Scholarly Reading and the Value of Academic Library Collections: results of a study in six UK universities

Carol Tenopir; Rachel Volentine; Donald W King

doi:10.1629/2048-7754.25.2.130

Figures & Tables

Table 1

Total scholarly reading by respondents' academic discipline

	Article readings	Book readings	Other publication readings	Total readings
Social sciences	21	9	11	41
Sciences	27	3	8	38
Humanities	28	21	9	58
Engineering/technology	28	5	9	42
Medical/health	31	4	10	45

Table 2

How academic staff respondents became aware of material

	Article		Book
	N	%	N	%
Found while browsing	134	11.2	61	6.5
Found while searching	392	32.9	218	23.4
Found through citation in another publication	211	17.7	106	11.4
Another person told me about it	205	17.2	262	28.1
Promotional e-mail or web advert	43	3.6	34	3.6
Don't know or don't remember	34	2.9	54	5.8
Other	173	(14.5)	197	(21.1)
Already owned or knew	–	N/A	73	7.8
For review or was a contributor/co-author	–	N/A	38	4.1
Others	173	14.5	86	9.2
Total	1192	100.0	932	100.0

In Table 2 and all subsequent tables, ‘n’ represents the number of responses

Table 3

Where academic staff respondents obtain material

	Article %	Book %	Other Publication %
I bought it for myself/personal subscription	4.7	39.1	14.9
The library or archives collection	65.2	25.7	13.8
Inter-library loan or document delivery service	2.1	1.9	1.4
School or department collection	4.5	2.6	2.7
A colleague, author or other person provided it to me	5.6	10.5	13.0
A free, advance, or purchased copy from the publisher	–	14.0	17.8
Website/free web journal	13.4	N/A	26.6
Other source	4.5	6.2	9.7
Total %	100.0	100.0	100.0

Table 4

Total time (in minutes) spent on scholarly materials by academic staff respondents

	Article	Book	Other publication
Become aware	16	11	9
Obtain	6	14	6
Read	49	106	42
Total time(in minutes) per material	71	131	57
No. read per month	22	7	10
Total time reading per month	26 hours	15 hours	9 hours and 30 minutes
Total time reading per year	39 eight-hour work days	22 eight-hour work days	15 eight-hour work days

Table 5

Comparison of principal purpose of scholarly readings by academic staff respondents

	Article % (n=1161)	Book % (n=921)	Other % (n=731)
Research and writing	74.3	57.6	45.2
Teaching	12.0	27.6	10.7
Administration	0.2	0.1	2.9
Current awareness/keeping up	5.9	2.5	28.3
Consulting, advising	0.9	2.2	2.5
Internal or external presentations	1.6	1.1	1.1
Continuing education for self	2.5	5.2	5.2
Engagement activities (to wider community)	0.3	0.8	1.2
Knowledge transfer or enterprise activities	N/A	0.4	0.5
Other	2.3	2.5	2.5
Total	100.0	100.0	100.0

Table 6

Importance of scholarly reading for academic staff respondents

	Article (n=1160)	Book (n=918)	Other (n=729)
Not at all important	1.1	0.9	5.3
Somewhat important	31.4	19.7	39.4
Important	29.5	29.8	26.5
Very important	25.1	31.3	18.1
Absolutely essential	12.9	18.3	10.7

Table 7

Outcomes of scholarly reading for academic staff respondents^*

	Article% (n=934)	Book% (n=935)	Other% (n=749)
Inspired new thinking	53.7	44.7	39.1
Improved the result	37.8	47.7	33.8
Narrowed/broadened/changed the focus	28.1	26.5	21.6
Saved time or resources	9.6	14.5	10.9
Resolved technical problems	9.9	21.8	10.1
Others	6.8	4.5	9.9
Resulted in faster completion	4.6	13.5	7.1
Resulted in collaboration/joint research	4.4	3.1	4.0
Wasted time	0.8	0.2	2.9

* Respondents could select more than one answer

Table 8

Source of reading by academic staff respondents

	Article		Book		Other publication
	N	%	N	%	N	%
Library-provided	800	67.3	257	27.6	111	15.2
Personal source	56	4.7	364	39.1	109	14.9
Others	333	28.0	310	33.3	510	69.9
Total	1189	100.0	931	100.0	730	100.0

Table 9

Association between principal purpose for which obtained by academic staff and source of article

		Personal subscription	Library provided	Others	Row Total
Principal Purpose	Research & writing	31	600	230	861
		57.4%	76.4%	71.9%	74.2%
	Teaching	7	99	33	139
		13.0%	12.6%	10.3%	12.0%
	Current awareness	8	39	22	69
		14.8%	5.0%	6.9%	5.9%
	Others	8	48	35	91
		14.8%	6.1%	10.9%	7.8%
	Column Total	54	786	320	1160
		100.0%	100.0%	100.0%	100.0%

Table 10

Association between source of article and year of publication by academic staff

	Personal subscription	Library provided	Others	Row Total
Before 1996	0	95	32	127
	0.0%	12.5%	10.0%	11.2%
1996–2000	0	53	18	71
	0.0%	7.0%	5.6%	6.3%
2001–2005	3	109	42	154
	5.6%	14.4%	13.2%	13.6%
2007–2009	6	163	78	247
	11.1%	21.5%	24.5%	21.8%
2010–2011	45	338	149	532
	83.3%	44.6%	46.7%	47.0%
Column Total	54	758	319	1131
	100.0%	100.0%	100.0%	100.0%

Table 11

Value of library resources

	Minutes per reading	Number read per month	Multiplied by 12 months	Percent from library	Total
Article	49	22	12	0.67	144 hours
Book	106	7	12	0.27	40 hours
Other publication	42	10	12	0.15	13 hours

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