The Rise and Rise of E-books:A Case Study from the

University of Portsmouth, UK

Anne Worden

Faculty Librarian:

Humanities and Social Sciences

November 2012

Background

• UoP is a post-1992 university with c20,000 FTEs

• Trial of networked e-books began in 2004

• Number of bought-in e-books has increased from 15,000 to around 90,000

• Books from Credo Reference, DawsonEra, ebrary, MyiLibrary, Oxford Scholarship Online

• Since 2005 use of e-books at Portsmouth has increased by well over 1000%

• UoP has the highest use of e-books in the UK (SCONUL Strategic Planning Data 2010-11)

E-book Section Requests

0

1000000

2000000

3000000

4000000

5000000

6000000

2004/5

2005/6

2006/7

2007/8

2008/9

2009/10

2010/11

2011/12

E-book Survey Participants

• Spring 2009 survey

• 903 Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS) & 208 Technology students

• Spring 2012 survey

• 1118 HSS & 101 Technology students

646 female 18-23 yr old HSS students

322 male 18-23 yr old HSS students

28 HSS students aged 24-29

41 HSS students aged 30+

81 HSS part-time mature students from School of Education

Do you use e-books for every assignment?

Percentage saying “Yes”

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

HSS Male HSS Female HSS Part-time 2012

Technology

2009

2012

How useful are e-books for your course?

Percentages by age and course group

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

Not at all

Some use

Quite useful

Very useful

How useful are e-books for your course?

Percentages for female HSS students

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Not at all useful

Some use

Quite useful

Very useful

How useful are e-books for your course?

Percentages for male HSS students

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

Not at all useful

Some use

Quite useful

Very useful

Why do you use e-books?

Percentages choosing each option

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

Convenient Easy to search Print taken Prefer online Other

HSS 09

HSS 12

HSS Part-time

Tech 09

Tech 12

Student Views – Advantages 1

So useful especially if it’s a book everyone on the course needsand there are not enough hard copies

Languages Yr 4

It is easy to bookmark pages and highlight so that you can go back to

research easily

English Lit Yr 3

It saves trouble of going into the library and carrying the book back home

MSc Computing

Really convenient

to useLanguages Yr 1

Student Views – Advantages 2

E-books are easier to flick through to find the right chapters relevant to assignment

Languages Yr 2

The word searchis very useful and often saves time reading irrelevant pagesSociology Yr 3

Copy and paste saves a lot of time when using

quotes in any essay

Languages Yr 2

You don’t have to pay fines!!

Languages Yr 4

Brilliant, life saver!Extremely useful and easy to use

English Lit Yr 3

Given a choice, I would prefer to use:

In 2009 59% of HSS & 44% of Tech students responding preferred to use a printed book. In 2012 it was 51% HSS and 35% Tech.

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

E-book Print No preference It depends

HSS 09

HSS 12

HSS Part-time

Tech 09

Tech 12

Given a choice, I would prefer to use:

Percentages for female HSS students

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

E-book

Print

No preference

It depends

Given a choice, I would prefer to use:

Percentages for male HSS students

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

E-book

Print

No preference

It depends

Discriminating consumers

• For reading a novel, I would have a printed version, but for research and other I would use an e-book English Literature Yr 1

• Prefer printed books for long articles, e-book for short references English Literature Yr 2

• For reading I prefer printed copies. For extracting quotes, e-books are better Politics Yr 1

• Large books are better to read from paper copy - foreign language sources are easier to read from paper copy Languages Yr 2

• Whether it’s for pleasure or research Eng Lit Yr 1

Top 10 UoP e-books accessed in 2011

• 70,131 Sage dictionary of criminology

• 34,669 Biosocial Criminology: New Directions In Theory

• 26,254 Contemporary Leadership Theories

• 20,857 Future Savvy: Identifying Trends to Make Better Decisions & Manage Uncertainty

• 19,464 Constitutional and Administrative Law

• 19,099 Labour Relations in the Global Fast-Food Industry

• 18,009 How to Price: A Guide to Pricing Techniques and Yield Management

• 17,205 Doing Your Research Project: A Guide for First-Time Researchers in Education

• 17,123 Introduction to Early Modern English

• 15,174 Afghanistan: How the West Lost Its Way

Why is use so high at Portsmouth?Environmental factors

• Sheer number of e-books available (& on library catalogue)

• Increased no. of students but lack of space and money to increase no. of multiple copies

• Significant number of distance learners

Why is use so high at Portsmouth?Student factors

• Students value convenience of e-books

• E-books give fair access to all, regardless of how late they leave it to look

• Word searching tools & copy+paste assist students who are short of time

• For many students finding books in a physical library is difficult – e-books particularly benefit these students

• Enthusiastic take-up by Humanities & Social Science students

Why is use so high at Portsmouth?What’s happening on the ground

• Promotion of e-books by lecturers & deliberate inclusion as key weekly reading on reading lists– Strong engagement across Humanities & Social Sciences

• Demonstration of e-books by librarians– Hands-on workshops a part of Study Skills units

• Systematic checking of reading lists for e-book matches

• Buying e-books which match weekly reservation requests– Algerian War book bought just before Easter reached

3081 section requests in 21 days

– European Revolutions 1848 book bought just before Christmas had 17099 section requests in January 2012

Top student concerns re e-books

• More e-books should be made available“Would be even more useful if there was more available”

Languages Yr 1

• Downloading to Kindles etc should be possible“Would like to be able to download to Kindle for all e-

books” Computing Yr 2

“They’re great – provided I can read them on any device I own” Computing Yr 1

• Moving through pages should be easier“If the page turning system were made easier it’d be

great” American Studies Yr 1

• Find reading on-screen uncomfortable“Sometimes they hurt my eyes to read” Criminol Yr 2

“I don’t like reading text on a computer screen” Computing Yr 1

The final word…