Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to review the nature of, and rationale for, user expectations in
the digital library setting, and ways in which they may best be met and/or managed.
Design/methodology/approach – An analysis of the literature, focusing on empirical studies, and
bringing out main themes and issues.
Findings – User expectations of digital libraries are often unrealistic, usually unrealistically high,
mainly due to the ubiquity of the web search engine as an information environment. Expectations
differ between user groups. Both meeting and managing expectations have been promoted as a
solution; it is likely that a mix of the two will be most effective. More empirical and conceptual studies
are needed. Ways of making the nature of digital library collections and their organisation “visible”,
embedded in a natural way within their interfaces, are desirable.
Originality/value – This is the first paper to review the literature of this topic.
Keywords Digital libraries, Customer satisfaction
Paper type Literature review
Introduction
Digital libraries have become of increasing significance in recent years, developing in
functionality and content, and becoming accessible to a wider community of users (see,
for example, Bawden and Rowlands, 1999; Borgman, 2000; Chowdhury, 2002; Andrews
and Law, 2004). User satisfaction with, and indeed acceptance of, digital library
services has not, however, increased to the extent which might be hoped. The most
obvious expression of this is a regrettable tendency on the part of many users, or
potential users, of such services to rely entirely on web search engines for information.
Not for nothing has the verb “to Google” entered the English language, seemingly as a
synonym for “to search for information”.
It seems clear that this neglect of digital library services must be associated with
users’ expectations of them, presumably low. This paper aims to give some perspective
on this issue. It goes on to examine, in this context, a perennial question for providers
of library services: once user expectations are understood, should they be met - so far
as is feasible – or should they be “managed”.
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This paper is based on a workshop, “Meet or manage? User expectations of digital libraries”,
given by the same authors at the LIDA (Libraries in a Digital Age) conference in Dubrovnik and
Mljet, Croatia, in May 2005. The authors are grateful to workshop participants for helpful
comments and insights.