Investigating the Correlation of Access to the Internet/ Computer System and Information Literacy

Abstract

Background: Formerly in societies, literacy only implied reading and writing skills. Gradually, the industrial 20th century turned into the information era of the 21st century. Accordingly, to survive in the present world, we need to have information literacy. Acquiring information technology (IT) is an indispensable part of literacy. The current research aims to investigate the correlation of access to computer/internet system and paramedical students’ information literacy at Hormozgan University of Medical Sciences, in 2015.Materials and Methods: In the present descriptive, cross-sectional research conducted in 2015, 229 paramedical students who entered university during 2012-2014 were selected through a clustered sampling method. The data collection instrument was a questionnaire already developed and used in the previous research (11). It was comprised of two sections: a demographic and an information literacy section. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, Pearson test, as well as independent-sample t-test, were applied via SPSS (version 16). Result: Totally, 86.9% and 85.2% of participants had access to computer and internet systems, respectively. A significant difference was found between access to computers and information literacy as well as between information literacy and academic degree (P<0.05). Among the domains investigated, the health-related IT group was found to have the highest literacy level. Conclusion: The results of the research indicated a correlation between access to net and information literacy. Therefore, providing for IT infrastructures is suggested for promoting information literacy.

Keywords: Information Literacy, Access to Information, Computer, Internet