The aim of this master’s thesis is to examine how users at four public libraries experience the alternative shelf arrangement in their library. The purpose of introducing an alternative shelf arrangement in a public library is often to facilitate for its users. In each of our chosen libraries, the librarians have arranged the books in the non-fiction section in broad themes, with the Swedish Library Association Classification System as subsections. Using qualitative interviews, we examined a total of 26 users’ experience of the shelf arrangement and its accessibility, their methods for seeking information and their opinion about the presentation of the books. The main part of our respondents prefers to browse through the book shelves when searching in the library. Most of them also declared satisfaction with the shelf arrangement in their library and that they are more likely to borrow a book that is on display than a book that is not. We found that our respondents lacked awareness of the organisation of the shelf arrangement as well as of the signs showing the themes. The majority of our respondents do not question the shelf arrangement. Many of the respondents do not question it because they are so used to their library and have learned how to find what they are looking for. Others seem to feel that they do not know the library well enough to question it. / Uppsatsnivå: D

The objective of this Bachelor’s thesis is to investigate how the public library in Luleå has set about implementing an alternative classification system for its children's books section and to explore why this was done. We wanted to investigate both how they have adapted the new system to the children's own way of seeking information and the library personnel's experience of using the new shelving system. We have done seven interviews to answer these questions and our choice of literature is intended to put the process of change into a wider context. The answers show that the library was dissatisfied with the former system and have instead expressed a desire to shift the focus of their classification system to their users. A significant factor behind the change was that they wanted to make children the basis of the new system. Here, they have instigated a change to the whole children's section and this new system is founded upon children's behaviour with regard to searching for information. The broad subject groupings have been given names that the children themselves use when they ask for books and, in order to facilitate the actual finding of the books on the shelves, the books have easily-recognisable symbols on the spine. According to our research, the staff in Luleå has found that both the users and they themselves are pleased with the new system, although an official evaluation has yet to be undertaken. We conclude that the advantages of the alternative systems outweigh the disadvantages. / Uppsatsnivå: C

The aim of this thesis is to study how public libraries in Sweden use alternative shelf arrangements that differ from the library’s original classification system, which in Swedish public libraries usually is the SAB-system. I sent out a survey to 169 public libraries, where I received 114 replies. 77 of these stated that they had some kind of alternative shelf arrangement, therefore these are the ones that are included in my study. I wanted to investigate in what way the libraries had changed their shelf arrangement and why this decision was made. I also wanted to explore the staff’s attitude towards this change, and how they perceived the user-satisfaction after the change. I came to the conclusion that most libraries had arranged their collections after category and genre. The most prominent reason to change their shelf arrangements was to make the library more user-friendly, the SAB-system was considered to be too complicated for the users to understand. Most of the staff had a positive attitude towards the change, they considered it to be an exciting project and something that would benefit both staff and users. They were of the opinion that most users had appreciated the change, and that it had assisted them, better than before, in finding what they were looking for in the library. / Program: Bibliotekarie

In this Master we have studied classification system and alternative arrangements of books in a public library. The public libraries in Sweden use the SAB classification system. This system was created nearly a hundred years ago in order to suit the librarians and the Swedish society at the time. Today many library users find the system difficult to understand. This and other factors have inspired a number of libraries to arrange books in an alternative and more user-friendly way. We chose Jönköping public library to study their alternative arrangement of fiction books for children and youth. The purpose was to find out why and how the new alternative arrangement of books was done and where the inspiration behind the changes came from. We also wanted to know how the new shelf system had been perceived by the children and the personal staff. We made interviews with three librarians in the library and a questionnaire to the children who visited the library. In order to get a theoretical background we studied classification and alternative shelf systems in literature and in a few Masters. It seems that the main purpose behind the alternative arrangements in Jönköping public library was to make the library more user-friendly and self-instructive. In both interviews and questionnaire the respondents gave a positive picture of the new shelf-system. / Uppsatsnivå: D

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