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General Information about LibQUAL+™

LibQUAL+™ Web Site

Your Opinion Counts!
LibQUAL+™ at UT Southwestern

What is the LibQUAL+™ survey? | Importance of This Survey
Benefit to Library Users at UT Southwestern | Survey Procedures at UT Southwestern

We heard you!

The 2004 LibQUAL+™ survey run at UT Southwestern has now closed. The library would like to thank the more than 800 individuals who completed the survey for their responses. Your opinions will be instrumental in not only identifying what we are doing right but also targeting areas for improvement.

More than 250 of the total responses, or approximately 30%, included a variety of comments. We will begin analyzing these comments in June to identify trends and initial areas of potential change. Complete results will be compiled and published later in the summer.

What is the LibQUAL+™ survey?

The purpose of the LibQUAL+™ survey, which was developed by the Association of Research Libraries and Texas A&M University Libraries, is to measure user perceptions and expectations of library service quality. This year, 209 academic institutions - including 13 academic health science institutions - are participating.

Survey respondents are asked to rate 27 core questions on three separate scales representing three levels of service.

  • The minimum level of service performance that the user considers "just adequate."
  • The level of service performance that the user desires or wants.
  • The level of service performance that the user perceives s/he actually receives.

More specific information, including publications written for or about LibQUAL+™ and information about the "science" behind the survey, may be found on the LibQUAL+™ Web Site.

Importance of This Survey

  • The UT Southwestern Library is user-centered and committed to consistently improving the information resources and services available to the UT Southwestern community.
  • Instead of measuring available resources and services against an "ideal," these outcome measures help us understand how well the Library meets our users' needs.

Benefit to Library Users at UT Southwestern

  • By using the information provided by the LibQUAL+™ instrument, we can not only identify what the Library is doing right but also target areas for improvement. Only you can tell us how well we are providing library services.
  • By planning action based on the results of this survey, the Library can be responsive to users' needs and provide services that are better aligned with users' expectations.
  • This survey also allows libraries to compare their service quality with peer institutions, to develop benchmarks, and to identify best practices across institutions.

Survey Procedures at UT Southwestern

  • On Monday, April 19, 2004, faculty, staff, students, fellows, and residents of UT Southwestern received a formal email invitation from the Director of Libraries, asking them to participate in the survey and providing a link to the online survey instrument.
  • During the four weeks of the survey, reminder notices will be emailed to each person in the participating group. Why?
    • Reminders are sent because research indicates that the single highest predictor of response rates in Web-based surveys is the number of contacts made, including reminders.
    • Reminders are sent to all respondents because all returns are confidential. Once a survey is submitted online, the contents are separated from the respondent's email address. This provides maximum security but prevents differentiating between respondents and non-respondents in the participant groups. Therefore, everyone gets a reminder.

If you have questions about the survey or problems completing it, please email LibraryResearch@UTSouthwestern.edu.
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Copyright 2006. The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas.
Unauthorized reproduction of this material is strictly prohibited.
Last Updated: 09/05/08