Analysis of controlled vocabulary and folksonomy in medical subject search using OPAC

Abstract

Subject access to library resources through OPAC has been a subject of much concern as it has continuously been found to be problematic compared to known-item search. Most of today`s OPAC have incorporated design features that support subject search. However, the effectiveness of OPAC in support of subject search in the medical science domain, particularly in Malaysia has never been explored before.The goal of this study is to evaluate the OPAC of University Science of Malaysia (USM) in order to further investigate the medical library user’s perception on subject search (Medical Subject Heading (MeSH)) in OPAC, the experience of medical library users when using OPAC, the problem to effective subject searching of medical resources in OPAC and the degree of matchness between medical library user’s vocabulary and MeSH assigned. The population of this study consisted of medical library users of Hamdan Tahir Library, Health Campus, University of Science Malaysia (USM), but limited to those who visited the library and used OPAC only .The research design applied in this study was quantitative approach by using a questionnaire based survey.The findings of this study will help medical libraries in Malaysia to create awareness about the importance of subject search, to increase the usage of subject search among their users, to overcome problems that are encountered by the medical library users when using the subject search (MeSH) in OPAC and at the same time enhance their performance of OPAC system.