Are Fines Fine? A Mixed Methods Study of the Effectiveness of and Attitudes to Overdue Fines among Various Borrower Groups (Age, Gender, Ethnicity, Student Status, Faculty and Degree) of the University of Canterbury Library

Abstract

This research explores attitudes to library fines among student borrowers in a New Zealand academic library. It investigates the extent to which borrowers are aware of their borrowing privileges, fine amounts and lending periods and examines the extent to which knowledge of borrowing policy affects the incidence of library fines and the extent to which knowledge of borrowing policy affects borrower attitudes to fines. The study seeks to discover the extent to which fines are perceived by borrowers to be a deterrent to overdue items. The study addresses the issues of punishment, positive and negative reinforcement and seeks to identify options to fines which borrowers consider might be more effective than fines. It examines the extent to which student borrowers agree or disagree with the effectiveness of fines. The study sought to discover whether or not some demographic groups are more likely to incur fines than others. A survey in the form of an online and print questionnaire was employed to collect quantitative and qualitative data from student borrowers at the University of Canterbury Library. There were 300 responses to the questionnaire. Participation was on a self-selected random basis, so it was not possible to generalise the results of the survey. The key findings of the study were that the majority of respondents to the questionnaire did not think library fines should be abolished at the University of Canterbury Library and the majority agreed that fines for overdue items encourage borrowers to return items on time. The majority of respondents felt that fines were a punishment rather than a price or a hire charge. The study was unable to identify significant differences in attitudes among demographic groups because the samples for most groups were too small to analyse. Further research is suggested in the form of in-depth interviews with borrowers and in other academic libraries in order to identify whether trends exist, to better understand why some borrowers keep items beyond their due dates and to discover what measures, if any, would reduce the incidence of overdue items.