The Behavior of scientists in seeking and using documents

Scientists deal in the commodities of knowledge and information. Much of the information they produce is disseminated and acquired from publications, hence the interest in examining how different reading behaviors are associated with their profession. Another goal of this thesis is to examine the reading behaviors of scientists and to discover relationships between these behaviors and the scientists' measures of professional success. To do this, the results from a library needs assessment were used to obtain information on user needs, wants, and desires. The assessment was done in 1993-1994 at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK). The survey was large, covering many aspects of present and future needs in services and facilities, and so was split into 17 parts, with each part answered by a different set of university-associated respondents. The part used in this thesis focused on the reading behaviors of the faculty level users. The data were analyzed to obtain information on the reading behaviors of scientists and nonscientists and information on the correlations of rewards (publication level, honors) with reading behaviors. Reading behaviors of the science and non-science faculty were generally similar. Notable exceptions were their different emphases on document types and their specific concerns for electronic and print publications. The differences between the reading behaviors of successful scientists and not-as-successful scientists were generally slight though fairly consistent among the success measures. The largest differences were seen in the amount of readings and the use of personal funds to buy subscriptions.