ICT literacy among undergraduates in
Nigerian universities
Airen Edale Adetimirin
Education and Information
Technologies
The Official Journal of the
IFIP Technical Committee on
Education
 
ISSN 1360-2357
 
Educ Inf Technol
DOI 10.1007/s10639-011-9163-
y
132
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DOI 10.1007/s10639-011-9163-y
ICT literacy among undergraduates
in Nigerian universities
Airen Edale Adetimirin
# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011
Abstract The purpose of this study was to investigate the availability, use of
Information and Communication Technology and the ICT literacy skills of under-
graduates in seven Nigerian universities. The descriptive survey research design was
adopted and seven universities were selected based on distribution of ownership of
university. Four faculties were purposively selected with a study population of 8,497.
Random sampling procedure was employed using a sampling percentage of 20% to
give a sample size of 1,702. Results revealed that computer, telephone and the
Internet were the three ICT mostly used by the undergraduates, although more on an
occasional basis. The undergraduates in the state universities (BSU and IMSU) were
found to have poor ICT literacy skills in the use of the three ICT with over 25%,
while those with average ICT literacy skills were in the federal universities (ABU
and UNIMAID). Three major factors affecting the ICT literacy of the undergraduates
were identified as irregular power supply, inadequate ICTand limited duration of the
use of the ICT. For increased ICT literacy of undergraduates, the university
administrators must introduce courses on ICT competency to all students especially
first year students and encourage all lecturers to use ICT for teaching and learning.
The article contains original work carried out on the ICT literacy competencies of
undergraduates in selected Nigerian universities and the result would be useful to
library staff and university administrators.
Keywords ICT literacy. ICTuse . Undergraduates . University libraries .
Nigerian universities
1 Introduction
Students search for information for various reasons, among which are to complement
what has been taught in their various courses and lecture notes, complete their
A. E. Adetimirin (*)
University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria
e-mail: aeadetimirin@yahoo.com
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assignments and term papers, undertake project and write up such reports, read and
pass examinations, etc. Chenoweth and Price (1997) stated that “the purpose of
general education is to provide a common experience in order to ensure that students
acquire skills, knowledge, and the ability to think critically and to perceive
interdisciplinary relationships”. Oliver (2002) also reported that one of the goals of
educational institutions is to ensure that graduates are information literate and can
identify, locate and evaluate relevant information to satisfy their information needs.
This implies that graduates demonstrate not only skills and knowledge in their
subject domains but also general attributes and generic skills.
The adoption of ICT in universities was necessitated by the continual review of
the curriculum which invariably requires access to a variety of information sources
and types by students and teachers (Oliver 2002). A study by Ogwu et al. (2010) on
fresh undergraduates in University of Botswana to determine their computer
proficiency level in order to restructure the computer curriculum under General
Education Courses (GEC) for effective learning was carried out and it was found out
that their computer proficiency was low. East Tennessee State University (ETSU),
USA, for instance revised its curriculum by introducing a program for first year
students to acquire ICT literacy which included computer literacy course, word
processing, electronic communication (e-mail and Internet), and online searches
(Oliver 2002) and this was to ensure that when they graduate they would be able to
meet several proficiencies related to writing, speaking, and using information
technology.
Academic libraries acquire and organize both printed and electronic information
sources for accessibility by their clientele. Most university libraries in Nigeria are
under-funded and therefore unable to acquire sufficient information materials for
their students and other library users. To alleviate this problem, students and staff of
universities are adopting information and communication technologies (ICT) to
access current information from CD-ROMs, electronic journals and other online
sources.
ICT has the capability to enhance teaching and learning through improved
interaction across cultures, between students, academics and between both, but some
factors in developing countries could impact otherwise (Mlitwa 2004). ICT use by
undergraduates therefore becomes inevitable for academic excellence in their various
disciplines. They use ICT to complement print resources available in their various
libraries to retrieve relevant information for their achievement of academic goals.
Students’ use of technology in education is expected to improve educational
outcomes, increase skills in the use of technology and decrease inequalities between
groups (Corbett and Willms 2002) as employers expect graduates who will be
prospective employees to possess some ICT skills. Therefore, to remain relevant in
the current information age, university lecturers and students have to adopt ICT to
enhance their teaching, learning and research activities. The use of such technologies
by the students is however, dependent on accessibility, skills and ease of use to such
technologies.
The acquisition of ICT by an organization is to meet the goals and objectives of
such an organization and invariably improve its productivity and image. The
availability of ICT in an organization does not imply that the users in such an
organization will make use of these ICTs optimally. Bondaryk (1998) reported that
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the adoption of any learning tool in higher education is dependent on awareness,
willingness to use it and ability to use it. Students’ experiences of the use of ICT are
influenced by the type and quality of education received prior to entering the
university, the level of exposure to such technologies in their family and the amount
of time spent out of the educational system and labour market where day-to-day
exposure to these technologies was not common (Barraket and Scott 2001). This is
in agreement with the study carried out by Mutula (2010) who reported that fresh
undergraduates in University of Botswana were found to lack ICT skills. McMahon
et al. (1999) also reported that factors such as access, training and time (duration of
use) influence the way undergraduates in UK universities use computers, as the
students focused on their individual information needs.
The implications ICT have for the curriculum of universities are that students
need to learn new skills such as how and when to use computers, and how to use
information stored on computers to solve problems. Some Nigerian universities have
responded positively by acquiring the computer technology and encouraging the use
of information technology for communication following the realization that
information is a powerful tool for education.
The use of ICT requires some skills to be able to retrieve the required information
without much stress. The level of ICT skills a student possesses may affect use of
ICT and some studies have been carried out to investigate the influence skill has on
ICT use. Mutula (2010) reported that fresh students from secondary schools who got
admission into the University of Botswana were largely information illiterate and
this created challenges to the university in terms of offering effective academic
programmes. In a study on gender differences in computer literacy among
undergraduates at the University of Botswana by Tella and Mutula (2008), the
findings revealed that undergraduates with higher computer literacy were more
inclined to access and make use of library facilities. Ajuwon (2003) also carried out
a study on the use of computer and the Internet among first year clinical and nursing
students in University College Hospital, Ibadan, Nigeria and discovered that the
students used these facilities to search for relevant information for their studies but
some factors such as insufficient computer and Internet use proficiency as factors
affected their use.
ICT literacy can be defined as the use of digital technology, communication tools
and or networks to access, manage, integrate, evaluate and create information in
order to function in a knowledge society (Report of the International ICT Literacy
Panel 2002). Access is knowing about and how to collect and or retrieve information
while management is the application of an existing organizational or classification
scheme. Integration relates to interpreting and representing information and it
involves summarizing, comparing and contrasting. Evaluation is the ability to make
judgments about the quality, relevance, usefulness or efficiency of information, while
creation is the generation of information by adapting, applying, designing, inventing
or authoring information.
ICT literacy focuses on bridging the ideas of information literacy and technology
literacy. It focuses on how students locate, organize and communicate information
with digital environments (Katz 2005). Ibegwam (2004) carried out a study on use of
the Internet by students of the College of Medicine, University of Lagos, Nigeria and
found out all the 200 respondents used the Internet and majority used it for searching
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academic materials and visiting other university websites. More than half of the
respondents had less than six months duration of access while only a minority had
used the Internet for over two years. Use of the Internet by these medical students
was however faced with some problems: few computers with Internet access,
unstable connectivity to the Internet and insufficient training in the use of the
Internet facilities.
Oblinger and Oblinger (2005) reported that college students who grew up with
the Internet might be impressively technologically literate, more accepting of new
technology than their parents and instructors. The level of ICT skills a student
possess may affect use of ICT and some studies have been carried out to investigate
the relationship skill has on ICT use. High use of ICT by students may be affected by
lack of adequate experience (Cretchley 2007). Manda and Mukangara (2007)
corroborated the relevance of necessary ICT skills to improve ICT use in a study
carried out on use of electronic resources in academic and research institutions in
Tanzania and found that poor skills affected use of e-resources.
Luambano and Nawe (2004) in their study on Internet use by university students
in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania reported that it was used mainly for communication with
friends and relatives more than for academic purposes because of lack of skills
required for effective use of the internet. The study recommended the provision of
training on use of the Internet. Virtanen and Nieminen (2002) carried out a study on
ICT use among undergraduate dental students in Finland and reported that more that
95% had good or satisfactory skills in word processing and a little over half could
manage some advanced operating system functions and this influenced their use of
ICTwhich was found to be high. It therefore becomes imperative to carry out a study
to investigate factors that can affect the use of ICTs by the users (students and staff)
in universities even when these ICTs are available.
1.1 Objectives of the study
The objectives are to:
1. Investigate the types of ICT available and used by undergraduates in the
universities.
2. Determine the ICT literacy skills of the undergraduates in the selected
universities.
3. Examine the factors affecting ICT literacy of the undergraduates in the selected
universities.
2 Research methodology
The descriptive survey research design was adopted for the study and seven
universities were selected based on distribution of ownership of university: three
federal, two states and two privately owned. The selected universities were: Ahmadu
Bello University, Zaria (ABU); University of Ibadan (UI) and University of
Maiduguri (UNIMAID) all federal universities, while the state universities were:
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Benue State University, Makurdi (BSU) and Imo State University, Owerri (IMSU).
The two private universities were Babcock University, Ilisan Remo, (BU) and
Igbinedion University, Okada (IUO).
Within these universities, four faculties were purposively selected on the basis of
being available in all the selected universities and most universities in Nigeria. The
faculties were Arts, Education, Science and Social Sciences. Different departments
were randomly selected within each of the selected faculties to provide a broad
spectrum of courses for the study (Table 1). The study population of the
undergraduates was 8,497 as at 2009. Random sampling procedure was employed
to choose undergraduates from all the levels in the selected departments using a
sampling percentage of 20% to give a sample size of 1,702 (Table 2).
The data collection instruments were the questionnaire, interview and observa-
tion. The systems librarians were each interviewed to collect data on the available
ICT facilities in their university libraries, while the questionnaire collected data on
demography, types of ICT and ICT skills of the undergraduates and observations
were done during the opening hours in the selected university libraries to ascertain
the different types of ICT available in the libraries. Data collected were analyzed
using the Statistical Package for Social Science version 10 (SPSS) for the analysis to
get frequency and percentages.
3 Results
Questionnaire were distributed to 1,702 respondents, 1,476 copies were returned but
only 1,284 copies were found useful for analysis giving a response rate of 87.0%
(Table 3). There were more male respondents constituting 60.9% than female
Table 1 Faculties and departments selected for the study
Univ. Faculties
Arts Education Science Social Sc.
Departments
ABU Arabic studies Physical & Health Education Microbiology Political Science
BU History & Information Resources Biochemistry Public Admin.
International Management
Studies
BSU French Pre-primary Education Chemistry Sociology
IUO International Not available Mathematics Economics
Relations
IMSU Philosophy Guidance & Counseling Computer Sociology &
Science Anthro.
UI English Library Archival & Information Geology Psychology
Studies
UNIMAID History Adult Education Physics Geography
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Table 2 Study population and sample size of the selected faculties according to levels of study
Faculties Level Universities
ABU BU BSU IUO IMSU UI UNIMAID
SP SS SP SS SP SS SP SS SP SS SP SS SP SS
Arts 100 24 5 24 5 89 18 38 8 149 30 44 9 94 19
200 98 20 32 7 56 11 36 7 130 26 39 8 96 19
300 65 13 22 4 86 17 32 6 128 26 42 9 164 33
400 45 9 24 5 55 11 32 6 110 22 31 6 171 34
Education 100 24 5 27 6 193 39 – – 98 20 56 11 49 10
200 32 6 26 5 55 11 – – 94 19 46 9 191 38
300 29 6 4 1 89 18 – – 86 17 45 9 174 35
400 48 10 14 3 28 6 – – 83 17 27 5 187 37
Science 100 86 17 47 10 150 30 34 7 64 13 44 9 111 22
200 89 18 25 5 68 14 30 6 66 13 37 7 85 17
300 75 15 22 4 54 11 34 7 IT IT 49 10 30 6
400 97 19 35 7 0 0 32 6 57 11 25 5 24 5
Soc. Sc. 100 290 58 36 7 250 50 50 10 127 25 93 19 218 44
200 221 44 44 9 152 30 48 10 116 23 67 13 160 32
300 212 42 34 7 197 39 45 9 110 22 60 12 231 46
400 75 15 39 8 151 30 40 8 105 21 65 13 130 26
Total 1,510 302 455 93 1,673 335 451 90 1,523 305 770 154 2,115 423
KEY: SP—Study population = 2,547, SS—Sample size = 1,702
IT (Industrial Training): 300 level students on Industrial Attachment in Faculty of Science in IMSU
respondents and 727 respondents (56.6%) were found to be between 20 and 24 years
old, indicative that they were young adults.
3.1 ICT use by undergraduates
The result from the observation revealed that in all the universities studied, ICTwere
available on their campuses in different locations such as university libraries,
computer laboratories and cyber cafes, although, the libraries of BSU and IMSU did
not have any ICT for the use of the respondents. Three ICTavailable and used by the
undergraduates were considered for this study: computer, telephone and the Internet.
The percentage of undergraduates that used these ICT ranged from 66.1% to
98.8% across the selected universities (Table 4). The undergraduates used ICT for
academic tasks such as for class work, assignment, term paper, seminar and project
report. It was observed that the ICT available for use by respondents in the
university libraries of ABU, BU, IUO, UI and UNIMAID were computers, the
Internet and CDROM, while the computer laboratories and cyber cafes in the
various universities had computers and the Internet. The number of the available ICT
was found to be inadequate when compared with the number of undergraduates
in these universities.
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Table 3 Questionnaire distribution and response rate
University Copies of questionnaire Response rate (%)
Distributed Returned Useful for analysis
Ahmadu Bello Univ. 302 289 274 94.8
Babcock Univ. 93 93 93 100.0
Benue State Univ. 335 319 249 78.1
Igbinedion Univ. 90 87 82 94.2
Imo State Univ. 305 260 213 81.9
University of Ibadan 154 137 123 89.8
University of Maiduguri 423 291 250 85.9
Total 1,702 1,476 1,284 87.0
Among the ICTcommonly used by the undergraduates, telephone had the highest
frequency of use, although the percentage of its use was much lower in IUO than in
the other universities (Table 4). The three mostly used ICT (computer, the Internet
and telephone) were found not to be used by all the respondents in all the selected
universities. Using the level of study of the respondents, the frequency of use of
ICTwas highest for telephone, computer and the Internet and 300 level respondents
were the highest users of the computer and the Internet. Respondents that used the
Internet on a daily basis were found to be least in all the universities.
The proportion of the total number of respondents that used telephone on a daily
basis was between 54.0% and 90.2%. In ABU, a high percentage of the respondents
used the computer and the Internet occasionally (41.7% and 41.4% respectively).
Occasional users were those that used ICTonce in a while, that is, less than once in a
month. In BU, 39.8% of the respondents used the computer daily, and a considerable
proportion (33.7%) used it occasionally. The highest proportion of the Internet users
were for occasional use (30.0%), although 23.8% and 22.5% used this facility twice
a week and once a week, respectively (Table 4).
Majority of the users of the computer and the Internet in BSU used it occasionally,
constituting 54.7% and 49.6% respectively. Respondents that used these ICT on a
daily, twice-a-week and once-a-week were each less than 20%. These results
indicated the frequency of use of these ICT to be low. Majority of the undergraduates
in IUO used the computer and the Internet once a week which accounted for 64.6%
and 65.4% respectively (Table 4)?
In IMSU, the highest frequency of use for the computer among the
undergraduates were twice a week (26.4%) with another 24.5% using it on a
daily basis. The highest frequency of use for the Internet was for once-a-week
(34.8%), followed by those who used it occasionally (29.6%) and least by
respondents who used it twice-a-week (21.5%). Majority of the users in UI and
UNIMAID used the computer and the Internet occasionally (41.2% and 45.7%;
28.0% and 39.3% respectively). For these ICT, percentage of respondents who
used them daily, twice-a-week’, weekly was lower than 21%. These results
indicated low use of the computer and Internet for academic tasks by
undergraduates in both UI and UNIMAID (Table 4).
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Table 4 Types of ICT used by undergraduates in the selected universities
Universities ICT N Frequency of ICT usage
Occasionally Once/ Twice/ Once/ Twice/ Daily Mean
(%) Month month week week (%) score±sd
(%) (%) (%) (%)
ABU Computer 192 41.7 9.9 4.7 18.8 10.9 14.1 2.9±1.91
Internet 181 41.4 12.7 8.8 16.6 8.8 11.6 2.7±1.82
Telephone 235 20.0 1.7 1.7 9.4 7.7 59.6 4.6±2.00
BU Computer 83 33.7 3.6 1.2 13.3 8.4 39.8 3.8±2.21
Internet 80 30.0 8.8 5.0 22.5 23.8 10.0 3.3±1.82
Telephone 80 22.5 1.3 1.3 2.5 5.0 67.5 4.7±2.10
BSU Computer 234 54.7 8.1 6.8 6.8 12.8 10.7 2.5±1.88
Internet 234 49.6 9.0 2.6 16.2 15.0 7.7 2.6±1.84
Telephone 200 30.0 1.0 1.0 6.5 7.5 54.0 4.2±2.23
IUO Computer 79 15.2 0.0 1.3 64.6 2.5 16.5 3.9±1.44
Internet 81 12.3 0.0 1.2 65.4 18.5 2.5 3.9±1.18
Telephone 80 11.3 0.0 1.3 62.5 0.0 25.0 4.2±1.42
IMSU Computer 163 22.1 13.5 0.0 13.5 26.4 24.5 3.8±1.94
Internet 135 29.6 9.6 0.0 34.8 21.5 4.4 3.2±1.69
Telephone 174 8.6 0.6 0.0 0.0 0.6 90.2 5.5±1.43
UI Computer 102 41.2 2.9 10.8 14.7 11.8 18.6 3.1±2.00
Internet 93 28.0 11.8 7.5 20.4 20.4 11.8 3.3±1.81
Telephone 96 14.6 0.0 10.4 2.1 2.1 70.8 4.9±1.87
UNIMAID Computer 219 45.7 19.6 1.4 12.8 11.8 18.6 2.6±1.85
Internet 229 39.3 7.4 6.1 19.2 17.0 10.9 3.0±1.88
Telephone 225 17.3 7.1 0.0 5.8 5.3 64.4 4.7±2.01
3.2 ICT literacy of undergraduates
An analysis of cross tabulation of ICT skills possessed by the undergraduates in the
selected universities was carried out. For the knowledge of ICT facilities, poor and
very poor were grouped together and the average found. This process was repeated
for very good and good so that the interpretation of the results would be meaningful
and concise.
The undergraduates were found to acquire their ICT skills mainly through friends
and personal development by going for private paid computer literacy programs run
by private computer companies. The universities did not provide computer literacy
programs for the undergraduates. The result showed that respondents in the state
universities (BSU and IMSU) had poor skills (above 27% when the average for very
poor and poor was found) for all the three ICT facilities (computer, Internet and
telephone), while those in federal universities had good knowledge of the computer,
the Internet and telephone (Table 5). More than 20% of the respondents in ABU,
BSU and UNIMAID had been using the computer, the Internet and telephone for
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Table 5 Level of ICT skills and duration of ICT use by respondents in the universities
ICT facilities Universities
N ABU BU BSU IUO IMSU UI UNIMAID
(%) (%) (%) (%) (%) (%) (%) (%)
Knowledge of ICT
Computer V. Poor 45 0.0 2.2 55.6 0.0 35.6 6.7 0.0
Poor 88 4.5 0.0 48.9 0.0 22.7 5.7 18.2
Average 438 26.9 8.4 16.7 3.9 5.9 14.6 23.5
Good 329 14.0 4.6 22.4 3.3 25.5 9.4 20.7
V. Good 237 13.1 13.1 8.0 21.9 19.4 4.6 19.8
Internet V. Poor 42 0.0 0.0 66.7 0.0 21.4 7.1 4.8
Poor 90 1.1 2.2 53.3 0.0 30.0 5.6 7.8
Average 401 26.4 5.2 18.2 3.5 5.2 15.2 26.2
Good 293 12.6 9.6 23.2 3.4 19.8 9.6 21.8
V. Good 273 16.8 11.7 4.4 19.4 19.0 6.2 21.2
Telephone V. Poor 33 0.0 0.0 33.3 0.0 51.5 6.1 9.1
Poor 39 0.0 0.0 64.1 0.0 30.8 5.1 0.0
Average 149 40.3 8.1 14.8 6.0 2.7 4.7 23.5
Good 259 24.7 5.8 23.6 0.8 18.1 8.5 18.5
V. Good 592 16.9 9.8 13.2 10.0 14.5 12.3 23.3
Duration of use
Computer <6 months 166 9.6 1.2 26.5 0.6 37.3 7.8 16.9
6–12 months 107 12.1 7.5 41.1 2.8 8.4 6.5 21.5
1–2 years 256 18.0 3.1 22.3 3.1 6.6 10.2 36.7
2–5 years 334 24.6 7.8 17.7 11.7 12.9 10.5 15.0
>5 years 232 15.5 15.9 12.5 12.5 17.2 12.5 13.8
Internet <6 months 149 7.4 2.0 37.6 0.7 30.2 7.4 14.8
6–12 months 130 20.0 6.2 41.5 1.5 6.9 6.9 16.9
1–2 years 257 19.5 4.7 21.0 3.9 5.1 8.9 37.0
2–5 years 326 19.9 9.2 15.3 12.3 6.1 13.5 23.6
>5 years 198 12.1 14.6 6.1 14.1 31.8 11.1 10.1
Telephone <6 months 115 11.3 1.7 18.3 0.9 37.4 9.6 20.9
6–12 months 53 3.8 9.4 43.4 3.8 7.5 5.7 26.4
1–2 years 158 25.3 5.1 30.4 1.9 1.3 12.7 23.4
2–5 years 276 25.7 5.8 13.0 15.9 11.6 10.5 17.4
>5 years 462 22.7 10.0 13.6 6.5 14.9 9.3 22.9
more than a year (Table 5). Undergraduates in the state universities (BSU and IMSU)
had poor skills for all the three ICT facilities skills and this could be attributed to the
inadequate ICT facilities available in these universities (Table 5). Respondents in
ABU and UNIMAID which were federal universities had good ICT skills because
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they had been using ICT for more than one year and universities had more ICT
available for use for the undergraduates in their libraries and cybercafés on campus
and outside the campus.
Respondents in Faculty of Social Sciences were found to have poor skills in the
use of computer and the Internet (with more than 33%), when the average was
computed for very poor and poor ICT knowledge, while over 34% of the
respondents in Faculty of Arts were found to have poor skills in the use of the
telephone (Table 6). This may be because information in materials in the Social
Sciences and Arts do not get outdated as quickly as those in the Sciences; therefore,
respondents do not need to frequently use ICT. Using the duration of ICT,
respondents in Faculty of Social Sciences were found to have the highest percentage
in the duration of using the three ICT facilities, having been using it for more than
one year (Table 6).
Respondents in first year were found to possess poor skills (more than 30%) in
the use of ICT, while those in the third year were found to possess good skills (more
than 24%) in ICT use (Table 7). Results showed that respondents in third year were
found to be been using the ICT facilities for more than five years which was the
highest than respondents in other levels (Table 7). This may be due to the fact that
fourth year students are expected to write a project report as a criteria for the award
of their degree and this would necessitate frequent use of ICT to access the relevant
information. The low ICT skills possessed by the first year respondents could be
attributed to their none or low use of ICT before their admission to the university.
3.3 Constraints to ICT Literacy
Six factors identified as constraints to ICT literacy of the undergraduates were:
namely: Inaccessibility to ICT, Inadequate ICT, lack of skills to use these facilities,
irregular power supply, limited duration for the use of ICT and frequent computer
breakdown (Table 8). Out of these six factors, three were found to be major given
that more than 50% of the respondents identified them as constraints: irregular
power supply (67.4%), inadequate ICT (54.3%) and limited duration of the use of
the available ICT (54.2%).
Among the constraints identified, irregular power supply was identified as a
problem in all the universities studied since this is a national problem faced by all in
the country, between 49.3% in IMSU and 90.2% in IUO. Power supply was the only
constraint for which the pattern of response was similar for all the seven universities.
The power outages occur more frequently when the respondents are likely to use the
ICT; these could be during the day when there is access to ICT in the libraries. Many
of the university libraries are now acquiring generating plants and solar power
system as an alternative power supply to address the power problem.
The pattern of response for the other two major factors varied across universities.
For inadequate ICT, undergraduates in four universities; BU (62.0%), BSU (68.7%),
IMSU (58.2%) and UNIMAID (65.2%) considered it as a major constraint to ICT
literacy, while 54.9% of those in IUO did not consider it to be a constraint at all
(Table 8). These results indicated differences in the level of adequacy of ICT among
the universities with ABU, IUO and UI being better in terms of availability of ICT.
For limited duration of the use of available ICT, IUO was the only university that did
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Table 6 Level of ICT skills and duration of ICT use by undergraduates in the selected faculties
ICT facilities N Faculties
Arts (%) Educ. (%) Sci. (%) Social Sci. (%)
Knowledge of ICT
Computer V. Poor 45 28.9 37.8 13.3 20.0
Poor 88 30.7 15.9 12.5 40.9
Average 438 16.9 17.1 21.7 44.3
Good 329 21.6 23.7 19.5 35.3
V. Good 237 27.4 16.5 24.5 31.6
Internet V. Poor 42 40.5 28.6 11.9 19.0
Poor 90 16.7 23.3 10.0 50.0
Average 401 19.2 17.2 19.5 44.1
Good 293 21.5 20.5 25.9 32.1
V. Good 270 25.9 17.4 25.6 31.1
Telephone V. Poor 33 48.5 39.4 9.1 3.0
Poor 39 20.5 17.9 10.3 51.3
Average 149 23.5 20.1 24.2 32.2
Good 259 23.6 17.4 18.1 40.9
V. Good 592 19.9 19.6 21.5 39.0
Duration of use
Computer <6 months 166 19.9 38.6 10.8 30.7
6–12 months 107 23.4 21.5 12.1 43.0
1–2 years 256 25.8 18.8 15.6 39.8
2–5 years 334 21.0 14.4 21.9 42.8
>5 years 232 22.8 16.8 31.9 28.4
Internet <6 months 149 14.8 40.3 13.4 31.5
6–12 months 130 25.4 20.0 10.8 43.8
1–2 years 257 22.2 19.5 19.8 38.5
2–5 years 326 27.0 10.4 19.0 43.6
>5 years 198 19.2 20.2 34.8 25.8
Telephone <6 months 115 19.1 33.0 12.2 35.7
6–12 months 53 17.0 22.6 5.7 54.7
1–2 years 158 28.5 19.0 15.2 37.3
2–5 years 276 20.7 14.9 22.8 41.7
>5 years 462 21.4 19.3 23.2 36.1
not agree that this was a constraint (81.7%), while respondents in two universities
considered it a constraint, between 48.0% in ABU to 49.5% in BU and respondents
in the four universities considered it to be a major constraint, between 51.2% in
IMSU to 73.9% in BSU.
Between the private universities (BU and IUO), IUO was found to have
adequate ICT and the use of ICT was not limited to the respondents while
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Table 7 Level of ICT skills and duration of ICT use by undergraduates according to level of study
ICT facilities N Level of study
100 (%) 200 (%) 300 (%) 400 (%)
Knowledge of ICT
Computer V. Poor 45 40.0 17.8 20.0 22.2
Poor 88 20.5 35.2 25.0 19.3
Average 438 33.6 24.0 22.8 19.6
Good 329 20.7 35.9 19.1 24.3
V. Good 237 21.1 19.8 38.8 20.3
Internet V. Poor 42 40.5 14.3 23.8 21.4
Poor 90 27.8 44.4 12.2 15.6
Average 401 31.9 26.7 21.4 20.0
Good 293 19.5 26.6 26.3 27.6
V. Good 270 25.2 18.5 35.9 20.4
Telephone V. Poor 33 60.6 21.2 6.1 12.1
Poor 39 23.1 56.4 5.1 15.4
Average 149 31.5 22.8 26.8 18.8
Good 259 22.8 22.4 21.2 33.6
V. Good 592 25.8 28.9 28.2 17.1
Duration of use
Computer <6 months 166 39.2 18.7 14.5 27.7
6–12 months 107 29.0 29.9 19.6 21.5
1–2 years 256 22.7 33.2 24.2 19.9
2–5 years 334 26.3 30.5 20.7 22.5
>5 years 232 17.7 20.7 44.4 17.2
Internet <6 months 149 28.9 23.5 19.5 28.2
6–12 months 130 31.5 29.2 23.1 16.2
1–2 years 257 32.3 24.5 22.6 20.6
2–5 years 326 22.1 28.8 27.0 22.1
>5 years 198 17.2 19.7 41.4 21.7
Telephone <6 months 115 34.8 15.7 19.1 30.4
6–12 months 53 28.3 41.5 13.2 17.0
1–2 years 158 32.3 24.7 24.1 19.0
2–5 years 276 26.1 30.4 22.5 21.0
>5 years 462 20.1 27.3 32.0 20.6
respondents in BU agreed that inadequate ICT and limited duration of use of
available ICT were major constraints affecting their use of ICT. The state
universities (BSU, IMSU) were found to be affected by all three major
constraints (irregular power, Inadequate ICT and limited duration of use of
available ICT) this implied that the state university administrators should
urgently adopt measures to increase the ICT in these state universities. Among
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Table 8 Constraints to ICT literacy by undergraduates in the selected Nigerian universities
Constraints Options N Universities
ABU BU BSU IUO IMSU UI UNIMAID
Inaccessibility to ICT facilities Agree 447 31.8 36.6 49.4 13.4 23.5 26.0 44.0
Not sure 154 14.6 14.0 14.9 14.6 0.5 15.4 12.8
Disagree 683 53.6 49.5 35.7 72.0 76.1 58.5 43.2
Inadequate no of ICT facilities Agree 697 40.1 62.0 68.7 31.7 58.2 37.4 65.2
Not sure 133 13.9 5.4 6.4 13.4 2.8 17.1 14.4
Disagree 453 46.0 32.6 24.9 54.9 39.0 45.5 20.4
Lack of skills to use these facilities Agree 524 31.0 21.5 59.8 13.4 32.4 40.7 56.0
Not sure 138 13.1 25.8 8.4 14.6 5.2 13.0 7.2
Disagree 622 55.8 52.7 31.7 72.0 62.4 46.3 36.8
Limited duration for the use of ICT Agree 696 48.0 49.5 73.9 17.1 51.2 61.0 54.8
Not sure 99 9.2 16.1 5.6 1.2 4.2 9.8 9.2
Disagree 488 42.9 34.4 20.5 81.7 44.6 29.3 36.0
Irregular power supply Agree 859 80.7 66.7 64.3 90.2 49.3 51.2 69.6
Not sure 93 2.9 9.7 10.4 1.2 7.0 10.6 8.4
Disagree 322 16.4 23.7 25.3 8.5 43.7 38.2 22.0
Frequent computer breakdown Agree 449 31.0 47.3 32.9 19.5 27.7 45.5 42.8
Not sure 334 32.5 16.1 25.3 12.2 31.0 18.7 27.2
Disagree 501 36.5 36.6 41.8 68.3 41.3 35.8 30.0
the federal universities, respondents in UNIMAID and ABU agreed that their use
of ICT were affected by inadequate ICT and limited duration of use of these ICT
facilities.
4 Discussion
4.1 Use of ICT by undergraduates
The use of ICT by undergraduates was considerably low and this was supported by
the study on computer proficiency among fresh undergraduates of University of
Botswana by Ogwu et al. (2010) who reported that their use of ICT was low. This
result can be compared to the daily users of search engines among postgraduates in
University of Ibadan (Salako and Tiamiyu 2007) and daily users of the Internet
among dental undergraduate students reported for the University of Oulu, Finland by
Virtanen and Nieminen (2002).
Among ICT, the Internet is credited with allowing access to a wide range of
knowledge, especially as it has become central to scholarly communication
through the creation of numerous e-journals and teaching resources (Leong and
Hawamdeh 1999; Koubek and Jandl 2000; Thelwall 2002; Rajab and Baqain
2005). Although availability of ICT may not necessarily translate to higher use, the
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ICT available in the universities studied were considered inadequate when
compared with the number of undergraduates to constitute a limitation to the
widespread use of ICT.
4.2 ICT Literacy of undergraduates
The third year undergraduates were found to possess good ICT skills because
they had been using the ICT for more than five years. This finding is
supported by Tella and Mutula (2008) who reported that undergraduates at
University of Botswana who had higher computer literacy accessed and used the
library facilities. Mcilroy et al. (2007) also corroborated this finding in their
study of computer experience and regular use by undergraduates in Liverpool
Moore University, USA and reported that these attributed positively to their use
of the computer, while Rajab and Baqain (2005) in a study on ICT use by dental
undergraduates at the University of Jordan reported that availability and
accessibility to ICT facilitated the use and subsequently improved their ICT
skills.
Frequent use of ICT would improve ICT skills and the longer the duration of its
use, the better the skills possessed. The result is supported by Ogwu et al. (2010)
who reported that the rate of knowledge acquired in ICT increased as the
undergraduates in University of Botswana progressed in their academic pursuit.
Cretchley (2007) and Manda (2005) also reported the relevance of ICT skills to
improve ICT use in a study carried out on use of electronic resources in academic
and research institutions in Tanzania where it was found that poor skills affected use
of electronic resources.
Luambano and Nawe (2004) in their study on Internet use by university students
in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania reported that due to their lack of skills required for
effective use of the Internet, it was used mainly for communication with friends and
relatives more than for academic purposes and recommended that an increase in the
use of the Internet for academic purposes can be achieved through training. Virtanen
and Nieminen (2002) reported that the use of ICT by dental undergraduates in
Finland was high as more that 95% had good or satisfactory skills in word
processing and a little over half could manage some advanced operating system
functions.
The undergraduates acquired their ICT skills from friends and self-development
rather than through organized university trainings. This however agrees with the
study of Haywood et al. (2004) in a study on comparison of ICT skills and students
across Europe where they reported that those undergraduates acquired their ICT
skills more from informal training and support such as from friends and family than
from integrated training and self-tuition.
4.3 Constraints to ICT literacy
The state universities (BSU, IMSU) were found to be affected by all three major
constraints (irregular power, inadequate ICT and limited duration of use of
available ICT) which implied that the state university administrators should
urgently adopt measures to increase the ICT in their universities. This finding is
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corroborated by Jagboro (2003) in a study of Internet usage by postgraduates in
Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria who listed limited access points
available in the library and Ajuwon (2003) who reported insufficient computer
and Internet use proficiency as factors affecting the use of computer and the
Internet among first year clinical and nursing students in a Nigerian teaching
hospital.
Among the federal universities, respondents in UNIMAID and ABU agreed
that their use of ICT were affected by inadequate ICT and limited duration of
use of these ICT facilities. The findings is supported with those of Igben and
Akobo (2007) who listed stable power supply and good telecommunication,
knowledgeable technical expertise as factors that affect the use of ICT. Barraket
and Scott (2001) in their study on students’ experiences of ICT use in University
of Technology, Sydney, Australia, highlighted ready access to infrastructure,
availability of facilities, maintaining and upgrading equipment as factors that
affected the effective use of ICT.
Cisse (2004) in the study on access to electronic information reported that
inability to access the equipment, difficulty encountered in using ICT affected use of
electronic resources, while Ibegwam (2004) observed that students of the College of
Medicine, University of Lagos, Nigeria listed frequent computer breakdown and
slow speed of downloading materials as factors affecting their use of the Internet.
The effect of these constraints may be reduced in the federal universities due to the
intervention of some foreign organizations that have been assisting in the acquisition
and implementation of ICT infrastructure in such institutions.
4.4 Conclusion and recommendations
ICT use is of great importance in education for the processing, accessing and
communication of information by undergraduates in Nigerian universities.
Nigerian Universities are providing ICT to complement the available print
resources in the library to meet the information needs of its users. The
university libraries due to their underfunding could not provide all the relevant
information to meet the information needs of their undergraduates. The
alternative adopted has been the introduction of ICT to provide the needed
information to its users which are made up of students (undergraduates and
postgraduates), staff and the community. The federal and private universities
were found to possess more ICT for the use of their undergraduates than the
state universities.
The ICT available in the seven universities were inadequate and this constituted a
limitation to their effective use and literacy skills. The challenges faced by the
undergraduates in their zeal to use the available ICT in the universities were irregular
power supply, inadequate number of available ICT, lack of skills to use ICT and
limited time of access to available ICT. These challenges must be addressed by the
university administrators for increased ICT literacy skills of the undergraduates. The
university administrators must introduce courses for ICTcompetency to all first year
undergraduates and encourage lecturers to use ICT for teaching and learning. This
will further enhance the use of ICT by the undergraduates and ultimately increase
their ICT literacy.
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