Introduction. This paper reports on university students' experiences of learning
information literacy.
Method. Phenomenography was selected as the research approach as it describes the
experience from the perspective of the study participants, which in this case is a
mixture of undergraduate and postgraduate students studying education at an Australian
university. Semi-structured, one-on-one interviews were conducted with fifteen
students.
Analysis. The interview transcripts were iteratively reviewed for similarities and
differences in students' experiences of learning information literacy. Categories were
constructed from an analysis of the distinct features of the experiences that students
reported. The categories were grouped into a hierarchical structure that represents
students' increasingly sophisticated experiences of learning information literacy.
Results. The study reveals that students experience learning information literacy in six ways: learning to find information; learning a process to use information; learning touse information to create a product; learning to use information to build a personal
knowledge base; learning to use information to advance disciplinary knowledge; and
learning to use information to grow as a person and to contribute to others.
Conclusions. Understanding the complexity of the concept of information literacy, and
the collective and diverse range of ways students experience learning information
literacy, enables academics and librarians to draw on the range of experiences reported