College and Research Libraries GORHAM LANE Assessing. the Undergraduates' Use of the University L~brary An academic library deserves to be appraised in terms of the use made of it by undergraduates. In an effort to apply these terms four studies were conducted in a specific library to determine what students did there and to analyze their long-term withdrawal of books. Details are given . on the purposes behind student visits to libraries, and statistics are enu- merated on student withdrawals by class and by sex. The library appears to be a greater potential educational force than is being realized. ALTHOUGH THE UNIVERSITY LmRARY is regarded consensually as a potent edu- cational force, its strength is more often than not described in terms of its phys- ical facilities, the extent of its collections, or even its budget. Important and limit- ing though these are to the library's ef- fectiveness, a listing of the "bricks and mortar" or perhaps the 'linen and vel- lum" does not provide a measure of the library's effectiveness as an instrument of education. Such measures can be ob- tained only by assessing the extent to which students use the library and the extent to which such use relates to aca- Mr. Lane is Professor of Psychology and Chairman of the University Impact Study in the University of Delaware. Studies such as are summarized in this report cannot be conducted without the full cooperation of the library staff. The author is deeply in- debted to the staff members of the libraries at the University of Delaware for their in- terest and cooperation. Special . thanks should be given to Richard D. Quick, who at the time of these studies was Assistant to the Director of Libraries at the University of Delaware, and to Alda Beach, who as a member of the Impact Study staff, had much to do with the analysis of the data. demic growth. These assessments are not easy. They are time-consuming and ex- pensive, and they cannot be achieved with complete objectivity. The library may be outwardly a quiet place, but it is not static, nor are its users. They can- not be manipulated and controlled in the manner required by objective research, and it is well known that the person who knows that he is being studied will often alter his behavior to meet the expecta- tions of the researcher. Yet attempts to assess the effectiveness of such a facility as a library can pro- duce worthwhile results and provide in- formation useful to administrators, stu- dents, and faculty. The information gained through such attempts can cer- tainly be more meaningful to an accredit- ation team than the traditional descrip- tive and "counting" reports which have been and are customary. With such thoughts in mind, the University of Del- aware has been attempting in recent years to devise ways of discovering the impact which its facilities and programs have on its undergraduates. Among the facilities studied was the university li- brary. In order to measure the extent to /277 278 1 College & Research Libraries • July, 1966 which the university library was used by students and faculty, four studies were designed and carried out. It was the pur- pose of the first two studies to determine what students were doing when they were in the library. 1 In May 1962 a rel- atively brief questionnaire was distrib- uted by library personnel sixteen times during a five-day period at three dif- ferent hours each day, to all students who were in the library. The question- naire asked several detailed questions concerning the materials the students were using at the time of the survey and those they had used during the preced- ing week. Questions were answered by a single word or a check mark. The questionnaire was unsigned, and stu- dents were asked to return it to the main desk of the library when they left, and not to fill out a questionnaire more than once. From an undergraduate population which was then just under three thou- sand, slightly fewer than seven hundred responses were obtained during the week of the survey. In proportion to the total number of students in their class, more seniors (approximately 28 per cent) . were using the library than members of any other class. Sophomores were next in frequency, and freshmen were fewest (approximately 18 per cent). At the time of the survey, there were five undergraduate schools. An analysis of the sample by school and class showed that fewer than 30 per cent of the total number of students in any school were using the library facilitie$. Of the five schools, that having the high- est percentage of its students in the li- brary was the school of education; stu- dents in the school of agriculture were represented least. It should be noted, however, that the school of agriculture has a separate library, and the depart- ment of chemistry (in the school of arts 1 Gorham Lane, "Report No. 1 on the Use of the University Library: Library Questionnaire Study," University of Delaware, September 19, 1962, p. 7. and science) also has a separate library. In all schools, with the exception of home economics, the number of seniors was greater than the number of fresh- men; sophomores were also much in evidence. Since university libraries are often used not just as a source of library ma- terials but also as a place where students study their own books and notes, an analysis was made of the materials the students were using at the time of the survey. More than half of the freshmen were using only their own books, but the number of students using the library as a place in which to study their own books decreased steadily from the fresh- man through the senior class. Converse- ly, the number of students using only library books increased. Somewhat more than a third of the students in all classes were using both their own and library books. Reserved books were being used by more people than any other library materials, with reference books next in frequency. Microfilm and recordings were being used least, and an analysis by class showed that with the exception of recordings, seniors were the most numerous users of all types of library materials. Seniors, more than any other group, were using the library for "course related work" or "research," and fewer of them were using the library for "reg- ularly assigned" work. The results also showed that although seniors were the most numerous and heaviest users of library facilities, they did not necessarily spend as much time in the library as members of other classes. The first study was conducted toward the end of the second semester, shortly before the beginning of final examina- tions. The second study, which used the same questionnaire and techniques, was conducted during a week in the middle of the first semester.2 In this study, data 2 Gorham Lane, "Report No. 5 on The Use of the University Library: Library Questionnaire Study (Sup- plementary Report)!' University of Delaware, Feb- ruary 21, 1963, p. 4. Undergraduates' Use of University Library I 279 were collected not only from the main library but also from the libraries located in the department of chemistry and the school of agriculture. More students were in the libraries at the time of the second survey but, in general, results were similar to those of the first. Library use increased progressively from the freshman through the senior year, and again it was shown that seniors do not spend more hours in the library than members of other classes, but that they are more frequently found there and are more likely to be using library materials. In the main library reserved and refer- ence books again were found to be in use more than any other materials. In the agriculture library, periodicals were be- ing used most heavily. In this survey it was the school of home economics which had the largest percentage of its students in the library. The nature of the work being done by students was different in the two sur- veys. In the first, seniors, as compared with members of other classes, were more likely to be engaged in "course re- lated" work or "research," rather than in "assigned" work. In the second survey, there were no differences in the percent- age of students from each class devoting time to these three activities. This finding might reflect the commonly observed and deplored but ubiquitous tendency for students to allow work on term papers and research projects to accumu- late until the end of the semester. The findings also may reflect the assignment- giving habits of the faculty. In both surveys the number of stu- dents using the library for recreational reading was small. The library seems to be regarded as a place for study and re- quired reading, and the use of the li- brary for this purpose increases year by year from the freshman through the sen- ior years. This is attested to not only by the larger number of students who use the library in each of the four years, but by the increasing number of upperclass- men who make use of library materials rather than their own books. In the more recent survey, approximately 4 per cent of the freshmen in the library were us- ing library materials only; the compa- rable figure for seniors was 19 per cent. The percentage of freshmen using peri- odicals was 3.9; for seniors it was more than 8. The third study investigated the long- term withdrawal of books from the gen- eral collection by undergraduates.3 Start- ing in the fall of 1961, for a period of two years, personnel of the library checked charge cards for the names of selected students at the close of each day to see whether or not they had with- drawn any books. Close record was kept of the Dewey number of each book withdrawn. A 20 per cent random sam- ple of the freshman and junior class was selected for study, and data were ob- tained for the freshmen during both se- mesters and for juniors during the sec- ond semester of the first year of the study. The following year data were ob- tained during both semesters for these students as sophomores and seniors. As in any longitudinal study there was con- siderable attrition in the sample. At the end of two years, 41 per cent of the original freshman sample were no longer present, and 23 per cent of the junior sample had left the university for var- ious reasons, including completion of course work. The results did not reveal extensive use of the library by undergraduates, at least insofar as the general collection was ·concerned. In fact, the majority of men students in the sample withdrew no books from the library's general collec- tion in any given semester during the period covered by the survey. Table 1 shows these results. It is perhaps com- forting to note that the percentage of undergraduates withdrawing no books 3 Gorham Lane, "A Summary Report on The Use of the University Library: The Withdrawal Habits of Undergraduates." University of Delaware, November 15, 1963, p. 15. 2801 College & Research Libraries • July, 1966 TABLE 1 PERCENTAGE OF THE SAMPLE WHo WITHDREW No BooKS DURING THE SURVEY CLASS YEAR SEMESTER Class of 1965 Freshman First Second Sophomore First Second Class of 1963 Junior Second Senior First Second decreased somewhat from the freshman year through the senior year. The students in the survey were sep- arated into two groups: those who had withdrawn no books during any semes- ter in the period covered by the survey, and those who had withdrawn at least one. In the latter group the average number of books withdrawn was not large. During the freshman year the average was between three and four, during the sophomore year between six and seven, during the junior year be- tween eight and nine, and during the senior year between six and seven. The increase in the number of books with- drawn by upperclassmen was much more notable for women students than for men students. As second semester seniors, women students' book with- drawals were at their peak (six to seven books), whereas the comparable number for men was one to two books, a figure quite typical of the men's withdrawals when freshmen and sophomores. When an analysis was made, semester by semester, of book withdrawals by students who remained in the university, their withdrawals were shown to be generally heavier than those of students who were dropped or left the university for various reasons. The differences, however, were small and not statistically significant. Correlational relationships MEN WOMEN TOTAL No. Per Cent No. Per Cent No: Per Cent 84 73 64 71 148 72 56 55 50 63 106 59 54 68 38 58 92 63 47 67 26 43 73 56 47 55 17 40 64 50 41 54 13 36 54 48 39 59 10 30 49 49 between scholastic standing in high school, or grade point average in college and the number of books withdrawn also failed to reach statistical significance.4 Throughout the two-year period of the study, books in the categories of litera- ture and the social sciences were by far the most frequently withdrawn and con- stituted almost 50 per cent of all with- drawals. Pamphlets, general works, books on religion, and languages were withdrawn least and comprised less than 8 per cent of the withdrawals. Relative to their total withdrawals, men with- drew four times as many books in the area of pure science as did women, and slightly more than twice as many books in technology. Women withdrew half again as many books in the area of liter- ature as did men. Class differences in withdrawals show only a few trends and differences. Fresh- men withdrew most of their books in the field of literature; in fact, they withdraw more books in this area than did students in any other class. Next in frequency for the freshmen were books in the social sciences. They withdrew somewhat more books in history than did other students, and they withdrew somewhat less fre- quently in the area of technology. These same students as sophomores withdrew 4 Statistical analyses were made by Carol Pemberton of the University Impact Study staff. Undergraduates' Use of University Library 1 281 less than half as many books from the area of history as they had when they were freshmen. Sophomores' withdraw- als were more frequently from the clas- sifications of social science and philos- ophy than were those of any other of the classes. Juniors, as compared with other classes, showed no particular pat- tern or emphasis in their book withdraw- als, although as compared with freshmen and sophomores they withdrew signifi- cantly more books in the pure sciences. For seniors, as compared with other classes, the areas of heaviest concentra- tion were in pure science and tech- nology. They tended to withdraw books in the areas of philosophy, religion, and literature somewhat less often than stu- dents in the other classes. Although the area of literature was most heavily used by students in all classes, the number of such books with- drawn decreased quite steadily from the freshman through the senior year, but even during the senior year, students were withdrawing almost 20 per cent of their books from this area. Books in the social sciences were next in frequency of use among all classes. In general, students majoring in the fields of education, English, history, and political science, and possibly biology and nursing, consistently withdrew more books than students in other major fields. Because very few students in some of the major fields were included in the sam- ple, it was not possible to analyze with any degree of certainty the relationship between voluntary withdrawal of books from the library's general collection and the student's major field of study. The studies reported above represent, for the University of Delaware, pioneer- ing attempts to assess the undergradu- ates' use of the library. As first attempts they have their limitations. They have, however, demonstrated that it is pos- sible to assess with some degree of re- liability the extent to which students actually make use of library facilities, if one carefully designs questionnaires and selects samples, and if tabulating and statistical help are available and there is a cooperative and interested library staff. It should not be expected that all of the results of such surveys will be sur- prising. Some, as for example finding that seniors make more use of library fa- cilities than freshmen, may simply sup- port what has been assumed or hoped. But it is reassuring to find that one's hopes have a basis in fact. Other findings are of interest primarily to the particular library being studied and cannot be gen- eralized to include other institutions. Such findings can be put to immediate use within an institution, if faculty mem- bers study the data and realize their im- plications. That fewer than 30 per cent of the students in any school (and fewer than 40 per cent in any class in any . school) were found in the library during a given week, or that the majority of men sampled withdrew no books from the university's general collection during any given semester, are findings that should have direct implications for cur- riculum and program planning, for coun- selling and advising, and for giving as- signments. So also should finding that the nature of work being done by stu- dents in the library differs at different times of the semester. That a university's general collection is not widely used by undergraduates, and that when it is used such use does not seem to have any significant relation- ship to academic achievement, suggests that an evaluation of the usefulness of a university library in terms of its gen- eral collection alone, would be most in- adequate. All of these findings have im- plications not only for the library staff but for the instructional staff as well. The finding that few students use the library for recreational reading raises several interesting speculations. Do stu- 2821 College & Research Libraries • July, 1966 dents read for recreation? If so, what do they mean by recreational reading, where do they get their books, and what kind of reading materials do they use? If they do not read for recreation, is this a reflection of their past experience, the lack of available recreational reading materials in the library, or the exigencies of college life? In an era wherein non- work time is increasing rapidly, this would seem to be an important area of concern. In a study which compared the activities of a small group of college and noncollege students, matched as high school seniors and then followed for a two-year period, it was shown that the college group spent less time in recrea- tional activities than the noncollege group. However, when asked to state how they best liked to spend a free eve- ning, "reading" was given as the re- sponse by 40 to 50 per cent of both groups. 5 But what do they read? Some highly tentative answers were provided by another study in which a group of seniors in the class of 1964 at the University of Delaware were pre- sented with a list of thirteen kinds of reading materials. 6 They were asked first to indicate how many of each of the several kinds of materials they had read (on an unassigned basis ) during the past academic year and then to indicate those materials which they considered to be "recreational reading." The sample, which was not a truly random sample, 5 Gorham Lane, "A Compatison of the Activities and Interests of Two Groups of College Students and a Non-College Group," December 3, 1963. 6 These data are summarized from a larger study of student activities and interests which has not been released at the present time. consisted of 175 men and 336 women. The average number of books read by the men was fourteen; for women it was eleven. For men, novels, science, essays, books on technology, and mysteries were ranked, in order, as the most fre- quently read. For women, the ranking was novels, poetry, essays, mysteries, and biography. When asked which they considered to be recreational reading, men listed, in order among the top five, novels, mysteries, science fiction, poetry, and biography. Women listed novels, mysteries, poetry, biography, and science fiction. For both groups, books in sci- ence, political science, technology, or foreign languages were at the bottom of the list as recreational reading. Such re- sults again are not unexpected but might serve as one basis for determining library purchases if one is to serve students' cur- rent interests, or for modification of in- structional programs, if students' inter- ests are to be modified. Finally, with all of their limitations and the occasional specificity of their results, attempts at assessing the students' use of the library focus attention on the li- brary itself and its unique position as a potential educational force. Feedback to the faculty and students, and involve- ment of them in such assessments cannot help but re-emphasize the importance which the university library may have in the academic community. The interest thus aroused many well stimulate, as it has at the University of Delaware, fur- ther studies of the library. With in- creased knowledge of its actual role, the library certainly can more nearly attain its potential. • •