General
A 1973 survey of all Duplicates Exchange Union (formerly Periodicals Exchange Union) members (survey size: 399 libraries; responding: 229 or 58%) showed that, of 228 respondents, 205 (89.5%) were college libraries; 15 (6.6%) were special libraries including hospital, art museum, and company libraries; and 8 (3.5%) were public libraries. (Source)
Ibid. . . . showed that most of the Duplicates Exchange Union libraries were small. For example, the “approximate number of [periodical] subscriptions” per library broke down as follows:
1-300 subscriptions 42 (18.3%) libraries
301-600 subscriptions 78 (34.1%) libraries
601-1,000 subscriptions 52 (22.7%) libraries
over 1,000 subscriptions 45 (19.6%) libraries
no response 12 ( 5.3%) libraries (Source)
Ibid. . . . showed that respondents’ estimates of the percentage of exchange lists received that proved useful were as follows (only 10 categories of usefulness were reported, e.g., 10%, 20%, etc., nothing in between):
30% or less of the lists received were useful to 65 (28.4%) of the respondents;
40-50% of the lists received were useful to 42 (18.3%) of the respondents;
60-80% of the lists received were useful to 66 (28.8%) of the respondents;
and 90% or more of the lists received were useful to 51 (22.2%) of the respondents
(5 or 2.3% of the respondents did not reply to this particular question). (Source)
Ibid. . . . showed that the average number of items requested from a list was as follows: 22.7% of the libraries requested 4 or fewer items; 48.5% requested 8 or fewer items; and 70.8% requested 12 or fewer items. Further, 61.6% of the libraries estimated they received less than 30% of the items requested, while 87.4% estimated they received less than 50% of the items requested. (Source)
Ibid. . . . showed that, although 24 (10.5%) libraries reported that use of the Duplicates Exchange Union resulted in a financial loss, most libraries considered it useful. Specifically, the libraries reported as follows:
very useful 98 (42.8%) libraries
useful 93 (40.6%) libraries
of some use 35 (15.3%) libraries
useless 3 ( 1.3%) libraries (Source)
Ibid. . . showed that generally libranes supported the idea of continuing to include books and documents in the exchange program. Of 221 respondents, 160 (69.9%) favored the idea, while 61(26.6%) did not. (Source)
A 1981 survey of U.S. depository libraries, both academic and public (sample size: 221; responding: 171 or 77%) concerning their use of online data bases (DIALOG, ORBIT, and BRS), particularly with regard to government documents, showed that the top 3 reasons given by respondents for not ordering government documents microfiche as the result of an online search were: library does not have computer terminals (academic depositories, 33%; public depositories, 59%), didn’t know that microfiche government documents could be ordered online (academic depositories, 24%; public depositories, 25%), and prefer hard copy to microfiche copy (academic depositories, 27%; public depositories, 20%). (Source)
Ibid. . . . showed that none of the public depositories had ever ordered microfiche online as the result of a government document search, while only 3% of the academic libraries had ever done so. (Source)
