Croft & Davis (2010)

Croft, R., & Davis, C. (2010). E-Books revisited: Surveying student e-book usage in a distributed learning academic library 6 years later. Journal Of Library Administration, 50(5/6), 543-569. Retrieved November 4, 2011, from Academic Search Complete.

This study was conducted at Royal Roads University in the UK, a distance-learning university that grants graduate and undergraduate professional degrees. Fifty-two percent of the library collection is print books and 48 percent is ebooks. The collection acquired its first ebooks in 2000 and Croft and Bedi conducted a patron survey in 2003 (published in 2005) to assess student perceptions of ebooks. 

"... results from the 2003 survey noted that the majority of RRU students and faculty had not used e-books (Croft & Bedi, 2005). Also, at that time, the preference for print over e-book versions of monographs for those who had used them was close to an even split among students" (p 548). 

The current study is a follow up with additional attention to "the proliferation of handheld devices" (p. 548).

Lit review: The most recent works cited date from 2009. Shelburne's article is cited in reference to several topics.

Methodology: Used Surveymonkey; invited all 1,970 students via email to participate. Offered entry to a drawing for a gift certificate as an incentive. Got 779 responses.

Some key data:

• 76.1% responded "yes" that they had used an ebook of some kind.; 23.9% "no."
• 51.2% responded "yes" they had used an ebook through the RRU Library (compared to 32.82% in 2003); 48.8% "no" (compared to 67.18% in 2003).
• Among the "no" respondents, the primary reason was that they didn't know ebooks were available (40.2%). 29.8% said they prefer print books. In textual responses to elaborate on the "no," three categories emerged: students who didn't need books for their research; students who used only journal articles for their research; students who don't like to read on screen.

The survey asked questions to drill down into how students found out about ebooks.
 
The survey also measured student satisfaction with ebooks. 68.7% reported being satisfied or very satisfied with the experience of using RRU Library ebooks. 11% not satisfied.

The survey sought information on adequacy of ebook availability and broke it down by subjects to identify weaknesses in the collection.

Regarding features of ebooks that respondents found important:

• 79.4% rated anytime access as very important.
• 68.7% rated downloadable to a computer feature as very important.
• 68.6% rated searchability as very important.
• 37.9% rated downloadable to a phone or hand-held device as not important.
• 87.2% said they had never downloaded an ebook to a hand-held device.

My thoughts
The results concerning downloadable devices need to be seen in the context of the degree of use of ereaders like Kindles and Nooks, information that is not provided. It doesn't surprised me that people don't want to read academic books on cell phones (although not having a cell phone makes me a poor judge of that question, since I can't imagine people wanting to do anything with one). But the increasing availability of iPads and similar tablets as well as Kindles, Nooks, etc. will probably alter the "hand-held device" issue. When was the iPad introduced? It isn't mentioned in this article and doesn't seem to have been part of the study. They do mention Macs, so they were not oblivious to the platform issue.