Reading behaviors and electronic journals
Introduction
Studies conducted over the last four decades show that scientists, on average, value journals and journal articles more than any other single information resource. 1 (In scientists, social scientists, and engineers. We also segment them into specific disciplines for analysis.) Journals are valued because the peer-review and editorial processes provide quality filters, they come from trusted sources, they bundle together articles on related topics, and they provide an archive of important research. 2 They are probably valued also because they are familiar some of this familiarity may be due to the traditional form and format of print- on-paper journals. As more journal articles are available in electronic forms, both as part of complete electronic journals and within databases of separate articles, several questions arise. Do scientists value electronic journals as much and for the same reasons as print journals? Do scientists in all academic disciplines use electronic and print journals in the same way? Will electronic journals or collections of electronic articles make print journals obsolete? Will e-print server collections replace traditional journals? A series of studies conducted in 2000 and 2001 sheds some light on these questions. our studies, aggregated numbers of ‘scientists’ include life and physical
e-print server collections