Social Support and Student’s Information Seeking Behavior: The Mediator Role of Academic Engagement

Background and purpose: Paying attention to the importance of information empowerment in solving academic problems and challenges and influencing the environment, the present study aims to investigate the role of social support on information seeking behavior in humanities and behavioral sciences students and academic engagement as mediator. Materials and methods: The present study is an applied research in terms of aim, and is a descriptive-correlation research in terms of data collection. The population of this study consists of humanities and behavioral sciences students, which 161 students were selected using the ratio of "sample size to number of variables" calculation and convenience sampling method. To measure variables, Lent et al’s social support questionnaire (2001), & Salmela-Aro and Upadyaya academic engagement scale (2013) and information seeking behavior subscale (2015) was used.Results: The results showed that the correlation of components and general factor of social support with information seeking behavior were all significant. The correlation analysis indicated that the correlation coefficients of components and general factor of social support and academic, engagement with information seeking behavior were all significant and positive. Examination of the pattern of relations between the three variables shows that the model fits the data and each of the estimated parameters for the paths in the model is significant. Overall, the results support the research hypotheses and illustrate the significant role of social support and academic engagement in explaining information seeking behavior.