Influence of peer and technical supports on the ease-of-use of educational support systems among lecturers of library and information science in Nigerian universities

The research investigated the influence of peer and technical supports on the ease-of-use of educational support systems among library and information science (LIS) lecturers in Nigerian universities. Literature relevant to the study were reviewed to relate past studies to the research. To guide data collection, descriptive survey design was adopted with the instrumentation of a questionnaire. A pre-test was carried out to improve on the reliability of the questionnaire which had a response rate of 72%. The data collected was analysed with descriptive and inferential statistics. Test of statistical significance was made at alpha 0.05. It was found that the lecturers were not well supported by their peers and the technical support staff in the use of educational support systems, hence, the difficulties they faced in the use of educational support systems. Peer and technical supports were found to have significant positive correlations and a significant and positive joint influence on the ease-of-use of educational support systems with a joint contribution of 10%. Analyses of their relative contributions to the prediction of ease-of-use revealed that, though, the two support factors contributed positively; only peer support contributed significantly. Therefore, to aid the lecturers in making an easy and seamless use of educational support systems, it was suggested that long-term collegial interaction and peer-coaching should be encouraged and training and support programmes designed to increase the ease-of-use of a wider range of educational support systems for quality and effective teaching practices. This research has application for LIS lecturers in other developing countries and for faculty in countries seeking to expand their programmes and educational outreaches into the developing world.