Are library and information professionals ready for evidence based practice?

Clare, Thorpe, Partridge, Helen L., & Edwards, Sylvia L. (2008) Are library and information professionals ready for evidence based practice? In ALIA Biennial Conference : Dreaming 08, Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA), Alice Springs, NT.

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Abstract

Evidence based practice (EBP) is recognised as a way of improving the quality of professional practice in many disciplines however its adoption within library and information sciences (LIS) has been gradual. The term was first introduced into the library and information profession‟s vocabulary a decade ago but an impediment to its uptake is the lack of clear understanding regarding how LIS practitioners understand the concept. Partridge, Thorpe, Edwards and Hallam (2007) identified the need to understand how LIS professionals experience or understand evidence based practice and proposed a model of four categories of experience to describe how LIS professionals experience EBP. This paper extends that framework by refining the different conceptions of evidence based practice and identifying relationships which exist between the categories of experience to provide a rich description of the EBP phenomenon. The paper also argues that the phrase “evidence based librarianship” and its variations be abandoned as practitioners do not see a distinction between EBP as applied to librarianship and information practice and industry specific jargon like “evidence based library and information practice”. This research will help current and future LIS practitioners, leaders and educators engage more actively in the establishment of an evidence based culture to improve library and information practice in Australia and internationally.

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ID Code: 28370
Item Type: Conference Paper
Refereed: No
Keywords: evidence based practice, library and information science, phenomenography
Subjects: Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classification > INFORMATION AND COMPUTING SCIENCES (080000) > LIBRARY AND INFORMATION STUDIES (080700)
Divisions: Past > QUT Faculties & Divisions > Faculty of Science and Technology
Deposited On: 02 Nov 2009 00:55
Last Modified: 09 Jun 2010 14:07

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