Impact of COVID-19 on the use of the academic library

PurposeThis study examines differences in library use patterns (in-person visits, online use, reference transactions, library resource and services use) pre-COVID-19 and during the COVID-19 pandemic through multiple data sets.Design/methodology/approachUsing library statistics collected during 2017/2018 and 2020/2021 and student responses to a biennial library use survey distributed in 2018 and 2021, the potential impact of the pandemic on users' behaviors was explored.FindingsLibrary use statistics and the biennial survey responses demonstrate that users' overall library use was impacted by COVID-19. Both the library's gate count and students' frequency of library visits showed a dramatic decrease. The use of virtual support to patrons increased during COVID-19 as reflected by the increase in email and chat reference interactions and virtual consultations.Practical implicationsAs students return to the physical classroom, observing library use via various data will help inform how well use of the library rebounded or if there are changes in users' behavior that suggest the need for the promotion of library services or an expansion in alternative services to support users.Originality/valueThis article highlights the importance of continuously obtaining various data sets to observe trends and changes. By observing multiple data points, some changes are aligned across data, whereas other changes or patterns are different. While impact on physical library use may be obvious, library use before and during the pandemic will help guide and inform how academic libraries should be prepared for hybrid environments post-pandemic.

Topic Modeling as a Tool for Analyzing Library Chat Transcripts

Library chat services are an increasingly important communication channel to connect patrons to library resources and services. Analysis of chat transcripts could provide librarians with insights into improving services. Unfortunately, chat transcripts consist of unstructured text data, making it impractical for librarians to go beyond simple quantitative analysis (e.g., chat duration, message count, word frequencies) with existing tools. As a stepping-stone toward a more sophisticated chat transcript analysis tool, this study investigated the application of different types of topic modeling techniques to analyze one academic library’s chat reference data collected from April 10, 2015, to May 31, 2019, with the goal of extracting the most accurate and easily interpretable topics. In this study, topic accuracy and interpretability—the quality of topic outcomes—were quantitatively measured with topic coherence metrics. Additionally, qualitative accuracy and interpretability were measured by the librarian author of this paper depending on the subjective judgment on whether topics are aligned with frequently asked questions or easily inferable themes in academic library contexts. This study found that from a human’s qualitative evaluation, Probabilistic Latent Semantic Analysis (pLSA) produced more accurate and interpretable topics, which is not necessarily aligned with the findings of the quantitative evaluation with all three types of topic coherence metrics. Interestingly, the commonly used technique Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) did not necessarily perform better than pLSA. Also, semi-supervised techniques with human-curated anchor words of Correlation Explanation (CorEx) or guided LDA (GuidedLDA) did not necessarily perform better than an unsupervised technique of Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture (DMM). Last, the study found that using the entire transcript, including both sides of the interaction between the library patron and the librarian, performed better than using only the initial question asked by the library patron across different techniques in increasing the quality of topic outcomes.

Too Big for the Library

Outreach is necessary to further the visions and missions of many university libraries, including Manderino Library at California University of Pennsylvania. Organizing events has been used to firmly cement the library’s place in the campus community. However, in the library’s efforts to be part of the larger campus, it has collaborated with other academic departments to create and hold large, well-attended events that require a lot of manpower and hours. After analyzing chat, reference, gate counts, and database usage, librarians found that large and successful events do not increase usage for other library services. This article explores whether the cost is equal to the gain for taking on events that eventually leave the library once they become popular. Results seem to indicate the library might better utilize time and efforts to hold small, focused events, even if attendance is low. Since the bump to actual library services is negligible, the library may want to look at other ways to increase funding instead of continuing to seek out collaborations to offset the cost of attractive events for students. Additionally, we found that while the relationships librarians forge with fellow academic departments are extremely valuable, larger events and collaborations generally relegate librarians to organizer roles that do little for the library’s bottom line.

Canadian Collaborations: Library Communications and Advocacy in the time COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic forced libraries to unexpectedly and suddenly close their physical locations, necessitating a remote working environment and a greater reliance on digital and virtual services. While libraries were in a better position than most sectors due to decades of experience in licensing and acquiring digital content and offering virtual services such as chat reference, there still were some services and resources that traditionally had only been offered in a face-to-face environment, or were available in print only. There were questions in the Canadian library community about how, and if these programs could be delivered online and comply with Canadian copyright law. This article will describe the access and copyright challenges that Canadian libraries faced during the first nine months of the pandemic and will outline the collaborative efforts of the Canadian library copyright community to respond to these challenges.

Is the library open? How the pandemic has changed the provision of virtual reference services

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of the pandemic on the questions received via chat reference at a Canadian university library.Design/methodology/approachA qualitative analysis using coding of chat transcripts and a quantitative analysis of the length of chat interactions were used in this study.FindingsThe author determined that the types of questions received changed slightly during the pandemic due to the new library services offered. The complexity level of questions did not change significantly nor did the presence of instruction. The length of individual chat interactions and the total amount of time spent on chat increased, most likely due to the extended hours of the service and the number of patron questions present in one interaction.Originality/valueThis is the first study to investigate the potential impact of the pandemic on virtual reference services at a university library. The findings could lead to practical implications for libraries who need to close their in-person reference desk or need to respond to building closures.

Referring academic library chat reference patrons: how subject librarians decide

Purpose The purpose of this study is to learn what factors liaison librarians in academic research libraries consider in determining whether to refer chat reference patrons to subject specialists. Design/methodology/approach Subject specialists were asked what policies guided their decisions to refer to a specialist and then assessed unreferred chat session transcripts both within and outside their specializations to determine need for a referral. Findings Few respondents were guided by formal policies. Contrary to an initial hypothesis, subject area was not a key factor in referring chat. A broader set of criteria included reference interviewing, provision of relevant resources and information literacy instruction. Respondents valued both the depth that subject specialists can provide to reference interactions and the ability of a skilled generalist to support information literacy. Research limitations/implications Findings are most applicable to large, public doctoral universities with liaison librarian programs. Assignment of respondents to subject specialist categories was complicated by their broad range of background and expertise. Practical implications The study contributes new understanding of referrals to subject specialists who have potential to guide development of formal referral policies in academic library virtual reference services. Originality/value The study is the first empirical examination of chat reference referral decisions.

Library 4.0: Eco-Blended Library and Library Inclusion

The role of libraries in education today is directed at implementing digitization, called library 4.0. There is a need for service innovation that is able to reach the needs of the digital natives. This study describes and analyzes the innovation of Library Services 4.0: Eco-Blended Libraries and Inclusion-Based Library at Universitas Negeri Malang’s Library. This research uses descriptive qualitative method. The data were obtained through interviews with librarians, observation and documentation. The results showed that in an effort to create a library ecosystem 4.0, the library has succeeded in implementing innovations. These innovations are in the form of an Eco-Blended Library program such as an e-book garden, Beringin Baca, a children's play ground, a library café, art performances, movie talk, and discussion booths. In addition, inclusion-based library is also developed with the Integrated Library Information System (SIPADU) facility digitizing collections in collaboration with Indonesia OneSearch, chat reference services, online loan and extension library collections, as well as information literacy. As a suggestion, the library needs to increase the number of human resources who might more focus on digital library services, further encouraging human resources to conduct online scientific publications and participate in online training forums or groups.