How Electronic Journals Are Changing Scholarly Reading
Patterns
Carol Tenopir, Professor, University of Tennessee, USA
Introduction
Scholarly journals have been one of the most important sources of information for
scientists, social scientists, physicians, and engineers for over 300 years. Access to
articles allows them to find out what is new in their field, to learn about related fields,
and to advance their research, practice, and teaching. Many changes in the technology
and dissemination of scholarly information, particularly in the last decades, is changing
how scholarly journals are disseminated and accessed. This presentation focuses on
some evidence of how these changes in dissemination and access have changed (or not
changed) the patterns of use and reading by subject experts and the way they use
information to get their research done.
My research over the years has led me to some conclusions about users’ needs and
expectations. This presentation shows evidence that has led to those conclusions. Subject
experts:
1. read more in not much more time
2. use many ways to locate and read information
3. rely more on library provided articles, and,
4. value journal article reading for many reasons, but ultimately make choices based
on convenience.
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These research studies have been conducted with Donald W. King over the past 30 years
and look mostly at subject specialists in universities and other settings. (For a summary
of the research from 1977 through 1999 see Tenopir & King, Towards Electronic
Journals, Washington, DC: SLA, 2000. Many results are updated in Tenopir & King,
Communication Patterns of Engineers, NY: IEEE/Wiley InterScience, 2004). The
studies rely on surveys, but supplement findings with log analysis, focus groups and
observations. The most recent surveys include surveys of students and faculty members
at five universities in the United States and two in Australia, surveys of pediatrician
members of the American Academy of Pediatrics and astronomer members of the
American Astronomical Society. Almost all of the respondents to these surveys are
affiliated users—that is they have access to libraries with substantial journal collections.
Recent survey instruments and reports are available at
http://web.utk.edu/~tenopir/research/
Subject Experts Are Reading More
There is more reading in all subject disciplines than in the past, but in not much more
total time. In all of the surveys from 1977 to the present by Tenopir & King, we define
reading as going beyond the title and abstract and into the body of the article. Reading of
just abstracts is not counted.
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We first started noticing a strange phenomenon in the mid-1990s, where the growth rate
of articles read and growth rate of total time spent reading that had pretty much followed
each other proportionately, began to diverge. More reading on average was occurring, but
the total time spent reading was not increasing as much as would be expected. Reading
now is much more likely to be skimming or scanning, as subject experts are reading more,
but spending less time per reading.
Looking just at university faculty members (in North America and Australia in the
newest surveys), this trend is even more noticeable. The average number of readings
among university faculty members of all disciplines is now over 250 readings per person
per year, up from only 150 in 1977. This is a conservative estimate; with outliers
included it is closer to 280 articles on average.
At the same time the average time (in minutes) per article for university faculty dropped
from an average of 48 minutes in 1977 to just over thirty minutes today. Scholars are
reading more, but also reading each article much more quickly. They need information in
manageable bites, formatted in ways that allow them to get to the important facts first and
quickly. There is pressure to read more articles, but there is not more time in the day to
devote to reading.
Publishers are redesigning articles to let readers get to the important parts more quickly.
Of course it is difficult to tell cause from effect, or which came first, faster reading or
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redesigned articles, but to some degree they are simultaneous and are an example of
changes that match readers’ habits. Any tools that help readers find the best articles
quickly and help them to read quickly are important in the future.
Of course, amount of reading and time spent reading varies tremendously by subject
discipline. University medical faculty read more than any other group (except doctoral
students at the time they are doing their dissertation.) Humanists are at the low end, but
read other things such as books and primary documents. By far the biggest predictor of
differences in reading patterns is subject discipline.
Total time spent varies because engineers spend the most time per article, and university
medical faculty read the greatest number of articles (420 articles per year on average up
from 322 in 2001), but in rapid fashion (spending on average 24 minutes per article).
Engineering faculty, on the other hand, spend an average of 43 minutes per article
reading.
Physicians, particularly those with clinical duties, also read on average very quickly—
just 22 minutes per article. They need to read a lot and rely on peer reviewed journals, but
read most very quickly. Many of the readings by physicians are from printed personal
subscriptions.
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Subject Experts Use Many Ways to Locate Articles
Subject experts still use many ways to locate articles to read and they choose the way that
matches the purpose of each reading. Although searching on general web search engines
is often the first place to start research, especially with students who are in a rush, young
and old scientists still use many sources and tactics to find the information they need. In
fact readers are quite adaptable, browsing for current awareness and through core titles in
their disciplines; searching, particularly for new topics, older materials, and for research
purposes; following citations manually or, more often recently, electronically;
recommendations from colleagues, professors, friends; and, to a lesser degree, although
increasing, from alerting services or other methods.
Browsing through tables of contents or through complete electronic or print journals and
searching both remain important ways to locate articles. Although a growing number of
articles are found via searching by some researchers, browsing is still important. One
solution does not replace another; readers are quite adept at using multiple sources for
different purposes and at different times.
Subject discipline again makes a difference. Browsing is very important for those who
rely on journal articles, who do a lot of current awareness reading, and for those who
value core journals and tend to read everything in a current issue. Researchers rely more
on searching. The number of ways is varied and varies with the discipline.
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Scholars are now reading from a wide variety of sources—paper journals, e-journals,
eprint servers, authors’ web sites, aggregated databases, subject repositories, and
institutional repositories. How has this wealth of sources affected reading patterns? Our
data from three U.S. research universities (Akron University, Case Western and
University of Tennessee) show that all possible sources of articles are used by faculty.
Complete journals and databases that point to separate articles coexist.
Reading from Library E-Collections Has Increased
Not surprisingly, reading from e-journals has increased steadily over the last decade, and
is mostly from library-provided collections. Reading patterns are clearly influenced by
the decisions that libraries make and the electronic collections they provide.
Library collections are becoming more important. One of the reasons is that the average
number of personal subscriptions continues to decrease. From an average of over five
personal subscriptions in 1977, the average subject expert now reports under two
personal subscriptions across all workplaces and among Australian academics (but three
and one half on average for U.S. faculty). Medical faculty and practitioners still have
between five and six personal subscriptions. In most subject disciplines we have
observed a continual decline in reading from personal subscriptions and an increase in
reading from library-provided collections and other sources. Other sources include web
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sites, colleagues, document delivery, and so forth, many of which may also be from
libraries. Students rely even more on library collections than do faculty members,
because students have very few personal subscriptions.
In OhioLink universities virtually all journals that are made available online are used by
someone, sometime, but reading is highly skewed. If the library provides many journal
titles electronically, nearly all journals will be used at least once by someone, but, on the
other hand, just three-quarters of the e-collection satisfies 99% of the use.
Even something as simple as whether readers got their articles from print or electronic
sources varies tremendously by subject discipline and work place. Pediatricians prefer
print journals for current awareness reading on the run—in the hospital, in the train,
waiting for a patient, at home, in the gym, etc. Astronomers overwhelmingly prefer
electronic journals read at their office. University scientists in the U.S. and Australia use
both print and electronic journals, but read more in electronic format from the library and
more in print from personal subscriptions.
Another phenomenon we have been tracking and are beginning to see changes in is the
age of articles read. Reading of older materials has been increasing in just the last few
years. Until the last few years the percent of readings overall within the first year of
publication remained pretty stable at about 2/3rds (65-68%) of all readings done by a
group in a year (except for physicians, who do a lot of current awareness reading
resulting in as many as 81% of their readings being within the current year of
publication.)
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Our most recent surveys in the US and Australia show that the current year readings had
decreased to just about one half of all readings, meaning that about one half of all
readings are a year old or more.
We are not exactly sure why, but I think availability of more e-backfiles and time-linked
embargoes may both be partly responsible. Clearly library’s e-collection policies have an
impact on reading patterns. Older materials are more likely to be for research, more likely
to come from a library collection, and are described as more valuable.
Reading Has Many Values But Convenience is Key
And finally, while there are some differences in reading patterns depending on factors
such as gender and age, there are not as many as might be expected. The information
preferences and usage patterns of an older astronomer who is still publishing are more
similar to a younger astronomer who is also actively publishing, than to an older historian.
When active publishing is not factored in, on the whole, younger readers are slightly
more likely to read from electronic journals and have fewer personal subscriptions. The
biggest predictors of differences in information/reading behaviors are differences in
subject disciplines and work places.
Again, this is tied to purpose of the preponderance of readings. Clinicians (pediatricians
here) do most of their reading for current awareness and for consulting/diagnosis/and
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treatment. This requires lots of very fast reading of current articles. University faculty on
the whole, read much more for research and writing.
The overall time spent reading is one measure of the value of articles to scholars. They
also report many explicit values of reading, including improving the result, inspiring new
thinking, changing their focus, and saving time. Only a few readings are reported to
waste the time of the readers.
Readers need high quality articles, but ultimately all users want systems and sources that
are convenient—those that help them get their work done better and are easy to use.
In focus groups we asked science faculty and graduate students what they want in
electronic journals systems. They almost all said “more”--more sources and more
backfiles of older articles. In addition, they want easy access with no barriers to use and
they want to make sure that the sources they use today will continue to be available next
year and five years from now.
Today’s users want high quality articles (how quality is judged varies from subject to
subject. For most, by far, the most common way of judging quality is by using peerreviewed journals and by recognizing the journal title as a good journal.) They didn’t use
this exact wording, but almost everyone puts importance on factors that build-in
convenience to getting their work done.
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In a large study by Stanford HighWire Press (the e-journals usage study or e-just) they
concluded that: “Convenience drives usage of e-journals…and it is a relative term
among scholars.” That is, what is convenient for one group of scholars is not convenient
for others. Or, to put it in my terms, what is convenient for pediatricians is not convenient
for astronomers.
Transaction logs tell us that library e-collections are widely used and use continues to go
up. For subject experts, however, these collections form just a part of their total reading
needs. Electronic reading is mostly (but not all) from libraries; print is mostly, but not all,
from personal subscriptions. Print is not yet obsolete, but if electronic journals are more
convenient they are quickly adopted by most readers. However, even when an electronic
journal is the source for reading, most readings are still printed out for the final form of
reading.
Conclusion
In conclusion:

Articles are read more now than ever
•
E-journal systems from libraries and through the web are making this possible
•
Both print and online and both browsing and searching are still important
•
Students rely on libraries and searching even more than subject experts, but all
use library-provided articles more than ever
•
Quality and convenience are both important
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Let me end with a quote that was used by the Associate Chief Librarian of the New York
Public Library at the NFAIS meeting in 2004. He said that, for users of the New York
Public Library, “Convenience trumps quality every time….
It is the job of librarians [and I would add, publishers] to make quality convenient.” I
leave you with this thought and this challenge.
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