Designing and Validating a Model for Databases in Open and Distance Universities

Humans have always needed to store and retrieve information. In the last decades, one of the most important phenomena in the information industry was the emergence and popularity of machine reader databases, especially online databases. The main purpose of this study was to design and validate a model for databases in open and distance universities. This research is a descriptive study conducted by survey method. The statistical population of the present study consists of all specialists in the field of studying databases and open and distance educational universities. In a small part, sampling was done by a census method and in a purposeful manner. The responses were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics and by SPSS and Lisrel software. For the purpose of examining the parametric deflections, the Kolmogorov–Smirnov test was used to check the normality of the data. The Levene’s test was used to examine the default of variances and obtain the inferential part of factor analysis. The current research was carried out in 2 qualitative and quantitative phases. In the qualitative phase, some of the distance education scholars and database experts were selected as a purposive sample to analyze the basic parameters obtained in the first phase. In the quantitative phase, sampling was done through census and purposive manner from professors’ at the University of Isfahan (N=211). 22 questionnaires were excluded due to reasons such as non-functional responses, and statisctical analysis was carried out for 189 participants. To measure content validity index (CVI), Waltz and Bausell index was utilized and the instrument under investigation was presented to 8 experts who were engaged in the content validity stage. The results of the research showed that databases in open and distance universities in Iran have high quality and quantity regarding the search and search features and the technical aspects. Based on this research a major issue of concern is to find a framework and model which can be used by executives and managers from distant backgrounds to evaluate the quality of their existing databases.