ABSTRACT
Introduction: Considering the academic members as fundamental part of education and research in the country, meeting the guidelines of resolving the information needs is very important. So the present study was aimed to assess the information needs and information seeking behavior in academic members of Shahroud University of Medical Sciences in 2013
Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted. Using census method, 210 of the faculty members, clinicians, GPs and lecturers of the university were investigated. A researcher made questionnaire was applied in order to collect the data. SPSS 16 software was used to analyze the data using Chi-Ssquare and T-test
Results: Findings showed that participants' main purpose to search for information was to update their educational and research information [36.2%], prepare scientific papers [33.3%] and teaching [31.9%]. The first problem regarding the access to information resources was low speed of the Internet. Databases with 48% met the information needs of the participects followed by printed resources which was found to be 13, 8 percent
Conclusion: Databases provides individual information needs three times more than printed resources. Low speed of the Internet was mentioned as the main barrier to impede access to information resources. Therefore, providing up to date databases as well as increasing speed of the Internet are of high importance