The study explores, through the survey method, the attitudes of circulation managers in large academic libraries toward their management role, user contacts and user expectations. The study seeks to put these attitudes toward the user in the context of the type of circulation control system in order to establish if there is any association between attitudes and the state of automation within the department. / The circulation function has undergone two important transformations since the turn of the century. The first of these is departmentalization; the second, automation. The departmentalization of the circulation function has tended to separate the circulation department from the library's educational and information functions, the more "professional" aspects of librarianship. Circulation work has increasingly been viewed as routine, process-oriented work, not completely worthy of professional attention. / Paralleling this change in the circulation function's organizational setting, the automation of the circulation process has continued to move from the laborious and slow use of manual procedures and book cards toward the immediate updating and record keeping of the online system. Circulation automation has passed from the early days of simply mechanizing files, represented by the batch system, to the present where libraries have the potential capacity to perform the complete circulation control process with real-time systems. Sophisticated online systems have begun to control the complete circulation process. / The metamorphosis of circulation automation--from simple mechanization to full computerization--has had a tremendous impact on the technical side, the processes, of the circulation department. Likewise, it may well have had impact on the service attitudes, priorities, and leadership of the department. As it automates, gaining control over its own processes, the circulation department may actually become more responsive to its users--more service oriented. / A questionnaire was sent to circulation managers of all the 98 academic libraries who hold membership in the Association of Research Libraries. It sought to identify the degree and state of automation of the circulation function, typified by the three system categories of manual, batch and online and to capture opinions on the manager's view of his management role, his attitudes on selected circulation service issues, his attitudes toward user contacts, problems and complaints, and finally, his attitudes toward user demands and expectations. / An analysis of returns revealed a generalized, slight tendency for online managers to be more favorable to the user's point of view. Respondents of all three types of systems (manual, batch, and online) were uniform in their tendency to express very strong, positive attitudes toward the circulation manager's role and were only slightly less positive in their attitudes to user contacts, complaints and expectations. / The study found circulation managers uniformly strong in their support of circulation management's role with no substantial differentiation among managers by type of system. It found circulation managers uniformly strong in their desire to respond to user complaints and problems, but with a slight tendency for online managers to be more favorable to the user. It found managers in general favorable in their attitudes toward users in regard to their demands and expectations; there was a tendency for batch managers to be more favorable to the user. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 41-07, Section: A, page: 2813. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1980.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_74233 |
| Contributors | MARTIN, JAMES ROBERT., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 182 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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