Survey on the use of different forms of scholarly output
Sally Maynard, June 2007
Report summary
A report to discover the various forms of scholarly output, the nature and extent of their use any problems they might cause.
The author posits that it is likely that the “extensive use of multi-format resources is becoming the norm across many subject areas”. She introduces the ideas of ‘blended learning’ in which new technology is used alongside traditional media as a teaching aid, social software (software that encourages social interaction) and the explosion of Web 2.0, which is well understood and used throughout the academic world.
The survey (based on a questionnaire sent to a variety of departments in 20 institutions – and then a further 20, and then another 20 again thanks to low response rates) set out to explore these phenomena.
The results of the detailed survey show the various methods teachers employ to communicate and encourage further learning. Most of the findings were unsurprising. They use a wide variety. Print books are most popular (although electronic journals just edge print journals). Most had access to Virtual Learning Environment software. (Only 1.9% of respondents said they didn’t)
Similarly, the scholarly output results are unsurprising. They use a wide variety of media, but primarily print and electronic journals, print and books chapters. Very few participants made use of blogging software, wikis or other collaborative software to disseminate their results. Subject portals and repositories were not often used either.
Respondents noted problems with access to journals and lack of funds for subscriptions. They also noted copyright concerns related to using other people’s material in teaching aids.
The discussion looks at these results again and notes how they fit into expected patterns, concluding that use is “mixed’ that but web 2.0 has not yet been adopted “fervently” as a teaching aid.
Key quotes
Researchers
“Participants were asked to indicate who they believed owns the IPR in such materials; the highest proportion (44.4%) thought that it is ‘the creators or their institutions’. However, 39.8% of the respondents did not know – this is worrying as it is possible that these respondents are contravening copyright legislation on occasion.”
Two participants noted that having to go physically to the library to photocopy journal articles from the printed source when there is no licence for e-access was time consuming.
Institutions
On the second issue, several respondents noted that their institution’s library had not subscribed to all the journals they require, either in print or electronically. In the case of electronic journals and electronic books (although it was commented that few books are available electronically), it was therefore often the case that the technology was in place but the journal required was not available.
Read the full report (PDF)