A researcher-made a 20 item questionnaire extracted from earlier studies with a Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.753 was used. The statistical population of the study includes 81 professors and experts in e-learning at the University of Tehran. After completing the questionnaire, the obtained data were analyzed using SPSS software and Amos software. Results: The components of the proposed production model of educational resources based on rank importance include learning models, modification; Change and merge, validity, resource quality, being free, licenses, integrated archives, and access and rewrite. The template was validated by mean test, Kaiser Meyer Olkin test (KMO), and Bartlett's Test at 95% confidence level, and the correlation of each part of the template was confirmed by the Chi square test. The components of the model are independent of other components: the reason loads of each reason with chi-square indices of the degree of freedom equal to 1.786, the goodness of fit index equal to 0.917, root mean square index of estimation error equal to 0.069, and A comparative fit equal to 0.901 shows the relationship between the factors and the model. It can be concluded that the proposed model is approved as a suitable model for an open educational resource

Archival literacy of archives' users in Tehran

Archival Literacy is a set of abilities requiring individuals to 'recognize when archival information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed archival materials.' The purpose of this study was to investigate the level of archival literacy among the users of the archival centers in Tehran, Iran. The research method was surveyed. The statistical population of the study was 80 people from the users of archival centers. Data were collected using literature and also a questionnaire. Since the community size was less than the sampling could be done, a census was used to collect data. At first, the components of archival literacy were extracted from the literatures, and then a questionnaire was designed based on them. Questions were constructed in the Likert five-point scale. The reliability of the questionnaire was 0.881 using Cronbach's alpha. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistical methods by utilizing the SPSS software. The findings of this study showed that the level of archival literacy among users of the archives centers is relatively well-suited. The findings of this study also showed that the variables of archival literacy are: knowledge, evaluation and analysis, rules, location, culture and use in a relatively desirable situation, the level of originality in the desirable level, as well as the role of archivist and advanced skills in an unfavorable situation. The conclusion of the hypothesis test was that there was a direct relationship between archival literacy with the level of education and the period of familiarity with the archival center, but there was no relation between the level of library literacy and the academic field of the users