Investigation into changes in users reading behaviours : the impact of electronic journals on New Zealand university adademics

Abstract

The purpose of this research project was to determine the academic staff's and postgraduates' reading behaviour changes responding to the growth in scholarly or academic electronic journals. It also tries to find the academic user opinions and perceptions about academic electronic journals and discover what factors limit a user to use electronic journals or how to improve library electronic journals services to satisfy lots of users' needs. To achieve this aim, a sample of 150 academic staff and 75 postgraduate students was selected from different faculties of a selected tertiary institute in New Zealand. They were invited to offer their opinions on the questions in the questionnaire designed for the study. The reasons for or against the use of electronic journals and print journals were analysed. The impact on their reading behaviours or habits and relationships between electronic journals and print journals were also assessed in the study. The study is focused on users' background experience of using electronic journals, users' views about advantages and disadvantages of electronic journals and their opinions about issues of current electronic journals.