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ebrary, a ProQuest business, announced that the social media data of its 2011 Global Student E-book Survey is now publicly available at http://site.ebrary.com/lib/surveys along with the full report. More than 6,500 students worldwide participated in the survey, which was similar to a 2008 survey created by librarians. As part of the latest survey, ebrary added questions pertaining to social media, which has grown and changed significantly over the past 3 years.

Among other key findings, the addendum revealed the following:

While 41% of students are currently using social media for research or study, 59% are not. Reasons for not using social media include that existing sites are not a reliable source of information.

When asked if they would use social media to share research with peers, 58% of students indicated “likely” to “very likely,” while 43% stated “unlikely.”

35% of students indicated they would “likely” to “very likely” pose a question to a librarian using social media, compared to 45% who would “likely” to “very likely” use social media to pose a question to faculty.

When asked if they would use social media to connect with students with similar academic interests, 69% stated “likely” to “very likely,” while 31% stated “unlikely.”

“Using traditional social media platforms for research could be problematic for students on a number of fronts: Most are not designed for serious research, and students may not wish to share personal information with faculty and librarians,” said Kevin Sayar, ebrary’s president and general manager. “This survey indicates that we need to develop better and more intuitive ways for students to collaborate with authoritative sources in a trusted, research oriented environment.”