Use of a National Library: A Survey of Readers in the Humanities and Social Sciences Reading Rooms of the British Library

Abstract

A questionnaire survey was carried out in the humanities reading rooms of the British Library one day each month from September 1990 to August 1991 with the aim of providing information of help in planning services, particularly at the new building in St Pancras. Readers were asked about their occupations, nationalities, the location of the academic institutions to which they were affiliated, the reasons for and frequency of their visits etc. 65% of readers were academic staff or students, and 33% lived outside the UK; 31% said they had visited the library over 50 times in the past year. The results were compared, where appropriate, with earlier surveys in 1968 and 1977. These comparisons highlighted significant seasonal variations in patterns of usage. It was not possible to compare the results with those from surveys by other national libraries, because of widely differing survey methods and content of reports.