DIGITAL LITERACY AMONG FEMALE POSTGRADUATE STUDENTS OF KARNATAK UNIVERSITY, DHARWAD, KARNATAKA, INDIA: A STUDY

Digital literacy is the ability of an individual to locate, organize, evaluate, analyze and use the required information using digital technologies. It includes a working knowledge of several technologies and understanding of how it can be used. The main objective of the study was to determine the literacy of using digital resources by Female Postgraduate students of Karnatak University, Dharwad. The present study also determines the student's level of ICT skills, frequency of internet use by the respondents, ascertain their awareness about different databases and their familiarity with various search strategies to retrieve E-resources. The study also highlights the problems faced by students in accessing information. The major findings of the study highlight that Google search engine is the most preferred search engine, the majority of the respondents i.e. 53 (68.83%) are aware of Google scholar followed by Research gate, Twitter, Slideshare, Academic.edu. and LinkedIn, SciSpace, Research ID are least used among the academic social networking sites. It is also found that there is a lack of awareness among students regarding the use of various search strategies for efficient information retrieval and only 43 (55.84%) respondents have awareness of copyrights issues. The study also highlights the problems faced by the respondents such as poor network connectivity, access restricted by the university, which curtail the prospects of effective use of digital information resources.