CFllU DOCUMENTATION SERVICES: A USER SURVEY

A user survey waS conducted to evaluate the threeD'ocurne nt at ton services of CFTRI. namely. L'ibrary Bulletin.Documentation List and Food Teclmology Abstracts. Re-sults have shown that these publications were being used bythe rriaj or ity of users for current awa r ene s a purposes.There was a general preference for abstracts among theuae r s over bare titles. The internal structure. such as.clas8ification. indexing. etc .. index terms and informa-tiveness of abstracts were ..-tate<!· to be helpful. Improve-Inents were suggested in extern..r format by way of print-ing. better binding etc. All the uae r e desired to receivethese aervlcfl!A on a ~ontmaal basis a.nd about 45.6% ofuser s outside CFTRI expressed their willingness to pay asubacriptiP!l charge for these aerv ices.

o INTRODUCTION

O. 1 FOSTIS

The proposal to develop the N at iorial Inf Or-mation System for Science and Technology (NISSAT)during the fifth five year plan is a significantfeature of the Science and Technology Plan pre-pared by the National Committee for Science andTechnology [2]. Food Science and Technology Infor-mation Service (FOSTL',) [1) is one of the SectoralInformation Centres included in this proposal.FOSTIS will be built around the infrastructuralfacilities available in the library of the Central FoodTechnological Research Institute (CFTRI). Mysore.where the central facility will be situated. Theregional facilities of FOSTIS will be located in theseven exper iment stat ions at E ombay, Hyderabad,Ludh iana , Lucknow, Mangalore, Nagpur and Tri-vandrum.

0.2 Documentation Services

The CFTRI library, now redes ignatedFOSTIS. has grown with its parent institution(Table Il .. Since 1963. when CFTRI adopted thepolicy of project oriented research, it has beenrendering documentation service to the CFTRI andits experiment stations. These services are alsobeing distributed to certain outside organizationsincluding industries and individuals hoth in India andabroad and are generally well received. It also

Vol 24 No 3-4 (Sept-Dec) 1977

S V Sangame su.aranM v Gopinntn

Central Food Technological Research InstituteMysore-5 70013

provides the inform.ation Cover to the Division ofIndustrial Development. Research and ConsultancyServices of CFTRI in its technology transfer acti-vities. The experience gained by these documenta-tion activities during the last decade has given wayto the c onc l us ion that the establishment of FOSTISis an urgent requirement to cover the informationneeds of the country's growing food industry. R&Dorganizations and educational institutions spec ial iz-ing in food science and technology, and governmentalagencies concerned with planning, production. test-ing. standardization. quality control and marketingof foods. A recent survey [5J conducted to a s s e s sthe information resourceS, services. and informa-tion needs of the country in food sc ience and techno-logy has also confirmed this conclusion.

The current services of FOSTlli are the threemonthly current awareness services. namely, Lib-rary Bulletin. Documentation List. Food TechnologyAbstracts and the subject bibliographies prepared inconnection with symposia and conferences heldperiodically at the CFTRI. The details regardingthe current awareness services arc:

1. Library Bulletin (LE): This is a monthlyaccession list of publications received in FOSTISduring the preceeding month. Earl ier it inc l ud ed aPeriodical Title Service' which listed about 200

articles per month selected after scanning nver 300periodicals in subjects other than food technologybut of interest to scientists of CFTRI. SinceJanuary 1976, this service was merged with theDocumentation List. thus leaving the Library Bul-letin as entirely an access ion list.

2. Documentat ion List (DL): Earlier, th isservice was termed "Documentation List for FoodTechnOlogy" as it included only articles in foodtechnology selected from about 150 periodicals everymonth. Since January 1976. consequent to themerger of the "Periodical title service" of theLibrary Bulletin, it COvers all subjects that arerelevant to the work carried out at CFTRI. It in-cludes 400-500 articles every rnont h selected fromover 150 periodicals. In this list, the entries are

147

SANGAMESWARAN & GOPINATH

TABLE

Statement showing the development of CFTRI Library

S1. 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1975No.

1. Books 6,129 6,530 7,418 7.799 8.273 9. 187 9.700 10.3]6 12.407

2. Periodicals 468 646 643 656*

3. Bound volumes of 7.417 8. 184 8.604 9.368 10. 284 10.836 11.616 12.236 14,742per iod ic al s

4. Pamphlets, Repr ints etc. 2.580 3.276 4,000 5,600 6.000 6.318 6.584 6.800 ' 7.100

5. Patents 26.084 31.778 36,941 41,032 46,726 51,001 56.028 60.000 68,200

6. ISI Spec if icat ions 1. 679 1,984 2,333 2.837 3,561 4, ]70 4.758 4,815 6.400

7. Reference materials 532 580

8. Thesis and D is se rtat ions 123 358

9. Readers 421 464 493 650 700 758 814 850 880

*Subs 388 Exchange 79 Gratis 189

classified according to Colon Classification and anexhaustive subject index prepared according to theChain procedure is provided. In the case of docu-ments in food 'technology, the depth version of Colonclassification for food technology developed is used[ 3].

3. Food Technology Abstracts (FTA): Thisis a monthly service covering about 150 core periodi-cals in food science and technology and includingabout 200- 250 abstracts per issue Iisted under, 18subject groupings. Earlier it did not have any sub-ject index and cross references were given instead.However. since January 1976, a subject index hasbeen provided.

The above services are being distributed orcirculated to a select group of users t ota ll ing 207comprising 89 scientists within CFTRI and itsexperiment stations and Il8 users outside CFTRIincluding organizations and individuals both in Indiaand abroad.

THE SURVEY

1. 1 Need for the Survey

Though the above services are being issuedfor Over it decade, no evaluation has beeri done tofind out whether they have created any impact on theusers receiving them. Hence this survey ,

The main objective of this survey is to findout if these services have been found useful to the

148

users, and if so, to what extent. Incidentally, itwill evaluate the adequacy of choice and coverage ofthese services and find out the different subject areasof interest to us er s in order that these services canbe shaped to effectively serve all USer groups. Itw ill also evaluate the helpfulnes s of the internalorganization of these services like arrangement ofentr ies, subject index, index term s etc .. and theexternal format so that improvements can be effectewhenever necessary. It is also expected that thissurvey will provide useful information which willhelp in the reorientation of these services to servethe entire country when FOSTIS is fully establishedas a national information centre.

1.2 Method

The method adopted for the survey is the ques-tionnaire method. Out of a total of 207 individualsand organizations us ing one or more of these ser-vices, 174 (84'70) were selected for the survey. Thebas is of selection be ing that the USer must have beenusing FOSTIS services continuously for at least 2years. Overseas users were omitted as thesurvey is meant for India only.

The questionnaire sent to different users isgiven in Appendix 1.

1. 3 Filled-in Questionnaire

A total of 1I6 questionnaires (or 56'70) wereduly filled and returned, Within CFTRI the res-ponse was about 78.610 (70 out of 89) and outs ide

Ann Lib Sci Doc

C F T R I DOCUMENTATION SERVICES

TABLE 2

CFTRIRegularly Occasionally Seldom

Outs ide CFTRIRegularly Occa s ionally Seldom

43 •.2 3 23 7 5

48 18 3 22 10 4

65 4 37 5

TABLE 3

CFTRI Outs ide CFTRIUseful Not useful No comment Useful Not useful No·comment

L ibrary 'Bulletin

Doc ument at ion List

Food Technology Abstracts

L ibr ary Bullet in 65

Documentation List 57 5

Food Technology Abstracts 66

CFTRI it was about 54. 110 (46 out of 85). D istr i-bution of user groups among the questionnairesreceived are:

University teachersBus iness executivesResearch scientistsCovt. admin istratorsLibrar ies and information

centres

161083

52

The above is considered a satisfactorysample for purposes of evaluation as it comprisesover 601. of the users asked to fill-in the ques -t lonna ire and is represented by almost all cate-gories of users. In a similar survey even a smallersample (29%) was considered to represent a faircross section of the users [41.

The succeeding sections give the results ofanalysis of the returned questionnaires.

2 RECEIPT OF DOCUMENTATION PUBLICATIONS

2.1 Within CFTRI. LB. DL. FTA were receivedby or circulated to 68. 69 and 69 users respectively.Outside CFTRI 35. 36 and 45 users received or hadaccess to. them respectively. A good majority ofthem used these publications for current awarenesspurposes (Table 2).

It can be seen from the above table that allthese publications are well used and the most usedamong them is the Food Technology Abstractsf allowed by the Doc umentation List.

Vol 24 No 3-4 (Sept-Dec) 1977

3 33 2

7 35

3 43 2

2.2 Usefulness

2.2.1 Users' opinion regarding the usefulness ofpublications are given in Table 3.

It is evident from the above table that lheusers find the Food Technology Abstracts most use-ful. This corresponds signif icantly with the find ing sof the earlier survey [5]. and indicates a generalpreference to abstracts instead of bare titles. evi-dently. because of their information content. Usefulness of a bare documentation list which is cheaperto produce than the list with abstracts is dependentupon the user having access to a library where hecan refer to the articles or being able to obtainreprints or photocopies. It is also pointed out thatDL and FTA may be used for r etz ospe ct ive searchesand in this respect DL is more useful as it hasbetter coverage. Th-~ titles included in DL havebeen stored in card form and at present about12.000 cards are available for retrospectivese ar che s ,

All the users in CFTRI regularly used thelibrary for reference purposes. E ut. in the case ofouts ide users. 22 used the 1ibrary reg ularly. 13occassionallv and 6 seldom. This is mainly due tothe fact that many outside users had no library facilities at their places of work and had to rely on out-side libraries. Only 1 among the outsiders regu-larly made requests for photocopies. 9 makingoccasional requests.

Considering all the above limitations. theuse of the Documentation List is no in s ign lf icant , Itcould be a more useful tool if more users become

149

SANGAMESWARAN lit GOPINATH

TABLE 4

DL FTAAdequate Moderately Inadequate Adequate Moderately Inadequate

__________________________ . ~a~d~e~g~uat~e ~a~d~e~g~u~a~t~e _

Users outs ide CFTRI 40

CFTRI users 22 14

aware and avail of the existing photocopying faci-lities. FOSTIS has at present a Xerox machine andan electronic scanner and a microfilming unit isbeing secured in the near future. In order to makethe users become aware of these facilities. infor-mation about them is given in each issue of the abovepublic at ions.

2.2.2 Choice and Coverage of DL and FTA

Majority of users have found the choice andcoverage of documents in these publications adequte(53.4'1. in the case of DL and 66.3'1. in the case ofF TA) or moderately adequate (31 '1. in the c as e ofDL and 30'1. in the case of FTA).

It has to be pointed out in this context thatthese publications are local documentation lists andas such have to be selective. Being current aware-ness services these publications have necessarily tobe produced with speed in order that time lag i.Sreduced to a minimwn.. Moreover. these publica-tions are primarily intended for Scientists of CFTRIand its Experiment Stations to provide literaturecover for their work on the projects. As FOSTISreceives several international abstracting servicessuch as FSTA. Chemical abstracts. B iolog icalabstracts etc .• CFTRI Sc iont is ts can always fulfiltheir additional requirements by referring to theseservices. However. in view of the fact that FOSTIShas to serve the country as a whole. in the field offood science and technology. a shift in the policy totake into account the nationwide r aqu ir erne nt willbecome necessary. The choice and coverage ofthese publications will be expanded keeping in viewthe subject areas of interest to users and also addi-tional services will be introduced to -su it the needsof various category of users in course of time.

2.2 ..3 Inf o r rnat iven e s s of Abstracts in FTA

About 93.4'1. (108 out of 116) of the usershave express-ed the opinion that the abstracts includ-ed in FTA are quite informative. As the Scientistsof CFTRI Exper iment Stations lac ked adequate1ibrary servic es , every effort wa s made to se e thatthe abstracts in FTA included all information signi-ficant to the paper so that they could be relied uponwithout reference to the original papers as far aspossible. This has been made possible as abstract-ing is being done by information scientists who are

150

7 46 21 2

3 I 14

well acquainted with the RlitD projects in progressat the Institute. Obviously. this feature has been'helpful to use r s and possibly this mav be the reasonas to why FTA is preferred most.

3 USE OF INTERNATIONAL SERVICES

Majority of users (about 80'1.; regularly usedinternational abstracting and indexing services likeFSTA. Chemical abstracts. BiOlogical abstracts. etc.The fact that inspite of ac c es s to these services theusers have found DL and FTA useful bears testi-mony to the adequacy and convenience-to-use f eatu r esof these services. Majority of the users (about70'1.) have also found the time lag in these servicesacceptable as compared to the international services.

4 INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION IN DL lit FTA

The findings of Some ez.r l ie r surveys haverevealed a reluctance of USers to use indexing andabstracting services but there are also surveysreported findings of which contradict the above [6J.However. one significant point that has come out isthat those who are reluctant to use the bibliographictools find them inconvenient to use. Conven iencefactors in indexing and abstracting services are theinternal organization (i.e. arrangement of entries),indexing. cross references etc. and also the factorsthat contribute to a good get up. namely. readabilityof the reproduced matter. binding etc.

Users opinion regarding the helpfulness ofinternal organization of documents in DL and FTAa r e given in Table 5. About 87 '10 of the USer s wh~replied the questionnaires have found the classifi-cation of documents in these publ ica t ions satisfactory.Cross references in FTA were acceptable to about101 users (87'1.) of the users out of which 35 users(33.410) preferred subject indexes. In this connec-tion. it is recalled that the cross references in FTAwere discontinued from January 1976 and subjectindex introduced instead, because subject indexingis a more standardized procedure and adopted bymost of the national and international indexing andabstracting services. Index terms be ing used inthese indexes were found helpful by 89 users(76. 710). Many users (98 or 84. 8'1.) we r e preserv-ing these documentation publications for retrospec-tive use and 86 of them (74. 5'1.) preferred to havea cumulative index at the end of each volume.

Ann Lib Sc , Doc

C F T R I DOCUMENTATION SERVICES

TABLE 5

Internal Organization of Documentation Publications (only DocumentationList and Food Technology Abstracts)

Cl as s if ied Crossarrangement references Subject Index Index Curnul at ivein DL and in terms Indexsection FTAheadings in DL FTAFTAYes No Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes No yes Nu

Users within CFTRI 58 59 5 61 62 54 6 45 II

Users outside CFTRI 44 6 43 40 33 35 41•

5 PHYSICAL MAKE UP

The phys ica l get up of the publications whichare now being mimeographed was found gener al lysatisfactory. However. several USers preferredprinting of the publications which would give thembetter get up and also better bind ing.

6 CONTINUANCE OF DOCUMENTATION PUBLI-CATION,S

All users were unanimous in their desire forreceiving these publications on a continual basis.This ind icates affirmation by users of the usefulnessof these publications. Users from outside CFTRIwere also put the question .as to whether they wereprepared to pay a nominal charges towards thesepublications. About 45. 6% (or 21 users) expressedtheir willingness to pay for these publications.

7 SUMMARY

User survey to evaluate the documentationservices of CFTRI viz .• Library Bulletin (LB).Doc ument at ion List (DL). and Food TechnologyAbstta6ts (FTA) was conducted. Qu~stionnaires(174) were distributed to 89 Scientists w ith in CFTRIand 85 users outside CFTRI. Out of a total of174 questionnaires 1l6{66%) were duly filled andreturned. 70 out of 89 (or 78.6%) were from withinCFTRI and 46 out of 85 (or 54.110) were from usersoutside CFTRI. Results of the survey have shownthat these publications are being used for currentawareness purposes by majority of users and a goodmany of them have found them useful (Table 2 &: 3) .FTA has been found to be the most useful. whichindicates a general preference for abstracts amongthe users. Though the use of DL was not insignifi-cant, availability of good library and photocopyingfacilities may increase its usefulness. The in te rna lorganization of these publications. like classification.indexing and cross references have by and large

Vol 24 No 3-4 (Sept-Dee) 1977

been found satisfactory. So also the index terms usedin the subject index and the infor rnat iven es s ofabstracts in FTA. While external format or get upof the publications was generally found satisfactory.several users have expressed that improvementscould be effected by pr intmtg>.better binding etc. Allusers desired to receive these services on a continua}basis and about 45.610 of the users from outsideCFTRI expressed willingness to pay a subscriptioncharge for these services.

8 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Thanks are due to Dr. B.L. Amla. Director.and Shri C. P. Nat a r aj an , Deputy Director. CFTRI.Mysore. for their kind encouragement.

REFERENCES

[ 1] Food Science and TechnEilogy InformationServices (FOSTIS): A Five Year Draft Plan.1973. CF TRI.

[2] INSDOC: Status of Documentation in India.1974.

[3] Neelameghan. A. and Sangameswaran. S. V.Food technology: Depth version of CC.Lib. Sci .. 1970. 7. Paper L.

(4) Nig ht ingle , R.A. Cost-benefit study of amanually published c urr ent awar enessbulletin. Aslib Proc. 1975. 25. 153-57.

(5) Sanga~eswaran. S. V.• Gop inath , M. V. andArnl a , B. L. Information resources. ser-vices and information needs in Food Scienceand Technology in India: A su rv ey. Lib.Sc i, 1976. 13. (Paper El.

(6) Wood. D.N. User studies: Aliterature from 1966 to 1970.1971. 23. 11-23.

review of theAs l ib Proc.

151

SANG <\MESWAR<\N 8. GOPIN<\TH Append ix

- A User Studv

l}SER ASSESSMENT OF CFTRI DOCUME0:TATI00: SERYICES

1. I Name of the Organisation/Individual

1. 2 Address

1.3 Kind of Organ isation

1. 4 A rea s of interest

2 Do you receive the folloWYlgDocumentation publications?

a) Library Bulletinb) Documentation Listc) F ood Technology Abstracts

3. I Do you see the above publications forcurrent awareness purposes?

a) Library Bulletin

b) Documentation Llst

c) Food Techftology Abltracts

3. Z Do you find them useful?Please grade the extent of their usefulne ••

a) Library Bulletin

b) Documentation List

c) Food Technology Abstracts

3.3 Please state whether the choice/coverageof the material included is adequate orotherwise

a) Documentation List

b) Food Technology Abstracts

15 Z

Research &. Development T"achin~Government DepartmentCorporationLea rned SocietyIndustr ia l

Yes/NoYes/NoYes/No

RegularlyOccas iona llySeldom

RegularlyOccaslonallySeldom

RelularlyOcc as s ionaltySeldom

Very usefulUsefulNot useful

Very usefulUsefulNot useful

Very usefulUsefulNot useful

AdequateModerately adequateInadequate

AdequateModerately adequateInadequate

Ann Llb Sc i Doc

4

C F T R I DOCUMENTATION SERVICES

Do you find the classified arrangement ofarticles in Documentation List and undersection hea d ing s In Food TechnologyAbstracts helpful?

I! not, please give your suggestions andalso suggellt add itlonal sections, If needed,for food technology abstracts

Is the subject Index provided for each lasueof Documentation List usef,a! Yes/No

5, I

Do you use regularly the InternationalAbstracting and Indexing services suchas Food Science and Technology Abstracts,Chemical Abstracts, Biological Abstracts,Current Contents ete?

I! 'Yes' in comparison to these services,please state whether the time lag in ourdocumentation publicatlonll

How often do you refer to the articlesindexed in our documentation publica-tions in any of the library accessibleto you?

Have you ever requested for photo-copies/xerox copies 01. articles Indexed in theseservices?(for users outside CFTRI onlyt

5.2

I! 'Yes' please state how often

6. I

6.2. I

I! not, please give suggestions

6.2.2 Are the Index terms used In the index InDocumentation List helpful for retrievalpurpose?

6.2. 1 Do you find the cross references providedin Food Technology Abstracts helpful?

6. Z. 4 Do you prellerve these documentationpublications for retrospective use

I! yea, do you feel provla Ion of a yearlycumulative subject Index wUl improveretrieval quality

7 Do you find the physical make up (get u"'of these publications generally acceptable?

I!'not, plealle give your lIuggestiona

8. I Do you wish to receive the above publl-cat lone on a continual basis

I! 'No' please IItate reasons

I! 'Yes'please atate If you are preparedto pay a nominal charge to_rd. sub-scription to these services(for users outside CFTRI onlyt

9 Any other comment

Vol Z4 No 3-4 (Sept-Dec) 1977

Ace eptaMe/Not acceptable

Re.alarly (once. rnoatNOc:caalonally (once Ia two to aix

months)Seldom (once In more than six months'

Re.ularly (once a month)Occasionally

(once In two to alx mofttha)

Seldom (once In more than alx months)

Yes/No

Yea/No

Yea/No

Ye./No

Yes/No

Yes/No

SIGNATURE

1 :, \