The Effect of Using Cooperative Authority File Generation on the Quality of Bibliographic Records

Purpose: Cooperative authority file generation is a part of the Cooperative Cataloguing process that takes place with the cooperation of several libraries. In this method, libraries use authority files created by cooperating libraries and avoid creating duplicate authority files. The use of this method reduces the use of expert human resources as well as the costs of bibliographic control in libraries and helps them to use the cataloging information of other libraries. Bibliographic control is a set of processes and procedures for setting and recording different forms of authority files' identifiers in bibliographic records. So that access points to bibliographic records are set by contract. When catalogers do the work of documentation, they create documentation by identifying and validating the controlled or documented identifiers of access points. This research aimed to investigate the effect of using cooperative authority file generation on the quality of bibliographic records using the opinions of cataloging and authority file generation experts.
Methods: The current research was applied and its method was a comparative survey. Inferential statistics have been used to check the findings. The research tool was a questionnaire designed by researchers, its validity and reliability were checked and confirmed. To verify the validity of this questionnaire, the opinions of 5 experts in the field of cataloging were used. In addition, Cronbach's alpha test was used to measure its reliability. The research community is cataloging and authority file generation specialists who can answer the questionnaire due to their expertise and experience. The questionnaire was designed online and was given to 100 catalogers, of which 87 people responded to the questionnaire. The responses obtained from the questionnaire were tested and analyzed using the single-variable t-test.
Findings: The use of different authority file generation methods, the use of the knowledge of specialists of large libraries, the uniformity of authority file information in the process of cooperative authority file generation by the National Library, and the participation of specialists in the knowledge organization of large libraries in performing cooperative authority file generation as a working group, are considered as the characteristics of cooperative authority file generation have taken. Also, the three characteristics of accuracy, correctness, and completeness of information are the characteristics that are considered for the quality of bibliographic records. Because the t value obtained for all items was bigger than the t value of the critical table (1.96), so in response to the main question of the research about the effect of cooperative authority file generation on the quality of bibliographic records, it can be acknowledged that cooperative authority file generation has an effect on accuracy, correctness and the completeness of bibliographic record information has a positive and significant effect.
Conclusion: This research showed that the cooperative authority file generation method use has a positive effect on the quality of bibliographic records and improves the quality level of records. Based on the findings of this research, the use of cooperative authority file generation has a positive effect on the accuracy, correctness, and completeness of information in bibliographic records.