Survey Results: Students Rely on Digital Tools for Research

Mac Slocum
June 25, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0) | Listen

Results from Ebrary's 2008 Global Student E-Book Survey show that students working on research projects use digital reference tools more often than print materials. From Publishers Weekly:

Respondents say they use Google and other search engines as well as e-books more than print books for research assignments; online encyclopedias and Wikipedia are only slightly less used than print books, according to the survey. Print books, however, are deemed the most trustworthy sources, as well as far better for cover-to-cover reading.

Post-survey analysis included in the Ebrary report notes a gap between the resources students trust and the resources they use:

While four of the top five trusted resources are print, four of the top five resources students reported using are electronic (Google, e-books, e-reference, and Wikipedia). Students will use whatever information resource most efficiently gets the assignment done within acceptable parameters for the desired grade.

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