Online journals: impact on print journal usage.

Area of Science:

• Library and Information Science
• Scholarly Communication
• Digital Libraries

Background:

• Academic libraries are increasingly subscribing to online journals.
• The University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) Library provides access to over 4,000 online journals.
• A print journal collection of approximately 400 titles is maintained at the Health Sciences-Peoria site.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effect of online journal access on print journal usage.
• To assess the impact of online journals on interlibrary loan (ILL) requests.

Main Methods:

• A longitudinal journal-use study was conducted at the Library of the Health Sciences-Peoria.
• The study analyzed usage data before and after the introduction of 104 new online journals in January 1999.
• Statistical analysis was employed to determine the significance of observed changes in usage patterns.

Main Results:

• Print journal usage declined significantly following the introduction of online journals (P < 0.001).
• This decrease was observed for journals available exclusively in print and those available in both print and online formats.
• Interlibrary loan (ILL) requests also showed a significant decrease (P < 0.02).

Conclusions:

• Patron preference appears to favor online journal access over print formats.
• The shift to online journals may lead users to compromise on article quality for convenience.
• Findings have implications for academic library collection development strategies.