Acceptance and Usage of OpenAccess Scholarly Communication by Postgraduate Students at the Sokoine University ofAgriculture and the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Abstract

This study assessed the awareness and usage of Open Access (OA) for scholarly communication by postgraduate students at the Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA) and the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM). A semistructured self-administered questionnaire survey was undertaken using a convenience sample of 230 postgraduate students of whom 128 (55.6%) participated in the study. The open access concept was familiar to 58.6% of the respondents; however, although 60.9% of them acknowledged having accessed OA content, only 10.9% of them had disseminated research findings through OA. The respondents’ perceptions toward OA were generally positive. Low awareness of the OA concept, inadequate online scholarly communication skills, and the slow Internet connectivity were possible factors affecting the exploitation of OA in the study area. The review and formalisation of the existing postgraduate information literacy training modules at the two universities is recommended in order to improve the adoption of OA and exploitation of the online resources in general.