Library and Information Sciences Research Literature in Sri Lanka: A Bibliometric Study

This paper presents a bibliometric study of US research literature emanating from Sri Lanka over 141 articles from the two LIS journals for the period from 1997 to 2007. Data collected from the two journals namely Journal of University Librarian's Association (JULA) and the Sri Lanka Library Review were analyzed to examine the type of US research, areas of LIS research and research strategies and data collection methods used by the LIS researchers in Sri Lanka. This paper also attempts to present an analysis of the authorship pattern, author productivity and prominent contributors, citation pattern, length of papers, language wise and year wise distribution of articles, growth and direction of LIS research papers over a period of ten years. The study is quantitative oriented and longitudinal in character. Sri Lanka LIS research output seems to concentrate in the area of "LIS Activities" and "Information Seeking". Some of other important findings are most articles (94%) are single authored, author productivity is not in agreement with the Lotka's Law. There is no definite growth pattern or positive growth in the area of LIS research in the country. English is the most widely used language. Average citation per article was 9 while average length of an article was 12.

Key Words: Bibliometrics, Library and Information science, US Literature, LIS Research and Development   

doi: 10.4038/jula.v12i0.327

Journal of the University Librarians Association of Sri Lanka (Vol. 12) 2008 p.17-46