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9 --- Research questions

As well as answering the hypotheses, the tabulated data may be manipulated to coordinate the following points:

• What were the most popular items?
• What was or was not held?
• What various languages, or conceptual and physical formats did sources have?
• How old were particular items? Hence how popular were citations of a given age.

These questions only have relevance when the various parts are combined. E.g.,

1. What was popular and not held? --- Since such items were of notable utility, they are potential acquisitions for the library.
2. What percentage of printed items are under a given age? --- Since it is printed items that are sent to off-site storage, it is convenient to have figures that estimate the true demand for older items when trying to anticipate the recall cost to the library and inconvenience to the patron.
3. What resources are in the library? Is there a subject-based difference?
4. What were the various combinations of conceptual and physical formats? Do these figures match historical, foreign trends?
5. What was the use of non-English languages? And was it significant?
6. What was popular and held? --- Such items should not be put into storage, even if old. This list may also be used to check whether citation-deduced usage is reflected in the items borrowing record.[125]

Footnote to Chapter 9

125.  This list also has relevance to other aspects of collection management, as noted in §2.4 above.