Search results

The purpose of this paper is to determine the characteristic patterns of monographs in the humanities, social sciences and hard sciences published by Polish scholars. The study provides a comprehensive overview of the Polish book evaluation system to explain how monographs are assessed and illustrate how changes in the definitions of the types of scholarly book publications influence publication patterns.

This paper analyses bibliographic records of 42,307 monographs published by Polish scholars in the humanities and science fields from 2009 to 2016. Through a bibliometric analysis, the paper investigates the characteristic patterns of the monographs, including authorship, publication language and length, across three fields.

The present study demonstrates that changes in the definitions of scholarly book publications in Poland have significantly influenced the characteristic patterns of monographs. The analysis of the characteristic patterns across three fields reveals that the monographs are different in terms of all characteristics. In the entire period, 85.3 percent monographs were written in Polish, 10.1 percent in English, 1.4 percent in German, 1.1 percent in Russian and 2.1 percent in 39 other languages. The most significant changes are observed in authorship patterns.

This work offers empirical findings on the characteristic patterns of monographs in the humanities, social sciences and hard sciences from a non-English speaking country. It discusses a unique model of book assessment and shows certain consequences of various overly formalized procedures of evaluation. Thus, the study identifies the major challenges and implications of using highly formalized procedures for book evaluation.

The purpose of this paper is to determine how the I‐Share collection serves its members, focusing on the state‐wide use of I‐Share domestic monographs (2003‐2008) by subject, collection overlap (number of copies owned), publisher, and how frequently books by subject are being used and to make recommendations for future selection criteria.

Illinois is fortunate to have the College and Research Libraries in Illinois (CARLI) consortium which manages “I‐Share,” a 76‐member shared online catalog equipped with patron‐initiated borrowing using the Voyager system. I‐Share successfully circulates hundreds of thousands of books annually among these libraries, dramatically broadening the scope of each member's collection. Data from CARLI's Voyager catalog databases were analyzed via Excel spreadsheets using 20 datafields.

Results found that numbers of copies purchased by I‐Share and use/circulation fell into three categories: high overlap with a corresponding high use, low overlap with a corresponding low use, and a middle area with a high number of copies with low to middle use. Additional analyses by publisher and Library of Congress subject classification were also conducted. The study also allowed for a comparison of what was purchased versus what was available for purchase as represented by the database of a large monograph vendor.

A number of recommendations are made that should improve the effectiveness of monograph selection in the CARLI libraries.

The paper documents an important and thorough study which may be of help to other library consortia in managing more effectively their monograph spend.

The purpose of this paper is to assess the educational value of prestigious and productive Spanish scholarly publishers based on mentions of their books in online scholarly syllabi.

Syllabus mentions of 15,117 books from 27 publishers were searched for, manually checked and compared with Microsoft Academic (MA) citations.

Most books published by Ariel, Síntesis, Tecnos and Cátedra have been mentioned in at least one online syllabus, indicating that their books have consistently high educational value. In contrast, few books published by the most productive publishers were mentioned in online syllabi. Prestigious publishers have both the highest educational impact based on syllabus mentions and the highest research impact based on MA citations.

The results might be different for other publishers. The online syllabus mentions found may be a small fraction of the syllabus mentions of the sampled books.

Authors of Spanish-language social sciences and humanities books should consider general prestige when selecting a publisher if they want educational uptake for their work.

This is the first study assessing book publishers based on syllabus mentions.

The purpose of this study is to present findings of an approval plan assessment project, which analyzed circulation statistics for four Gobi Select designations: research essential, research recommended, basic essential and basic recommended.

This study approaches approval plan assessment by analyzing three years of circulation statistics to determine which, if any, of the Gobi Select designations circulated the most.

This study reveals that books designated as “basic essential” have circulated at higher rates than other designations.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, no other studies have made use of Gobi Select designations to analyze circulation statistics for books obtained on an approval plan.

The purpose of this paper is to report on a project undertaken at University College London (UCL) examining the role and value of the academic monograph – considering continuing decline in sales and usage – and its possible survival in the digital age.

A qualitative approach was adopted, in which 17 arts and humanities academics were interviewed in‐depth on their experiences and views.

The monograph continues to be of great value in the arts and humanities field, and is seen as essential for career progression. Much concern was expressed about the decline in quality of this and other forms of writing, with pressures of the university Research Assessment Exercise foremost in contributing to this decline. Reservations were expressed about moving towards digital versions of the monograph, although print‐on‐demand was considered to be a viable option to enable the continuing publication of specialist works.

This is the first in‐depth study of the role, value and future of the monograph from the viewpoint of the scholar, and so gives a unique insight into the scholarly communication behaviour of arts and humanities researchers.

The aim of this study is to analyse the disciplinary coverage of Thomson Reuters' Book Citation Index database focusing on publisher presence, impact and specialisation.

The authors conducted a descriptive study in which they examined coverage by discipline, publisher distribution by field and country of publication, and publisher impact. For this purpose the Thomson Reuters' subject categories were aggregated into 15 disciplines.

Humanities and social sciences comprise 30 per cent of the total share of this database. Most of the disciplines are covered by very few publishers mainly from the UK and USA (75.05 per cent of the books), in fact 33 publishers hold 90 per cent of the whole share. Regarding publisher impact, 80.5 per cent of the books and chapters remained uncited. Two serious errors were found in this database: the Book Citation Index does not retrieve all citations for books and chapters; and book citations do not include citations to their chapters.

There are currently no studies analysing in depth the coverage of this novel database which covers monographs.

Assessment centres as a total system, involving theoretical, practical and technical aspects, are focused on. Recent research findings on assessment centres, their processes and practices, are discussed and the implications for practice are examined.

The purpose of this study is to determine what proportion of books were checked out in an academic library over a 15‐year period and what pattern of use occurs over the years and among various subject groups and between purchased and donated books.

Check‐out counts were obtained for each year over a 15‐year period and the results analysed by year, language, and Library of Congress classification.

Book check‐outs rise each year during the first five to seven years of a book's arrival in an academic library and stabilise after that period. Books that are checked out in their first year tend to continue to be checked out, while books that are not checked out in the first or second year will still not be checked out after 15 years. While overall check‐outs are generally about 70 per cent, some subject areas show almost 100 per cent use. As expected, books acquired as direct purchases had more use than books acquired as gifts. Although a third of the collection has not circulated over a 15‐year period, it is believed that the lack of use does not necessarily imply a lack of value.

This research covers a longer period than earlier studies and has been conducted in a non‐Western library using both Chinese and English texts. It supports the conclusion of earlier studies that approximately one‐third of book acquisitions will not be checked out and that circulation within the first few years of a book's acquisition is a good predictor of future circulation. For libraries considering remote storage, books not circulated within five to seven years could be removed to storage with little inconvenience to users.

I begin by examining some ways in which organisations have attempted to improve their recruitment and selection procedures to minimise bias and unfair discrimination, and focus on the assessment centre as a potentially useful technique in this respect, especially for managerial selection. I go on to examine the assessment centre in more detail, including its origins, construction and uses, before discussing the strong evidence for its validity as a selection and assessment procedure. I then describe some recent British innovations in assessment centre design and practice, especially in its use for management and organisation development purposes, before discussing some of my own recent research, in collaboration with Ivan Robertson and Usha Rout, on participants' attitudes towards the use of assessment centres for selection and development purposes, including gender differences in attitudes.