How Researchers Search for Manuscript and Archival Collections

ABSTRACT

By conducting a survey of a cross-section of researchers at six major research libraries, the author sought to determine the usefulness of specific online resources to find primary sources, to ascertain researchers' awareness of these sources, and to uncover their discovery methodology. The survey results demonstrate that the majority of researchers continue to utilize traditional methods of uncovering primary sources and do not take full advantage of online resources. The author offers four recommendations that archivists can implement to assist researchers with online discovery.

KEYWORDS:

• Online searching
• primary sources
• research strategies
• archival finding aids
• user survey