At the North American Serials Interest Group (NASIG) in June, Andrew Wesolek, Scholarly Communications Librarian at Utah State University, presented the results of a survey of 200 end-users of DigitalCommons@USU. One highlight of the presentation is a graph that illustrates the breakdown by user type. According to survey responses, graduate students, undergraduate students, and faculty (in that order) comprise the top three categories of repository users. These groups combined make up over 60% of users, clearly indicating that institutional repositories further assist authors in reaching their intended audience: researchers.
The presentation was based on a short survey that was featured in the repository from the end of 2010 through the beginning of 2012. Click here to view the slide deck, titled Who Uses this Stuff, Anyway?
If your institution is interested in featuring a user survey, please contact our Consulting Services team.
