Comparative Usage of Science E-book and Print Collections at Texas A&M University Libraries

Abstract

This study compares usage figures between equivalent e-books and print books owned by the Texas A&M University Libraries in the physical sciences and technology. For NetLibrary, the top 10 science e-books were used over six times more than the print books, and the top 10 chemistry e-books were used over three times more than their print counterparts. For ebrary, the top 17 science e-books were used at least 17 times more than the same print books. In Safari, the top 10 computer science e-books were used 207 times more than their print counterparts. Usage statistics such as these can help librarians make informed e-book purchase decisions, especially in times of retrenchment. KEYWORDS e-books, electronic and print format book comparisons, academic libraries, e-book collections, e-book packages INTRODUCTIONThe publications that study e-books are still a relatively small body of work. Even smaller is the subset of studies that compare the usage data between the print and e-book formats of equivalent titles. NetLibrary e-books have been the focus of most of these studies. Although these studies suggest possible reasons for the usage patterns they present, one major NetLibrary study looks at survey data that can potentially add meaning and insight into the print/e-book comparative studies, namely the why and how e-books are currently used. Among all of these studies, usage data for print books and e-books in the sciences have rarely been compared, other than books in the area of computer science.In this study, comparisons of usage data for book titles in the physical sciences and technology for the print and electronic formats were compared for three major e-book providers to Texas A&M (TAMU) Libraries-NetLibrary, ebrary, and Safari. Details concerning some promising growth of use of newer e-book collections also are provided. This paper reports on usage comparisons that were made between the most popular e-books and their print counterparts at TAMU Libraries. The results of this study are important in terms of collection development planning as well as the purchasing of science books and e-books for large academic libraries.This study was originally undertaken to provide information to support the purchase of a group of NetLibrary books available with special pricing to libraries affiliated with Amigos Library Services, Inc. The purchase of the collection did not have enough support among the selectors, and the authors of this study desired to present concrete usage data to the science and engineering librarians who seemed the most likely group to support the expenditure for the NetLibrary update. There were many competing proposals, and just anecdotal reports of user experience with NetLibrary would not be sufficient to raise the priority of the collection. At the same time, we needed to review the usage statistics for other e-book collections in order to have comparative data. When shown preliminary data from the study, science librarians were impressed that NetLibrary science e-books were accessed an average of 3....

How E-books Are Used

“…37 In the study done by Kimball, Ives, and Jackson, a comparison of the usage rates of electronic and print versions of the titles in chemistry, physical sciences, and computer science yielded figures of 3.4 to 1, 17 to 1, and 207 to 1 respectively. 38 In addition, for business, computing, science, and technology, in other words the fields in which the need for current information is most acute, Herlihy and Yi found a particularly strong correlation between the currency of an e-book and its relevance to researchers. 39 The monograph-dependent humanities and social sciences present a more complicated picture.…”

Not on the Same Page: Undergraduates' Information Retrieval in Electronic and Print Books

“…The researchers chose this user group because undergraduate science students are expected to be heavy users of e-books. 25 The nature of qualitative research limits the sample size. The number of participants recruited for this study was determined by estimating the number of participants needed to reach the point of saturation.…”

Are Print Books Dead? An Investigation of Book Circulation at a Mid-Sized Academic Library

“…Dillon, 2001;Littman, 2002;Littman & Connaway, 2004;Christianson, 2005;Christianson & Aucoin, 2005;Williams & Best, 2006;Ugaz & Resnick, 2008;Slater, 2009;Kimball et al, 2010). Most found that e-books had similar or somewhat higher use than print books, but patterns vary among libraries, user groups, and subject area.…”