CC BY
93
https://doi.org/10.29013/ESR-21-3.4-13-19
Truong Dai Luong, Ph D., Faculty of Library and Information Sciences, Hanoi University of Culture, Vietnam E-mail: Luongtd@huc.edu.vn
CURRENT SITUATION OF READING CULTURE OF VIETNAMESE STUDENTS IN SOME UNIVERSITIES OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES
Abstract. This article is aimed to study the problems of reading and improve reading culture of students in the study of social sciences and humanities disciplines. For this study, the author inherits the previous related research works, on the basis of the analysis and synthesis of the obtained research outputs and use a method of sociological investigation by questionnaires. The study found that Vietnamese students spend too little time reading documents for study while they surf daily on social media. Most of the surveyed students' digital literacy and information literacy are limited.
Keywords: reading culture, Vietnam, students, digital literacy, information literacy, reading habits.
1. Introduction (Sadykova, Yashina & Sharafieva) [4]. Nowadays
The world today is undergoing great unprec- reading of students is in a state of ambiguous transedented changes. The fourth industrial revolution is formation (Volkova) [9].
and will continue to create strong changes, affecting all aspects of human life in the 21st century. To meet the requirements for industry 4.0, training issues high-quality human resources in Vietnam are more important than ever. Development of reading culture will have a positive impact on the development of human resources, effectively contributing to accelerating the process of industrialization and modernization of the country. Therefore, it is time to properly recognize the reading culture, especially the development of reading culture for students [6].
However, over the last twenty years the reading status, the role of reading culture, the attitude of society to it around the world, has changed dramatically. The decline of interest in reading is a worldwide trend of globalization of media and the rapid development of the entertainment industry, displacing reading and as a prestigious source of information and as a pleasant and prestigious form of leisure [3]. The problem of reading among students and young people is one of the urgent problems of our time
The Hindu (2004) indicates that as technology develops, reading habits are changing day by day. Today, while technology is steadily controlling personal lives, the habit of reading paper books is rapidly decreasing. Instead, they spend more hours on electronic means. Browsing the internet, using fun handheld devices, sending messages, and participating in social media seem like a routine of the day. This makes reading in a quiet corner of the library or home an ancient idea for young people [5]. In an information booming society, students can search and read documents from many different sources by many different means, especially documents in a digital environment. The reading needs of students are also very diverse, including books, textbooks, dissertations, scientific articles, reports, and statistics.
With above reasons, this research will examine the situation of reading culture of students in some universities of social sciences and humanities in Vietnam. On the basis of analyzing the survey results,
the author proposes some solutions to improve the efficiency of developing reading culture for students.
2. Concept of reading culture
Reading culture is a problem that many researchers around the world are interested in. There have been quite a lot of researches related to reading culture. The concept of reading culture is expressed in many different aspects, but in general it can be seen that reading culture is approached under two angles: reading culture as a culture class of the community in a certain period and reading culture as a cultural behavior of each person in society.
According to Lera A. Kamalova & Natal'ya D. Koletvinova [3]), the culture of reading includes:
1) the rational organization of the process of reading depending on the text, the broader context of reading and the properties of the reader;
2) deep, accurate, clear and complete understanding and appropriation of the content of the text, accompanied by emotional empathy, critical analysis and creative interpretation of the read work;
3) search, analysis and selection of text (books, electronic documents, databases, search engines on the Internet, etc.) for reading in accordance with the interests and capabilities of the reader, and also for the purpose of reading;
4) a variety of ways (oral, written) and language means saving read work on native and foreign languages (statement, judgment, report, plan, abstract, abstract, abstract, abstract, etc.);
5) the culture of reading of the reader is implemented in the actions of the reader as a manifestation of his compassion, co-thinking, co-creation with other people in society, subject to the laws of nature and society [3].
In the digital environment, reading culture consists of three components: reading needs and habits, digital literacy (ability to use tools, digital means, some software to exploit and disseminate information) and information literacy (ability to identify information needs, ability to locate information, find information, evaluate information, use information,
analyze and synthesize information, understanding of issues economic, legal, and ethical related to use and sharing of information) [7].
3. Research methods
For this study, the author used the following research methods:
- Analysis and synthesis: The author inherited the previous related research works, on the basis ofthe analysis and synthesis ofthe obtained research outputs.
- Sociological investigation by questionnaires.
To determine the current situation of reading culture of students in some universities of social sciences and humanities in Vietnam, the author conducted a survey by 600 students at three universities, including Hanoi University of Culture, VNUHCM - University of Social Sciences and Humanities, VNU -University of Social Sciences and Humanities. The number of questionnaires given out was 600 and the collection was 588, reaching 98%. Out of 588 students responding to the survey, there were 206 first year students, accounting for 36.9%; 167 second year students, accounting for 29.2%; 150 students in the third year, accounting for 26.9% and 65 students in the fourth year, accounting for 11.7%.
4. Research results and discussions
Reading needs and habits
The reading need is a fundamental concept in library operations. Libraries, whether public, scientific, children's, specialized, or university libraries, must explore and identify reading needs and find services that satisfy their needs. The habit of reading is a series of conditioned reflexes that come from practice. Reading habit is reading behavior that is repeated many times in life and practice. It is a defining behavior in life and it is not available, but is the result of daily reading diligence of each individual. To understand the needs and habits of students to read documents, the author surveyed contents including: reading time, reading purpose, content of reading, type of document and language to read.
About the time to read the document. The author posed the question: What do you often use your
free time for? With this question, students can have many different options. The results showed that 501 students, accounting for 98.8%, use their free time to access social networks. Next is 362 students, accounting for 64.9% choose to watch TV and listen to music. 262 students often work part-time during their spare time. 156 students, accounting for 27.9%, choose to play games. Playing sports and participating in extracurricular activities, the club has the same percentage of students choosing with 24.4% ofwhich only 253 students choose to search and read documents. Thus, the activity of searching and reading documents is only ranked fourth among activities and only by nearly 50% compared to the choice of accessing social networks.
Furthermore, in order to know the time spent reading the documents, the author asks: How many hours per day do you spend reading the documents? Survey results show that 45.57% of students surveyed spend 1 to 2 hours a day searching and reading documents. The number of students who only spend less than 1 hour to read documents accounts for 37.07% while the number of students who spend 2 to 3 hours reading documents per day is only 11.05%. Only 6.29% of students surveyed spent 3 hours or more reading documents. The above results show that students spend much less time reading documents than required by studying. As a rule, students who study for 1 hour in class must study and read documents for 2 hours by themselves. On average, a student per day in class is from 2 to 3 hours and so they will have to spend 4 to 6 hours reading documents and self-study.
About the purpose of reading the document. The research raises the question: What is your reading purpose? With this question, students can choose from several options. Survey results show that the vast majority of students surveyed read documents for the purposes of learning and scientific research with 87.58% and 25% respectively. The number of students reading documents for entertainment purposes is 311/588 students, accounting for 52.89%.
Demand for document content. Since all surveyed students are studying humanities and social sciences, their reading needs will also reflect the specifics of their careers. The survey results show that 58.5% often read documents about the specialized fields they are trained. 42.17% of students choose to read literary art documents. 49.48% of students questioned need to read recreational and sports documents. Foreign language documents are also chosen by a large number of students to use with 31.8%. Documents on science, technology and informatics are seldom selected by students with 14.45% and 7.31%, respectively.
Requirements for document type, language and document format. When asked about what kind of documents students would read for scientific research and learn, the majority of students correctly identified textbooks, reference books, monographs, and journals. Specifically, 65.47% of students will read the textbook, followed by 61.73% of students reading reference books, 38.42% ofstudents reading monographs, 32.31% of students wishing to read the research results are published in scientific journals. However, many students have not yet determined what types of documents will be used for the purposes of learning and scientific research, so 314 students, accounting for 53.4%, choose to read online newspapers, 20.23% choose to read recreational materials and 16.66% of students choose to read common documents. The above results reflect that more than half of the students still use electronic newspapers and entertainment materials for the purpose of learning and scientific research. Regarding the language of documents, the survey results show that the vast maj ority of them read documents in Vietnamese with 96.93% of students being asked. 32.82% of students wish to read documents in English. 3.23% of students can read documents in Chinese. Regarding document formats, the number of students regularly reading electronic documents is the majority and the number of students choosing to read paper documents tends to decrease. Specifically, 92.34% of students like to read
electronic documents while 50.85% of students have the need to regularly read documents on paper. This result reflects the general trend that the demand for reading electronic documents is increasing as digital information sources and network access devices are becoming more and more popular, especially among the younger generation.
Digital literacy
Nowadays with the development of science and technology, electronic/ digital documents are becoming more and more popular. This resource allows information users to be accessed via the internet. To exploit digital resources effectively requires users to be equipped with digital literacy. According to UNESCO (2018), digital literacy is defined as the ability to use digital devices, communication applications and networks to access and manage information. It allows people to create and share digital content, communicate and collaborate, and solve problems to effectively and creatively improve themselves in life, study, work, and social activities in general [8].
In this study, the author surveyed students' digital literacy in terms of frequency of internet use, the means used to access the internet, the tools used by students to search electrical documents and the ability to find electronic documents on the internet. With the question of how often do you access the internet? 93.54% of students surveyed said that they access and use the internet every day. 4.93% of students use the internet several times a week. 1.19% of students only use the internet several times a month while there are 2 students, accounting for 0.34% of students who do not use the internet. The above survey results show that the vast majority of Vietnamese students access and use the internet every day, higher than the global rate of 64.2% [2]. To access the internet, 92.86% of students said they use mobile phones, followed by laptops with 60.88%. Only 5.44% of students use desktop computers and 2.55% of students use computers in libraries to access the internet. These results show that today the most popular means of internet access for students
are mobile phones and laptops. Students are less and less using search tools at the library.
Besides the frequency of using the internet and the equipment used to access the internet, the author surveyed students on their use of tools to find electronic documents and the ability to search electronic documents. With the question: Which tools do you regularly use to search electronic documents, the survey results show that 537/588 students are asked, accounting for 91.33%, often use search engines such as Google, Bing, Yahoo, Ask.com, ... Only 22.79% of students surveyed said they often use the library's OPAC.
Moreover, today electronic documents are popular online with many different file formats such as doc, docx, pdf, mp3, mp4, exe, ppt, pptx, ... To exploit and use electronic documents effectively, it requires trusted users to know specialized software to read each format and know how to search for some popular file formats on the internet. In this study, the author only raised one question: To find full text documents in pdf file format on the internet, which search command do you use? The survey results show that only 48.64% of students chose the correct command as filetype: pdf while 24.15% of students use the command file type: pdf. 19.22% of students use the command filetype: doc and 11.05% use the site: pdf command. This result shows that students' ability to find information on the internet is quite limited even though they use the internet every day.
Information literacy
The 1989 American Library Association (ALA) Presidential Committee on Information Literacy formally defined information literacy (IL) as attributes of an individual, stating that "to be information literate, a person must be able to recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate and use effectively the needed information" [1]. Nowadays, with the development of information and communication technology, online resources are extremely plentiful. This requires that users not only have the skills to read traditional documents, but also evaluate, use and share various information and
sources, understand economic and legal issues, and ethics related to the use and sharing of information.
In this study, the author surveyed students' information skills in terms of selecting and evaluating information, methods of reading documents, sharing information, critical thinking, understanding of plagiarism and quote. Experience has shown that before reading, users need to make a general assessment of the appropriateness of the document to the research topic. If they read in detail a document that has not been pre-screened, it will most likely take time and effort for information that is not of high scientific significance. To find out about students' choice of documents before reading, the author asks: Do you choose documents before reading? The results showed that the overwhelming majority with 87.07% of students choose documents before reading and only 12.93% of students said they did not choose documents before reading. This means they will read any documents without thinking. This reflects that only a small number of students do not use critical thinking skills in the process of selecting and reading materials.
Furthermore, in order to select suitable documents for reading, users must also know the skill of evaluating information found on the internet and evaluating information sources. When searching for information in databases, publishing agency, can be assured of the reliability and scientific value of the documents presented. For search engines, a more rigorous evaluation of the search results is required, consisting of two steps: quick screening to select documents that might be suitable; general assessment to confirm reliability and conformity. The evaluation of information should be based on criteria such as: author's reputation, reliability of information sources, time of publication, accuracy of information, references cited in documents, purpose, scope and opinion of the author. To the question: What criteria do you base on to evaluate information found on the internet? The criterion selected by the most students is "accuracy of information" with 73.8%, followed by the "purpose of the article" criterion with 54.93% of
students choosing. The criteria "objectivity", "subject area", and "updating" have approximately the same percentage of students choosing 47.44%, 46.25% and 45.74%. Criterion "information about the author" was least selected with 199/588 students, accounting for 33.84%. Reality shows that in order to evaluate the quality of information on the internet, users need to rely on many different criteria and at least all of the above criteria.
Before reading, we need to clearly define the purpose of reading the document, preliminarily review the document to be read before going into every detail. What is a document reading motivation? For example: reading for entertainment, reading for general understanding of an issue, reading for in-depth research on a problem, reading for a definition, reading to clarify an issue, .. Second is what content readers need to care about? These are aspects of the problem that have been identified in the selection of documents to read. What type of information is needed? Statistics, research results, illustrations, synthesis reports. With the purpose of reading the document in mind, it's still not time to read all the details. Should read through the entire document to preliminary assess the content and opinions the author wants to present. Sometimes, this phase also helps determine the suitability of the document for reading, to decide whether to go into detail or to skip the document. At this point, it is advisable to look carefully at the summary of the document, read the main and sub-headings of the document to get an overview of the relationships between all of the key concepts and the focus of the document. To test students' reading skills, the author asked: When reading specialized documents, which methods do you usually read? The option of "skimming to see what you need after reading it carefully" was chosen by 183/588 students, accounting for 31.12%. The option of "carefully reading the whole text, recording summaries of the main readings" was chosen by 405 students, accounting for 68.88%. This result shows that 2/3 of the students questioned do not have a
method of reading specialized documents for the purpose of learning and scientific research.
While reading the document, we may not understand some of the content and we need to communicate with others. In this regard, the research raised the question: If you do not fully understand the content of the document, what do you usually do? Survey results show that 61.73% of students choose the solution "talking with friends"; 47.62% of students said that they should "keep reading it many times"; 27.21% of students choose the option "ask and talk with lecturers". Especially, only 11.22% of students think that they will "stop reading" if they do not understand.
A reference quote is an idea or a paragraph drawn from another document to illustrate and protect the point in your article. It is imperative that the writer specify the source of the information when quoting a reference. This requirement makes no exceptions for any source of information: books, articles, encyclopedias, audio-visual materials, websites, etc. as well as type of information such as: comments, discussions, conclusions, pictures, tables of data. When drafting scientific documents, especially in research reports, researchers need to rely on known research results, ideas and theories to defend their views. Citing references when using other people's scientific information in their articles, for many reasons such as: respecting the author's copyright; limit "plagiarism"; help readers to easily identify the resources used (through the reference list). To the question: When using other people's ideas in your research do you cite the source? The research results show that 55.27% of students surveyed are aware that they must indicate the source. However, 35.71% of students said that sometimes they just remember and refer to the source. In particular, 6.63% of students said that it is not necessary to indicate the source of the document they used in their writing.
Other than citations, bibliographies provide detailed information about the documents that have been read by the author and that are cited in the
article. The list of references along with citations in the article are important factors for identifying what information is from the writer and what information is quoted by the writer. The results showed that only 22.79% of the students surveyed said they understood the citation regulations while 67.17% of the students said they knew but did not understand. In particular, 10.03% of the students admitted that they did not know anything about the regulations for citing scientific documents.
5. Some solutions to develop reading culture for students
On the basis of analyzing research results, the author proposes a number of solutions to develop an effective reading culture for university students in Vietnam as follows:
Universities should propagate and disseminate to raise awareness of lecturers and students about the role and benefits of reading culture; build and apply solutions to stimulate reading needs, form reading habits for students, develop digital literacy and information literacy for students.
Lecturers need to renew their teaching methods, test and evaluate in a student-centered direction, develop self-study skills, critical thinking, and information analysis skills for students. Teaching methods must make students read textbooks are required to grasp the basic knowledge if they want to complete learning tasks; Read documents to supplement and expand the knowledge of each subject if they want to become good students.
University libraries need to coordinate with lecturers to integrate their information literacy and digital skills into their training programs.
Universities need to implement digital transformation, develop digital resources, set up a variety of library information services to meet the needs of remote access and the need to read digital documents.
6. Conclusion
Research results show that nowadays, students' reading culture has changed from reading traditional documents to reading digital documents. Using mo-
bile phones and laptops to access the internet becomes popular with students and becomes a daily demand. However, students spend less time reading documents for study and scientific research. Students spend more time on social media and surfing the web than reading documents. Most students do not have the habit of reading. Students' information literacy such as read-
ing skills, critical thinking skills, information searching and assessment skills, understanding ofplagiarism and reference citation are limited. To develop a reading culture for students in a digital environment requires universities to simultaneously innovate activities including teaching methods, library and information services, and development of digital resources.
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