Factors Affecting the Utilisation of Electronic
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Electronic library resources, including e-journals, e-books, subscribed databases and institutional repositories, can support postgraduate learning and research, but availability alone does not ensure meaningful use. This structured literature review examines individual, technological and institutional factors associated with postgraduate students' utilisation of electronic library resources in Uganda, drawing on selected studies from comparable African university settings as contextual evidence. Targeted searches of publisher platforms and university repositories identified reports concerning postgraduate students at Makerere and Kyambogo universities, alongside comparator studies from Ghana and Tanzania. The located evidence suggests that affordability and reliability of internet access, electricity and device availability, remote-access arrangements, awareness, information-search skills, convenience and institutional promotion all shape resource use. Students may favour familiar general search tools when library platforms are difficult to discover, navigate or access. These patterns point to a combined service response involving reliable access, clear authentication guidance, embedded information-literacy instruction and discipline-relevant resource promotion. Interpretation must remain cautious: the searches documented for this draft are targeted discovery searches rather than a fully reproducible search across prespecified databases; some findings were extracted from abstracts or repository descriptions; formal critical appraisal is incomplete; and potential overlap among reports from Kyambogo, Cape Coast and Dar es Salaam has not been resolved. The synthesis is therefore provisional and should not be interpreted as exhaustive evidence until full-text screening, overlap checks and design-appropriate appraisal are completed.
Author: Nikuma, Collines Mercy
Institution: Kampala International University
Language: English
Subfield: Library and Information Sciences
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Quality education
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7225150663