Research Forum Presentation: Generating Higher Response Rates for User-based Evaluation Instruments in Archives and Special Collections

Authors:
Elizabeth Yakel, Associate Professor, School of Information, University of Michigan

Helen Tibbo, Professor, School of Information and Library Science, University of North Carolina

Wendy Duff, Associate Professor, Faculty of Information, University of Toronto

Joan Cherry, Professor, Faculty of Information, University of Toronto

Aprille McKay, Digital Preservation Specialist, Digital Preservation, Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research

SAA Presentation
SAA 2008 Presentation

Abstract
The Archival Metrics Project has created five user-based evaluation instruments for use by college and university archives and special collections. These are aimed at: (1) onsite users of the reading room, (2) students who have attended an orientation session, (3) instructors who use the archives for teaching, (4) online users of the website, and (5) online users of finding aids. As part of the development and testing process, we experimented with different administration methods to test response rates. Generating good response rates to surveys is as important for research design as is the construction of the actual questions. Through a presentation of initial findings from our pilot testing, we will demonstrate how survey administration can affect results rates for both paper and online instruments. We will also discuss the importance of surveying different populations in user-based evaluation. For example, in our testing we found little overlap in the survey samples derived from two populations: reading room patrons and email reference requestors. This presentation will describe how the Archival Metrics project team tested different administration methods to increase response rates for their instruments and our findings concerning administration methods.