The Information Needs of Postgraduate Law Students and Availability of Legal Information Resources in University Law Libraries.

Abstract

The paper explored the information needs of postgraduate law students and availability of legal information resources in Federal university law libraries in the South-East Nigeria. Descriptive survey research design was adopted for the study. The total of 252 postgraduate law students of 2019/2020 and 2020/2021 sets in the two federal universities in South-East formed the population. The instrument used for data collection was a structured questionnaire and observation checklist. The findings of the study revealed that postgraduate law students have significant information needs on current affairs, academic journals, new laws and recent enactment, research grants and scholarships, among others. The law libraries under study have more electronic legal information resources than print legal information resources. The major electronic legal information resources available include: professional law website, online legal textbooks, E-legal journal, LexisNexis professionals and Quick law. Nnamdi Azikiwe University has high availability of print legal information resources on Laws and statutes (Local), Insurance (Local and Foreign), Taxation (Local and Foreign) and Local law reports while UNEC’s print legal resources is significantly high on international/public law (local/foreign), Local journal and Land law/property law (local and foreign). Both libraries need to upgrade on the availability of their print legal information resources in line with the Council of Legal Education standard to be able to meet the information needs of the Postgraduate law students