Information and Communication Technology Skills, Internet Use and Copyright Infringement of Electronic Information Resources by Undergraduates of Two Universities in South West-Nigeria

The widespread increase in the use of Information and Communication Technologies coupled with regular Internet use has brought to the fore, the challenge of Copyright Infringement among university students. To this effect, this study investigated the influence of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) skills and Internet use on the Copyright Infringement of Electronic Information Resources by undergraduates in two universities in South-West, Nigeria. The study adopted the survey research design of the correlational type with a study population of 28,816 undergraduates in two universities in South-West, Nigeria. The sample size was 375 undergraduates out of which a sample of 372 questionnaires were retrieved and used for data analysis using a two stage sampling technique. Cross tabulation, Pearson Product Moment Correlation and regression analysis technique was used for data analysis. Questionnaire was used as the main research instrument for data collection. Findings revealed that the undergraduates in both universities possess a high level of basic ICT skills with overall mean of (Grand Mean= 88.91). Findings also revealed that to obtain educational and research information was the major purpose for which undergraduates in both universities use the Internet. Results from the findings indicated that undergraduates in both universities use Internet daily for communication and correspondence, while the least use for University of Ibadan was to obtain educational and research information and while Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba was to watch movies or for entertainment. It is shown in the result that inadequate power supply or electricity was the major constraint to Internet use by the undergraduates in both universities, while the least constraint was lack of training on the use of Internet in UI (33.6%) and lack of time in AAUA (50.9%) respectively. From the result, we can see that undergraduates’ in both universities plagiarised as they sometimes quote without acknowledgement (56.0%), summarised texts without appropriate reference to the author of the text 70(47.3%), although they do not hack into restricted access materials through websites like Sci-hub.tw (80.3%). Another result from the findings reveal there is a significant relationship between ICT skills and Copyright Infringement on Electronic Information Resources by undergraduates of the two universities (Df= 370, N= 372, r= .222*, P<0.05), there is no significant relationship between Internet use and Copyright infringement on EIR by the undergraduates (Df= 370, N= 372, r= .046, P>0.05), there is no significant relationship between the undergraduates’ ICT skills and Internet use (Df= 370, N= 372, r= .028, P>0.05) and there was a significant combined effect of the independent variables on the dependent variable (F (2, 369) =10.104, P<0.05).