The use of online legal information access and retrieval devices in the e-library of the Faculty of Law, University of Calabar, Nigeria

Abstract

This study examined the availability of online legal information access and retrieval devices and their utilization in the e-library of the Faculty of Law, University of Calabar. To aid the study, the faculty of law students constituted the population of study. Of this 433 students formed the sample of the study being the bona fide law library registered students who completed and returned the questionnaire.The research instrument for data collection was a structured questionnaire. The instrument was designed to elicitinformation on the availability of fifteen online legal information and access devices in the e-library library and the extent of their utilization in accessing and retrieving legal information in the library. Findings reveal that although the e-library library had a number of the sampled online access and retrieval devices there were disparities in their usages by the students. The disparity in the utilization of these devices stemmed from the fact that some were heavily utilized than others, while some were non-existence. The study further showed that but for the manifest problems that affected the usages of the devices, the level of patronage implied that the e-library seems to be the in-thing in contemporary information search and access for possible utilization to meet desired goals.