By Suzanne Parfitt (Charles Sturt University, New South Wales, Australia) at MMIT 2015

1. Would you like to be
my friend?
Patron responsiveness to
academic library
Facebook posts
Suzanne Parfitt
Master of Information Studies (Applied Research)
Charles Sturt University, Australia
https://flic.kr/p/2vbjsP

2. A primary benefit of Facebook is to
facilitate interaction with students.
Brian Mathews,
2006
https://flic.kr/p/jFEN1u

3. “Going where patrons are”
Farkas, 2007

4. “Be where the conversation is”
Lankes, Silverstein, Nicholson & Marshall, 2007
Knowledge is
created
through
conversation
https://pixabay.com/static/uploads/photo/201
5/05/12/09/13/social-media-763731_640.jpg

5. Chen et al. (2011)
33.32% posts – announcements of events or updates
56.75%
23.43% posts – promotion of library services and resources
7.87% posts – for discussion
13.29%
5.42% posts – for enquiry
How are
academic
libraries using
Facebook?

6. Digital Engagement
Framework
(Visser & Richardson, 2013)
Reach Interest Involve Activate
Followers ‘Likes’ Comments Share posts
Write posts

7. • Library-patron conversations to
facilitate knowledge generation
• Universities are increasingly focusing on
student engagement (Jisc, 2014)
• A changing world means academic
libraries must find new ways to interact
with students

8. What are the relationships
between attributes of
academic library Facebook
posts and patron
responsiveness?
https://flic.kr/p/9EhzwC
Research Question

9. Plan
March 2016 Ethics approval then the study
begins
October 2016 The research and the report
will be complete
March 2015 Began literature review
June 2015 Began working on the research
proposal

10. My study
Case study method
Australia and United Kingdom
My Study
Purposive sample
• Pages with lots of responses
(Activated)
• Pages with very few responses
(Reached)

11. My study
Case study method
My Study
Data collection:
• Content analysis
 Coding
 use Philips’ (2011)
themes as a basis
• Questionnaire
 open & closed
questions

12. My study
Case study method
My Study
• Questionnaire
 open & closed
questions
Possible issue – will
academic libraries be
willing to post a link to my
questionnaire?

13. References
Chen, D. Y.-T., Maxwell, W., Chu, S. K.-W., Li, W. Z. S., & Tang, L. L. C. (2011). Interaction between libraries
and library users on Facebook. Presented at the The 2011 Research Symposium of the Center for
Information Technology in Education (CITERS 2011), The University of Hong Kong., Hong Kong. Retrieved
from http://hdl.handle.net/10722/161205
Farkas, M. (2007). Going where patrons are: Outreach in MySpace and Facebook. American Libraries,
38(4), 27. Retrieved from https://bocescareer.wikispaces.com/file/view/Farkas_goingwhere.pdf
Jisc. (2014). Listen, understand, act: Social media for engagement. Jisc Inform, (39), 6. Retrieved from
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/inform/inform39/ListenUnderstandAct.html#.VQ0TlTSUehB
Lankes, D. R., Silverstein, J., Nicholson, S., & Marshall, T. (2007). Participatory networks: The library as
conversation. Information Research. Retrieved from
http://quartz.syr.edu/rdlankes/Publications/Journals/COLISFinal-v7.pdf
Mathews, B. S. (2006). Do you Facebook?: Networking with students online. C&RL News, 306–307.
Retrieved from http://crln.acrl.org/content/67/5/306.full.pdf
Phillips, N. K. (2011). Academic library use of Facebook: Building relationships with students. The Journal
of Academic Librarianship, 37(6), 512–522. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.acalib.2011.07.008
Visser, J., & Richardson, J. (2013). Digital engagement in culture, heritage and the arts. Retrieved from
http://digitalengagementframework.com

14. Any questions?
suzanneparfitt@me.com
@sueparfitt
http://searchingshelves.weebly.com
Suzanne Parfitt
Master of Information Studies (Applied Research)
Charles Sturt University, Australia
https://flic.kr/p/2vbjsP