Connecting the Dots: How Researchers Use Their Library’s News Resources Debora Cheney, The Larry and Ellen Foster Communications Librarian and Head, The News and Microforms Library The University Libraries The Pennsylvania State University

News Resources at Penn State Microfilm and print newspapers 3 Aggregator Databases LexisNexis ProQuest Newsbank 6 Historical Newspaper Databases 3 Specialized Databases PressDisplay (E-Newspaper)

A VARIETY OF DATA “DOTS” Individual data points

Areas Evaluated: Penn State News Sources “Old Brands” and State Newspapers International and Historical Newspaper Use New Media Use and Print Newspaper Use Search effectiveness/efficiency

“Old Brand” Use Compared – Aggregator Databases, 2009

Most Frequently Viewed? Relative Usage by Aggregator, 2009 Documents Viewed The New York Times LexisNexis 90% ProQuest 24% Newsbank 13% 25% of total Plus: The New York Times Digital Archive 41% Pennsylvania Newspapers LexisNexis 0% ProQuest 4% Newsbank 45%  Centre Daily Times 4%  26 titles 16% of total

Use of International Sources: Newsbank, 2009

International Titles: Newsbank Times of India, The (Mumbai, India) 2. Chinadaily.com.cn 3. Toronto Star, The (Ontario, Canada) 4. Daily Star, The (Beirut, Lebanon) 5. Economist, The (London, England) 6. China Daily (Beijing) 7. Guardian Unlimited (England) 8. Sydney Morning Herald, The (Australia) 9. Financial Times (London, England)

Percent of Historical News Content Use Compared to Aggregator Databases,

Newspaper Requests from Inter-Library Loan (ILL), Year Requested Total Pre Current Unidentified Year Total ,193

Video, Blogs, and Web Content, Oh My!

Newspaper Use Online and In Room, 2009

Top Newspapers: 2009 PressDisplay 1. Le Figaro 2. Liberation 3. The Guardian 4. Times of India (Mumbai) 5. Star (Malaysia) 6. National Post (Canada) 7. Jerusalem Post 8. Les Echos 9. Aujourd'hui en France 10. China Daily News & Microforms Library 1. Asahi Shimbun 2. El Pais 3. Times of India 4. Dong-a Ilbo 5. Le Monde 6. Daily Telegraph 7. Estado de Sao Paulo 8. Times (London) 9. Corriere della Sera 10. Izvestiia 11. Jerusalem Post

How efficient are researchers? Ratio of Searches to Documents viewed By Database LexisNexis1 ProQuest7 Newsbank1 By Category Aggregators3 Specialized8 Historical 1

Cross-Disciplinary Databases and use of newspapers? Searches ProQuest: ~84% Newsbank: 8% LexisNexis: 8% Documents Viewed ProQuest,35% Newsbank 31% LexisNexis34% 2009 data

Summary: Major trends in use of library news resources Dominant use of “Old Brands” Growth in use of state newspapersGrowth in use of “New Media”Modest use of pre-1922 newspapersLimited use of International News Sources

CONNECTING THE DOTS Larger Trends

Use by Category, 2009 Aggregator Databases: 61% Specialized Databases: 21% Historical Databases: 18%

Database Use by Category,

Percentage Change, Documents Viewed, of total By Category Aggregator Databases -24% Specialized Databases +17% Historical Databases + 6% By Aggregator LexisNexis - 8% Newsbank +22% ProQuest -14%

Where we stand More documents viewed from Aggregator databases Decline in use of Aggregator Databases Decline in documents viewed in library news resources Cross disciplinary databases do not increase use of newspapers

Questions, Comments, Suggestions? Debora Cheney, The Larry and Ellen Foster Communications Librarian Head, The News and Microforms Library The University Libraries The Pennsylvania State University Pennsylvania, USA

POST-SCRIPT What impacts news content use

A Changing Definition of “News”

Trends: Youth news consumption Hunt and gather news they wantExpect news to “find them” Accustomed to viewing news “categories” May never have read a “newspaper”

Trends: News distribution No longer means just a “newspaper” News creators vs. news “aggregators” vs. library database aggregators News is different: Event driven news vs. news commentary

Trends: Youth Research Behaviors Power browsing behaviors Google and familiar library databases Faculty as advisor

Libraries and News Content Possibly Too Tied to the Concept of the “newspaper”

Challenges for Libraries Increased competition Find-ability and library websites Libraries ≠ News Content

News: a “digital wilderness” Re-think how we position news content and news resources into the research, teaching, learning context of academic research

Re-establish the library as a the place for news-based research Better understand news researchers (faculty & students) Make library’s news resources more visible and find-able Establish clearly how library news resources differ from web- sources for news