General
A 1970 survey of psychiatrists randomly selected from the 1968 membership of the American Psychiatric Association (survey size: 394; responding: 290 or 74%) showed thatthe 4 most frequently mentioned prime methods of searching the literature (out of 11) were:
library reference services 23% respondents
abstracts and indexes 17% respondents
bibliographies 17% respondents
review articles 16% respondents
Use of the card catalog as a prime method of searching the literature was reported by 5% of the respondents, while browsing as a prime method was reported by 4% of the respondents. (Source)
Academic
A 1973 survey of physicists in 6 universities of the greater Boston area (Boston University, Brandeis, Brown, Harvard, MIT, and Northeastern) to determine how they meet their information needs (sample size: 339; responding: 179 or 52.8%) showed thatthe reasons for library use (Harvard chemistry faculty respondents included) were (multiple responses allowed): specific information (160 respondents), keeping up (122 respondents), browsing (88 respondents), and other (6 respondents). No number of respondents given. (Source)
Public
A 1966 survey of 21,385 adult (12 years old or older) public library users in the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan region of Maryland conducted during a 6-week period of patrons entering the library (79.1% of patrons approached filled out the survey instrument) showed thatthe use made of the library was as follows (multiple responses allowed): browsing (43.1%), reference books (22.1%), library catalogs (19.0%), help from a librarian (16.0%), consulting books or magazines (12.4%), read new magazines or newspapers (8.7%), periodical indexes (5.7%), recordings (2.7%), films (0.7%), other (2.0%), and no response (11.1%). (Source)
Special
A 1970 survey of psychiatrists randomly selected from the 1968 membership of the American Psychiatric Association (survey size: 394; responding: 290 or 74%) showed thatthe 4 most frequently mentioned prime methods of searching the literature (out of 11) were:
library reference services 23% respondents
abstracts and indexes 17% respondents
bibliographies 17% respondents
review articles 16% respondents
Use of the card catalog as a prime method of searching the literature was reported by 5% of the respondents, while browsing as a prime method was reported by 4% of the respondents. (Source)