Information Literacy Web Tutorials – New Insights and Challenges

The paper presents the results from a study on information literacy in a higher education (HE) context based on a larger research project evaluating 3 Norwegian IL web tutorials at 6 universities and colleges in Norway. The aim was to evaluate how the 3 web tutorials served students’ information seeking and writing process in an study context and to identify barriers to the employment and use of the IL web tutorials, hence to the underlying information literacy intentions by the developer.  Both qualitative and quantitative methods were employed. A clear mismatch was found between intention and use of the web tutorials. In addition, usability only played a minor role compared to relevance. It is concluded that the positive expectations of the IL web tutorials tend to be overrated by the developers. Suggestions for further research are presented.