This survey questioned almost 6,000 students concerning media use for 16 new and seven continuing courses at the British Open University. Student access to and use of various types of media are detailed, and helpfulness, irrelevance, and difficulty ratings for various components and services in the new courses are presented. Brief feedback…

As a continuation of research into online public access catalog systems (OPAC's), this study focused on the actual use of OPAC's and on refinement of the methodologies used in carrying out transaction analysis studies. Current patron use patterns were obtained via machine-readable catalogs from four online public catalog systems: The Library of…

This survey of the literature provides a review and synthesis of research findings and current thought on the use of microcomputers by school children. Modes of learning and taxonomies of learning are described, and the results of recent surveys indicating the number of computers in schools and the amount of access by students are reported.…

Previous work assessing the effectiveness of computers in education has gone no further than acknowledging a network of interconnected variables (comprising a system) which contribute to computer impact and describing its component parts. An impact systems model developed by Glasman and Bibiaminov (1981) has been adapted to facilitate measurement…

A study examined the shift of the United States public's primary news source from newspapers to radio and then to television between 1937 and 1987 to determine the validity of the generally accepted explanation that people have shifted media (displacement). Two alternative processes were discovered that could also account for this phenomenon: (1)…

In 1972, when the third campus of Montgomery College was being planned, a commitment was made to community use of the campus facilities. From the day the Germanstown Campus library opened, its services have been available to the college's students and to the community at large. The library has a bookstack capacity of 65,000 books, 100 study…

In order to determine the capacity of high schools to profit from the pre-high school computer experiences of its students, a study was conducted to measure computer utilization in selected high schools of Middle Tennessee. Questionnaires distributed to 50 principals in 28 school systems covered the following areas: school enrollment; number and…

The six surveys on photocopying and publishing activity in America that are described in this report were conducted in 1981 to assess the effectiveness of the 1976 Copyright Act in balancing the rights of creators and the needs of users for copyrighted works. An indication of their statistical precision precedes detailed reports on each type of…

A five-page questionnaire was mailed to 709 persons on the subscriber list of the "Newspaper Research Journal" to determine if a problem existed between academic journalism researchers and practitioner consumers of the research. The questionnaire was constructed to measure the usefulness of various sources of information to the…

Within counselor education, attention to computer-assisted instruction, and to the use of microcomputers is just beginning. To collect information about counselor educators' use of microcomputers and to solicit opinions about the possible influence of this technology on counselor education curriculum and programming, a questionnaire was sent to…

In the winter term of 1979-1980, 692 faculty members and 1,319 students responded to a library use study conducted at the Technishe Universitat Wien (Vienna, Austria). Among other topics, the hours of operation of the main library were studied. Results show that more than 50% of the faculty and more than 70% of the students consider the…

Using circulation data to determine whether materials specifically acquired for the circulation collections of libraries at undergraduate institutions show heavy use, this study examined the first 3 years of shelf life of one year's book acquisitions at a small liberal arts college. Contrary to expectations of a high rate of use for newly acquired…

This overview of the status of online databases in the United Kingdom describes online users' attitudes and practices in light of two surveys conducted in the past two years. The Online Information Centre at ASLIB sampled 325 users, and Chadwyck-Healey, Ltd., conducted a face-to-face survey of librarians in a broad cross-section of 76 libraries.…

A study was conducted to explore the relationships between sensation seeking--a multidimensional personality trait--and categories of leisure activity choices, mass media uses and gratifications, and television program preferences. It was hypothesized that low sensation seekers would find vicarious media such as television to be attractive leisure…