A use study of speech pathology and audiology periodicals at Illinois State University

Abstract

No core list of periodicals exists for speech pathology and audiology. Faced with the prospect of having to cancel periodicals for all subjects, the science librarians at Illinois State University decided to determine which science periodicals were used most heavily. A one-year study of science periodical reshelving and interlibrary loan requests yielded ranked lists of periodicals important to speech pathology and audiology faculty and students at Illinois State University. The three most heavily used journals were the Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, ASHA, and Topics in Language Disorders. Most of the periodicals on the lists were indexed by either MEDLINE or Uncover, or by both. While the lists of journals developed in the study are not sufficient to serve as true core lists, they should be useful to libraries supporting comparable programs in speech pathology and audiology.