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Niusha Zohoorian-Fooladi

Bio: Niusha Zohoorian-Fooladi is an academic researcher from University of Malaya. The author has contributed to research in topics: Social media & Higher education. The author has an hindex of 3, co-authored 4 publications receiving 56 citations.

Papers
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors identify the prevalence of social media used in Malaysian academic libraries and examine the reasons for creating a social media presence among academic libraries; and understand the obstacles to social media participation among academic librarians.
Abstract: Despite the widespread use of social media by students and their increased use in higher education, very little empirical evidence is available concerning the prevalence of use among academic librarians. The objectives of this study are: a) to identify the prevalence of social media used in Malaysian academic libraries; b) to examine the reasons for creating a social media presence among academic libraries; and c) to understand the obstacles to social media participation among academic librarians. Data were gathered via three focus study groups with 22 librarians from three research-intensive universities in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The results indicated that at least four types of social media are deployed in libraries to reach out to the users: blogs, multimedia sharing sites, social bookmarking and social networking sites (SNS). Facebook, Blog, Delicious, YouTube and Twitter are the tools mainly adopted by these libraries. The motives for librarians to use social media were to promote library services, ...

48 citations

Journal Article
TL;DR: This stream of research on the personas method will provide library managers with results that can be useful to show librarian’ behaviour in using social media, and how library management can use it to design library services to reach out to wider audiences.
Abstract: Zohoorian-Fooladi, N., & Abrizah, A. (2014). Personifying academic librarians’ social media presence. Malaysian Journal of Library and Information Science, Vol.19, no. 3: 13-26. Persona is an approach for system designer to group users based on their common characteristics and personafying refers to the configuration of a concept or practice in the form of a persona. The objective of the study is to explain how persona method can be helpful to illustrate academic librarians’ social media presence with respect to their awareness, current practices and readiness. The study uses qualitative research design in a form of case study to understand how librarians know, use and implement social media in the delivery of library services. Data was gathered through interviews with 26 academic librarians and three focus groups sessions of librarians from three research intensive universities in Malaysia. Findings show that librarians illustrate different behaviour to show how their social media awareness, practices and readinessdetermine the personas into which they were grouped: Skaters, Sliders, Shufflers and Starters. This stream of research on the personas method will provide library managers with results that can be useful to show librarian’ behaviour in using social media, and how library management can use it todesign library services to reach out to wider audiences. Moreover, library managers can direct subordinate librarians to become more active and participatory in creating their social media presence. It is hoped that the method presented in this paper would be easy to perceive and be translatable into practice.

8 citations

Journal Article
TL;DR: Overall, based on the number of publications indexed by both WoS and Scopus, the Asian region, represented by seven countries, are the dominant producers of publications in this field, of which Malaysia is in the number one position.
Abstract: This article has the general aim of assessing the worldwide research productivity of Elaeis guineensis Jacq. and Elaeis oleifera or more commonly known as oil palm, as reflected by the literature indexed in the Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus databases. Specifically, the research aims to identify the most productive countries, institutions and authors in this area of research. It also investigates the subject characteristics of the publication and collaborative patterns among researchers and institutions. Overall, based on the number of publications indexed by both WoS and Scopus, the Asian region, represented by seven countries, are the dominant producers of publications in this field, of which Malaysia is in the number one position. Whereas, USA and some European countries, such as United Kingdom and France, are also leading in terms of publications and citations. Research in the areas of food science and technology (WoS) as well as agricultural and biological sciences (Scopus) account for the highest number of publications. High levels of collaboration among authors are evident among the top 10 most productive countries. This is a good indication of collaboration impact with increased research output. * Department of Library and Information Science, Faculty of Computer Science & Information Technology, University of Malaya, Lembah Pantai, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. E-mail: abrizah@um.edu.my 52.3 million tonnes for 2012/2013 (United States Department of Agriculture, 2012). It is thus by far the most widely-produced tropical oil, and constitutes almost 38% of total edible oil production worldwide (Basiron, 2011). From 1998 until late 2008, the international demand for palm oil had increased consistently, leading to alteration in the price of crude palm oil. Over 85% of the world’s crude palm oil comes from Malaysia and Indonesia (Timms, 2007), providing a considerable income to the national and regional governments of these two countries. Since 1970s, Malaysia has strengthened its position as the primary producer and exporter of world palm oil. In line with the very rapid expansion of planted area, Indonesia overtook Malaysia as the world’s biggest palm oil producer in 2007. The global production of palm oil has increased more than nine-fold in the past three decades, supplying the major markets including the European Union, China, Pakistan, India and Indonesia. Significant increases in production were also seen in countries INTRODUCTION Palm oil which is produced from the fruits of the oil palm (Elaeis guineensis Jacq. and Elaeis oleifera) is the second largest edible oil worldwide, after soyabean oil. The Elaeis guineensis Jacq. originated from Africa, whilst the Elaeis oleifera originated from South America. In the past decade, palm oil was the highest produce of the world’s production of oils and fats (Oil World, 2010), exceeding soyabean oil in terms of global production in 2005 (Cheng, 2010). Worldwide, palm oil production for season 2011/2012 was 50.3 million tonnes, increasing to

6 citations

01 Jan 2012
TL;DR: In this article, the authors explore the phenomenon of social media application in Malaysian academic libraries from a standpoint of a group of stakeholders: the academic librarians and investigate what is the gratification sought among them in using social media.
Abstract: This paper reports preliminary findings of a study, seeking to explore the phenomenon of social media application in Malaysian academic libraries from a standpoint of a group of stakeholders: the academic librarians. The study is grounded in user centered theory of media uses and gratification with the goal to figure out the concept regarding the appeal of social media usage among librarians and their continuance intention to use it in their library services. To accomplish this goal, the study put forward 3 objectives: a) To identify social media tools that are used in Malaysian academic libraries for library outreach; b) to examine the purposes of social media usage in the Malaysian academic libraries for library outreach; and c) to investigate what is the gratification sought among librarians in using social media. Data were gathered via interviews with fifteen (15) librarians from three research-intensive universities in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Preliminary results indicated that at least four types of social media were deployed in libraries to reach out to the users: blogs, multimedia sharing sites, social bookmarking and social networking sites. Facebook, Blog, Delicious, YouTube and Twitter were the tools which are mainly adopted by these libraries. This paper offers relevant theoretical avenues to be explored in the form of a uses and gratification model of social media by using a honeycomb of seven functional building blocks. The exploration of relationship between academic librarians’ motivation and application of social media technologies in Malaysia will lead to framework which will be scrutinized in future study.

2 citations


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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This review provides an extensive account of the state of the art in both scholarly use of social media and altmetrics, reviewing the various functions these platforms have in the scholarly communication process and the factors that affect this use.
Abstract: Social media has become integrated into the fabric of the scholarly communication system in fundamental ways, principally through scholarly use of social media platforms and the promotion of new indicators on the basis of interactions with these platforms. Research and scholarship in this area has accelerated since the coining and subsequent advocacy for altmetrics—that is, research indicators based on social media activity. This review provides an extensive account of the state-of-the art in both scholarly use of social media and altmetrics. The review consists of 2 main parts: the first examines the use of social media in academia, reviewing the various functions these platforms have in the scholarly communication process and the factors that affect this use. The second part reviews empirical studies of altmetrics, discussing the various interpretations of altmetrics, data collection and methodological limitations, and differences according to platform. The review ends with a critical discussion of the implications of this transformation in the scholarly communication system.

380 citations

Posted Content
TL;DR: A review of the state-of-the-art in both scholarly use of social media and altmetrics can be found in this article, where the authors examine the role of these platforms in the scholarly communication process and the factors that affect this use.
Abstract: Social media has become integrated into the fabric of the scholarly communication system in fundamental ways: principally through scholarly use of social media platforms and the promotion of new indicators on the basis of interactions with these platforms. Research and scholarship in this area has accelerated since the coining and subsequent advocacy for altmetrics -- that is, research indicators based on social media activity. This review provides an extensive account of the state-of-the art in both scholarly use of social media and altmetrics. The review consists of two main parts: the first examines the use of social media in academia, examining the various functions these platforms have in the scholarly communication process and the factors that affect this use. The second part reviews empirical studies of altmetrics, discussing the various interpretations of altmetrics, data collection and methodological limitations, and differences according to platform. The review ends with a critical discussion of the implications of this transformation in the scholarly communication system.

232 citations

01 Jan 2014
TL;DR: Singh et al. as mentioned in this paper proposed two key RD and higher mesocarp oleic acid composition for the oil palm industry to meet the highest projections for future vegetable oil requirements while minimising adverse environmental consequences.
Abstract: In recent years, the oil palm sector has witnessed a period of historically high prices with buoyant global demand and high levels of production driven largely by economic development in major Asian countries such as India and China. However, the oil palm sector is also confronted by many important challenges that require attention. Such challenges include fragmentation of the industry, stagnating yields, and an image problem that is largely due to the conversion of tropical rainforest and peatlands in a few regions in South-east Asia. The biological and managerial tools to surmount these challenges already exist but need more focussed application and political support. Potentially groundbreaking biological tools include the new molecular breeding technologies, such as those made possible by the recent publication of the oil palm genome sequence (Singh et al., 2013a, b). Two key RD and • higher mesocarp oleic acid composition – preferably over 65% w/w. The more focussed use of new and traditional technologies can also help to confront pest and disease problems, to redesign of crop architecture, and to facilitate yield and harvesting efficiency. In the mediumterm future, we can look forward to a considerable geographical extension of oil palm cultivation in a broad zone across the tropics of Africa, Asia and the Americas. If these and other measures can be taken, increased palm oil output could more than meet the highest projections for future vegetable oil requirements while minimising adverse environmental consequences. Improved oil palm varieties could also considerably increase the global market share for this highly productive tropical crop at the expense of some of the less efficient temperate oilseed crops.

129 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The study explores the use of this emerging mobile app using the official WeChat accounts of the top 39 academic libraries in China and uses six aspects of quality to evaluate the interaction and content delivered by WeChat.

113 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The results show variance between academic libraries in distribution of tweets over time and highlight the importance of using data- and text-mining approaches in understanding the aggregate social data of academic libraries to aid in decision-making and strategic planning for patron outreach and marketing of services.

54 citations