This project explores the ‘digital turn’ brought about by COVID, the experience of the compelled move from analogue to digital in public libraries, from multiple perspectives :–
(1) Organisational and sectoral issues
(2) Ethical issues
(3) User information behaviour issues
Research questions
The project will investigate six research questions exploring the themes above:
• RQ1. To what extent has the usage of digital services in public libraries across the UK increased as a result of COVID?
• RQ2. How do the public libraries mitigate any digital exclusion issues?
• RQ3. What are the experiences of users in utilising these services from behavioural and digital exclusion perspectives?
• RQ4. What information on privacy issues is presented by public libraries to users related to the use of 3rd party services?
• RQ5. How accessible/understandable are the privacy policies of the 3rd party vendors?
• RQ6. How aware of the privacy issues related to the use of 3rd party services in libraries are library users?