eJUSt - Stanford University Libraries and Highwire Press

Follow-up Survey Questionnaire

Please note that links to results have been added next to each question for your convenience. Look for the » see chart notations below.

Stanford E-Journal Follow-up Survey

This survey, a follow-up to our original May 2001 survey "Scientific Journals: A User Study", investigates changes over the past year, and also investigates some new topics, including journal costs, users' reading, searching and archiving practices, and the use of online journal features.

Your participation will remain entirely anonymous; responses will be analyzed in the aggregate only, and individual responses will not be associated with individual participants.

DEFINITIONS

» E-journals are peer-reviewed journals available online, whether or not also available in conventional, printed form.

» Printed edition refers to conventional journal editions published and distributed as paper copies, and "online edition" refers to journal editions available online (same as "e-journal").

» PDF refers to the formatting of articles in the "portable data format" read by Adobe® Acrobat®.

» HTML is an abbreviation of HyperText Markup Language which is the publishing language of the World Wide Web.

» E-mail alert is defined as a service readers sign up for, through which they receive email from the journal containing (a) tables of contents, (b) citations of articles on topics of interest, or (c) articles on keyword(s) of interest. We refer to these three types of alert services as "table-of-contents alerts," "article citation alerts," and "article keyword alerts," respectively.

» Pre-Press refers to a service providing online access to articles in press (peer-reviewed and accepted but not yet revised/edited).

USAGE FREQUENCY
» see chart

1. When did you last retrieve, read, or download a full-text, peer-reviewed journal article online or through the Internet?

Yesterday or today
Within the last week
Within the last month
Longer than a month ago
Never

2. How often (based on the past year) do you retrieve, read or download full-text, peer-reviewed journal articles online or through the Internet?

Daily
Weekly
Monthly
Seldom
Never

STAYING CURRENT
» see chart

3. Currently, how many journals do you read or browse regularly?

Number of Journals Read
Number of Journals Browsed

COST OF ONLINE ACCESS
» see chart

4a. Do you personally subscribe to any scientific journals or maintain any society memberships specifically to obtain ONLINE access to full-text journal articles?

Yes [Go to question 4b]
No [Go to question 5a]
Don't know [Go to question 5a]

4b. Currently, how many societies are you a member of in order to obtain ONLINE full-text journal access? If you receive online full-text access to a journal that comes free with your society membership, please count it as a society membership here. If you pay a surcharge to your society membership for online access to a society journal, please count it as a journal subscription in 4c below, and do NOT count it here.

Number of Societies

4c.. Currently, how many journals (other than those that come free or discounted with your society memberships) do you subscribe to in order to obtain ONLINE full-text journal access?

Number of Journals

4d. How much is your annual spending (U.S. dollars) on scientific journal subscriptions and/or society memberships for the primary purpose of ONLINE full-text journal access? Please do NOT include amounts you pay for printed journal editions that include free online access, or amounts you pay for "pay per view" access.

How much (US dollars per year)?

4e. Which of the following payment options would you most prefer when you need personal online access to full-text scientific journal articles? Please check only one:

To receive both the printed edition and the online edition of a journal for a price somewhat higher than the regular price for a printed edition only.
To pay a somewhat discounted price for a subscription to the online edition of a journal only (without receiving the printed edition of the journal).
To pay "per view" for online access to individual articles as needed.
None of the above (please fill in below how you would prefer to pay for personal online access).

FORMAT PREFERENCES
» see chart

5a. Do you plan to continue having at least some printed scientific journal issues delivered to you personally by post?

Yes [Go to question 5b]
No [Go to question 6]
I do not use printed editions any more. [Go to question 6]
I do not currently subscribe to any scientific journals or maintain any society memberships. [Go to question 6]

5b. Why will you continue to have printed journal issues delivered to you personally by post?Check all that apply:

I can easily carry a printed journal issue anywhere to read.
The pictures and images in printed journal issues provide better color resolution and detail than those I could print out from online editions.
Printed journal issues enable me to browse a range of topics for new ideas more easily than I could on the screen.
Having both printed and online journal issues provides me with more choices and flexibility in how I read and browse articles.
Online access to journal issues is unreliable or inconsistent.
It is easier for me to retrieve an article from my collection of printed journal editions than from a collection of printouts or photocopies of individual articles.
I like to scan the advertisements in the printed editions.
Printed editions come automatically with my membership or subscription.

6. Do you currently visit libraries to read/copy/browse printed editions of any journal?

Yes
No
I visit libraries only when journals are not available online and I have no other convenient access to the printed editions.

SEARCHING
» see chart

7. Where do you USUALLY begin searching for FULL-TEXT scientific journal articles? Check only one:

A general-purpose search engine (e.g., Google, Yahoo)
A specific journal's website
A multi-journal search website with links to full text (e.g., PubMed, MEDLINE, Ovid, Science Direct, HighWire)
An online citation index (e.g., Web of Science, SciFinder Scholars, BIOSIS) where only abstracts are available
My local library's reference room or stacks

READING/ARCHIVING
» see chart

8a. When I search and retrieve a full-text article online from a scientific journal, I usually:(Check only one)

Read it in full text on the screen in PDF format first
Read it in full text on the screen in HTML format first
Rather than reading from the screen, I prefer to print them out and read the printed copy

8b. When you first look at a full-text article you have retrieved or downloaded online, which of the following statements best represents what you USUALLY do? (Check only one)

I scan the headings and the first few sentences of paragraphs that look important, just to see if the article really matches my criteria.
I read the article all the way through, very quickly, to determine whether or not it is worth spending more time reading later to fully understand it.
I read the article all the way through, very slowly and carefully, hoping that I can fully understand it right away and not have to read it again.
None of the aboveIf you check this box, please describe below what you USUALLY do.

8c. If I decide to archive a full-text article after reading it, I USUALLY: (Check only one)

Save it to a file on my computer
Print it out and store it somewhere
Do both--save it to a file on the computer and also print it out

8d. Which of the following are problems you have encountered when reading or printing articles in HTML format? Check all that apply :

Difficulty reading the articles on the screen because it is hard to tell where pages break and how long the articles are.
Difficulty reading the articles on the screen because there are too many useless or distracting links and icons.
Difficulty printing the articles out because there are too many pages to print out and pages break poorly.
Difficulty printing the articles out because part of the screen gets cut off.
I haven't encountered any problems when reading or printing articles in HTML format.
I have other problems not listed above.If you check this box, please list problems you have encountered when reading or printing articles in HTML format.

ONLINE FEATURES
» see chart

9. Which of the following types of email alerts have you found to be useful? (See definitions at top of survey) Check all that apply. If you haven't used ANY of these types of email alerts, then check the "Not Applicable" box.

Table of contents alerts
Article citation alerts
Article keyword alerts
Not Applicable (If you check this box, please go to question 11.)

10. When I receive an email alert, I:

	Most of the Time	Sometimes	Never
Review the entire message to identify articles of interest
Look at just part of the message because it is too long
Hyperlink to the journal site to review the article abstracts
Hyperlink to the journal site to read full-text articles
Hyperlink to the journal site to print full-text articles out to read later
Delete it as junk mail

11. Which of the following statements MOST accurately describes your use of e-journals? Check ONLY ONE:

I use electronic journals primarily to retrieve full-text journal articles online.
I use electronic journals primarily to access special online features (e.g., hyperlinks to cited articles and scientific data bases, email alert services, pre-press, etc.).
I use electronic journals primarily for ease of searching and/or browsing.
I don't use electronic journals at all.
None of the above If you check this box, please describe below your primary motivations for using electronic journals.

PAY-PER-VIEW
» see chart

12. I typically use pay-per-view (i.e, purchase access to articles as needed by credit card) Check all that apply:

whenever I see an article that seems important to my research
when a pay-per-view article seems more important than articles that are available to me at no cost
when there is no other pertinent article available
when I have an urgent requirement for a particular article
I have never used pay-per-view.

Please type in the email address where you received this survey. This is crucial for data merging. This email address will be used for data merging purposes ONLY. The information will be discarded after merging the data. Thank you!

email address where you received this survey

That was our last question. Please feel free to write additional comments and feedback in the following box, then click the "SUBMIT SURVEY" button below. We greatly appreciate your feedback.

Thank you very much for participating in this follow-up survey! We greatly appreciate your help.

The complete analysis of the original survey you participated in last year is posted on the web at http://ejust.stanford.edu. We will post the results of the follow-up survey on the same website this fall.

Home § About § Methodology § Workshops § Findings § Researchers § Privacy § Announcements § Presentations § FAQs

http://www.perseusdevelopment.com/fromsurv.htm.