How can library anxiety play a positive role on students' identity?

A philosophical approach to anxiety and academic libraries

Cecilia Elsen

Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences

The question raised:

•Can library anxiety be positive for students?

Structure

1. What is anxiety?

2. What is library anxiety?

3. Library anxiety in positive terms?

2. What is anxiety?

Online Oxford dictionnaries

• "a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease about something with an uncertain outcome” (general)

• “a nervous disorder marked by excessive uneasiness and apprehension, typically with compulsive behavior or panic attacks” (in psychiatry)

Heidegger's anxiety – An overview

• Anxiety is essential to reveal someone’s existence

• Anxiety is not fear!

• I fear something concrete but I am anxious about something abstract

• I experience anxiety when I realize I am not «one» with the world

Moxnes' anxiety

• Anxiety reduces the fear for tomorrow

• Anxiety's task is to create security

• Difficult to give a proper and accurate definition

• «the sick anxiety» vs «the healthy anxiety»

• Anxiety as a form for intelligence

2. What is library anxiety?

Definition by the Online Dictionary for Library and Information Science:

• Confusion, fear, and frustration felt by a library user

• Lacking experience, when faced with the need to find information in a library

• Library anxiety may be one cause of academic procrastination among college and university students

Constance Mellon, "Library anxiety: a grounded theory and its development" (1986)

• Qualitative study

• Explored the feeling of students about using the library for research

• 75 to 85% response in terms of fear.

• (1) students generally feel that their own library-use skills are inadequate while the skills of other students are adequate

• (2) the inadequacy is shameful and should be hidden

• (3) the inadequacy would be revealed by asking questions.

More about Mellon's paper

• "feeling intimidated, embarrassed, and overwhelmed by libraries and librarians"

• College students believe their research skills are inadequate

• They feel ashamed and unwilling to talk to librarians

• Feeling of being lost: (1) the size of the library; (2) a lack of knowledge about where things were located; (3) how to begin, and (4) what to do

Sharon Bostick’s Library Anxiety Scale (LAS), 1992

• (1) barriers with library staff

• (2) affective barriers

• (3) comfort with the library

• (4) knowledge of the library

• (5) mechanical barriers

(From Online Dictionary for Library and Information Science)

3. Can library anxiety be positive?

«Positive anxiety»

• Everyday anxiety is a constructive force if the conditions are right

• This anxiety is necessary to take good decisions

• Anxiety related to freedom

• Anxiety is a tool for the construction of the self

• Library anxiety as an identity-builder (if mastered)

Conclusion

• Quite common for new students to experience library anxiety because theyare put into an unfamiliar situation

• One has to go through this process to gain autonomy and to be able to getthe information one need

• One need to overcome libray anxiety to feel more at home in the library

• Students will gain independance and higher self-esteem and self-confidence