Electronic Journals and Changes in Scholarly Article Seeking and Reading Patterns

By tracking the information-seeking and reading patterns of science, technology, medical and social science faculty members from 1977 to the present, this paper seeks to examine how faculty members locate, obtain, read, and use scholarly articles and how this has changed with the widespread availability of electronic journals and journal alternatives

Scholarly article seeking, reading, and use: a continuing evolution from print to electronic in the sciences and social sciences

Electronic journals are now the norm for accessing and reading scholarly articles. This article examines scholarly article reading patterns by faculty in five US universities in 2012. Selected findings are also compared to some general trends from studies conducted periodically since 1977. In the 2012 survey, over threequarters (76%) of the scholarly readings were obtained through electronic means and just over half (51%) of readings were read on a screen rather than from a print source or being printed out. Readings from library sources are overwhelmingly from e-sources. The average number of articles read per month was 20.66, with most articles read by the medical and other sciences, and on average each article was read for 32 minutes

Electronic Publishing: Research Issues for Academic Librarians and Users

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Evaluating Digital Libraries: A Longitudinal and Multifaceted View

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A Review of Information Behaviour Literature on Professoriates across Disciplinary Fields

This paper reviewed empirical literature on information behaviour of academic faculty across disciplinary fields with particular reference to studies whose demography included the professoriate in the context of their information needs, purposeful information seeking and use of information for teaching and research. Paucity of literature focusing on the professoriate prompted this study. Literature focusing on the professoriate will provide a rich theoretical and contextual background for researchers embarking on studies that focus specifically on the professoriate in related information context, besides filling the knowledge gap in library and information science literature. The scope of the literature review covers scholarly journals in major electronic databases and search engines such as EBSCOhost, ERIC, Social Science Citation Index, ProQuest, Google and Google Scholar. In reviewing the empirical literature, attention was given to literature with professoriate in their population. The outcome of the literature review revealed the general information needs of the professoriate are for teaching and research. Literature on purposeful information seeking revealed the professoriates’ use of print and electronic information resources varied across disciplinary fields, and is influenced by age, environmental and individual characteristics. Use of electronic information resources is context-dependent and prevailed more in research settings and in studies conducted in the West relative to those carried out in sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East. The paper concludes that in-spite of the continued relevance of print information resources, electronic information resources usage continue to increase in academic environment that is fast embracing information technology

Library Economic Metrics: Examples of the Comparison of Electronic and Print Journal Collections and Collection Services

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As the Cursor Blinks: Electronic Scholarship and Undergraduates in the Library

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Publishing patterns within the UK accounting and finance academic community

This study reports on publishing patterns in the UK and Irish accounting and finance academic community for the 2-year period 1998-1999 using the data contained in the BAR Research Register. It is found that the community has been growing modestly since 1991, with a doubling in the number of PhD-qualified staff (to 30%) and a reduction in the number with a professional qualification (from 81 to 58%). Nearly half of all outputs appear in other than academic journals. The mean number of publications is 1.76 per capita, with significantly more staff active in publishing than in 1991 (44% compared to 35%). However, only 17% publish in a subset of 60 'top' journals. Just over half of all articles are published in the core discipline journals, the rest appearing mainly in management, economics, sociology, education and IT journals. This may indicate a growing maturity in the disciplines, whereby applied research findings are flowing back into related foundation and business disciplines. Nearly two-thirds of academic articles are co-authored, with 25% of contributions coming from outside the community, indicating an openness to interdisciplinary collaboration, collaboration with overseas academics and collaboration with individuals in practice. The findings of this study will be of assistance to those making career decisions (either their own career or decisions involving other people's careers). They also raise awareness of the way in which the accounting and finance disciplines are developing

Is information-seeking behaviour of doctoral students changing?: a review of the literature (2010 – 2015)

The advent of the Internet and networked communications in the last 15 years has arguably considerably changed the information behaviours of doctoral students, including the discovery process. Information seeking includes initiating a search, constructing search strategies, locating and evaluating the identified sources. Current research on information-seeking behaviours is focusing on understanding how the Internet, social media and other technological and communication-based changes, including mobile technologies, have changed the way students seek information in order to understand the information behaviours of the students of tomorrow. This paper offers a review of the literature on information-seeking behaviours, with a particular focus on recent years (2010-15). It aims to determine whether notable changes in the information-seeking behaviour of doctoral students have emerged in recent years. The study shows that the information-seeking behaviours of doctoral students follow a steady trend, with some subtle changes, particularly in the (patchy) use of social media and networking sites. There appears to be more similarities than differences across disciplines in the information-seeking behaviours of doctoral students. Considerations to their information literacy skills are given to understand better the role supervisors and library staff can play to support the doctoral students population in the early stages of the research process