Some headline findings:
- Use of e-books for study increased for students from 61.4% in 2008 to 64.4% in 2009 but the highest increase was use by staff, which increased from 58.9% to 64.9%.
- Surprisingly, over 63% of respondents said that they read the content of e-books from a screen with only around 6% printing pages out, however, the average time spent reading was only between 11 and 20 minutes.
- Over 54% of respondents said that they dip in and out of e-book chapters with only around 8% reading a whole chapter.
- Encouragingly, the percentage of teaching staff recommending e-books to students and placing direct links to them via the virtual learning environment or online reading lists increased between 2008 and 2009.
- Most staff and students get access to their e-books via the university library and dependency on this access had increased by 2009.
- Satisfaction with the availability of print textbooks through the library increased from 2008 to 2009 and this may be due to the availability of more e-books taking the pressure off the print copies.
The results of the surveys will be used to develop the e-books market to help make sure that staff and students can get access to the books they need either in print or electronic format.
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