Xie Bo, Bugg Julie M
2117G Hornbake Library, South Wing College of Information Studies, University of Maryland College Park, MD 20740.
Libr Inf Sci Res. 2009 Sep 1;31(3):155. doi: 10.1016/j.lisr.2009.03.004.
An innovative experiment to develop and evaluate a public library computer training program to teach older adults to access and use high-quality Internet health information involved a productive collaboration among public libraries, the National Institute on Aging and the National Library of Medicine of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and a Library and Information Science (LIS) academic program at a state university. One hundred and thirty-one older adults aged 54-89 participated in the study between September 2007 and July 2008. Key findings include: a) participants had overwhelmingly positive perceptions of the training program; b) after learning about two NIH websites (http://nihseniorhealth.gov and http://medlineplus.gov) from the training, many participants started using these online resources to find high quality health and medical information and, further, to guide their decision-making regarding a health- or medically-related matter; and c) computer anxiety significantly decreased (p < .001) while computer interest and efficacy significantly increased (p = .001 and p < .001, respectively) from pre- to post-training, suggesting statistically significant improvements in computer attitudes between pre- and post-training. The findings have implications for public libraries, LIS academic programs, and other organizations interested in providing similar programs in their communities.
一项旨在开发和评估公共图书馆计算机培训项目的创新实验，该项目旨在教会老年人访问和使用高质量的互联网健康信息，此实验涉及公共图书馆、国立衰老研究所、美国国立卫生研究院（NIH）的国立医学图书馆以及一所州立大学的图书馆与信息科学（LIS）学术项目之间富有成效的合作。2007年9月至2008年7月期间，131名年龄在54至89岁之间的老年人参与了该研究。主要研究结果包括：a）参与者对培训项目的看法总体上非常积极；b）在培训中了解了两个NIH网站（http://nihseniorhealth.gov和http://medlineplus.gov）后，许多参与者开始使用这些在线资源来查找高质量的健康和医学信息，并进一步指导他们在健康或医疗相关问题上的决策；c）从培训前到培训后，计算机焦虑显著降低（p < .001），而计算机兴趣和效能显著提高（分别为p = .001和p < .001），这表明培训前后计算机态度有统计学上的显著改善。这些研究结果对公共图书馆、LIS学术项目以及其他有兴趣在其社区提供类似项目的组织具有启示意义。
