College and Research Libraries MARTHA C. ADAMSON AND GLORIA J. ZAMORA Publishing in Library Science Journals: A Test of the Olsgaard Profile* As a test of the universality of the Olsgaard profile of authorship character- istics in academic library journals, the gender, geographic location, and occupation of authors contributing to five journals of interest to special li- brarians were analyzed. The resulting data provide the basis for the con- struction of a profile of authorship characteristics in special library jour- nals. This profile is compared to that produced by Olsgaard and Olsgaard, whose methodology this study replicates. This study shows that while female authors are consistently underrepresented in the literature of library sci- ence, they are published in greater proportion in special library periodicals than in the academic library periodicals sampled by the Olsgaards. This study essentially confirms the Olsgaards' findings with regard to geographic distribution and occupation of authors in library periodicals . IN THEIR RECENT ARTICLE "Authorship in Five Library Periodicals ," John N. and Jane Kinch Olsgaard reported the results of a bibliometric study that examined selected characteristics of authors published in library science journals. 1 The characteristics under study were journal authors' sex, occupation, and geographic location. The Olsgaards sought evidence of publication bias by com- paring authorship characteristics with the characteristics of the library science com- munity as a whole. The Olsgaards found that in the five jour- nals studied, female authors were not repre- sented in proportion to their numbers in the library profession. Thirty-four percent of *This paper was supported by the U.S. Depart- ment of Energy under contract DE-AC04-76- DP-00789. Martha C . Adamson is librarian , physical sci- ences and engineering, Technical Library , Air Force Weapons Laboratory , Kirtland AFB, Netc Mexico . Gloria ] . Zamora is subject specialist, Technical Library, Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico. the authors in the journals studied were women, while 84 percent of all librarians are women. With regard to occupation, the Olsgaards found that the journals studied contained a "substantial number of articles by practicing librarians. "2 They also found that library· science faculty members were represented in numbers greater than their proportion of the library population . In comparing the geographic distribution of au- thors in five library journals to the distribu- tion of the United States population as · whole, the Olsgaards found that a dispro portionately large number of authors wer from the Northeast and Midwest, while th Southeast and Southwest were underrepre sen ted. PROBLEM AND HYPOTHESIS The Olsgaards selected the five librar periodicals in their study based upon th following criteria: 1. minimum ten-year publication history ; 2. recognition as a "nationally know journal of library science" ;3 3. article format; I 235 236 I College & Research Libraries • May 1981 4. influence on the library profession; 5. "common trends in publishing. "4 The journals selected were: College & Research Libraries, V.29-38, 1968-77; Library Journal, V.93-102, 1968-77; Library Quarterly, V.38-47, 1968-77; Library Trends, V.16-25, 1967-77; RQ, V. 7-16, 1968-77. This article does not question the selec- tion of these five journals for the Olsgaard study. Each journal quite . clearly meets the criteria they stated. In the opinion of these authors, however, each journal also meets another, unstated criterion. Each is a jour- nal that is of greater interest to librarians in institutions of higher learning or to library science faculty and students. We were con- cerned that rather than portraying the au- thorship patterns of library periodicals in general, the Olsgaards' study might be biased toward the authorship characteris- tics of academic librarianship. To test the general applicability of the Olsgaards' authorship profile, a study was conducted using the Olsgaards' methodol- ogy. The research population selected was journals believed to be of interest to special librarians. Do authorship characteristics in special library periodicals differ from those found in the Olsgaard study? The intent in gathering additional data was to modify and enhance the evolving profile of authorship characteristics in library periodicals. METHODOLOGY With the Olsgaard criteria in mind, the following journals were selected for study: journal of the American Society for In- formation Science (ASIS), V.21-30, 1970- 79; Law Library journal (Law), V.62-71, 1969-78; Bulletin of the Medical Library Associa- tion (MLA), V.57-66, 1969-78; Online Review (Online), V.1-3, 1977-79; Special Libraries (SL), V.61-70, 1970-79. Online Review does not meet one of the prescribed qualifications because it does not have a ten-year publishing history. It was included in the study genre because it rep- resents a new field in library periodicals, and an area of interest that is of growing in- fluence in the special libraries community. All articles for the years shown above were studied. As in the Olsgaard study, book reviews and letters to the editor were not included. The Olsgaard methodology was followed with respect to multiple au- thorship and occupation.* Ambiguous or incomplete information in any data entry was assigned to an "indeter- minate" category and was disregarded in statistical operations, which utilized the fol- lowing formula: X = a/ (N - cl) where X = pecentage of spe- cific data entries; a = numbe·r of un- ambiguous data en~ tries in a particular category; N = total number of entries in a journal; d = number of entries for which data can- not be determined. LIMITATIONS Analyzing authorship characteristics based only on the information provided by the typical library science journal is inherently risky. Most author information is sketchy and incomplete. In this regard, Online Re- view merits praise for the completeness of its author information, which includes the author's current preferred mailing address. The journal of the American Society for Information Science has much room for improvement. The regional designations adopted by the Olsgaards and continued in this study are those of the ALA Committee on the Accreditation of Graduate Library School Programs. These regional designations are, in the opinion of the authors, not always in agreement with common usage. For exam- ple, the ALA Committee on Accreditation considers Mississippi to be part of the Southwest region. Missouri, which was missing from the Olsgaards' regional listing, was added to the Midwest group. The com- mittee's regional categories are as follows: Northeast: Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Maine, Maryland, Mas- *Each author was counted as one complete data entry, and each occupation was counted as one complete data entry. sachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont. Southeast: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Ken- tucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia. Midwest: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebras- ka, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin. Southwest: Arizona, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas. West: Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Washington, Wyoming. Because this study focused on special li- brary journals, it was necessary to modify the Olsgaards' occupational categories to de- scribe more accurately the contributors to these journals. The occupational sets for the two studies are compared as follows: Olsgaard Study Academic librarian Public librarian Other librarian Library science faculty Library science student Other faculty Nonlibrarian/ Nonacademic This Study Special librarian Library science faculty Academic librarian Other librarian/Library science student Other faculty/Graduate student Information supplier/ Broker/ Association Nonlibrary/Government/ Private sector The reader is cautioned not to make ex:- tensive occupational comparisons between the two studies. Because occupational cate- gories in this study have been redefined, correlations drawn between the studies would be spurious. In this study, librarians and information specialists who work in li- braries and information centers serving in- dustry, business, research institutes, and government are defined as special librar- ians. Also counted as special librarians are academic librarians clearly identified as working in a separate subject collection in an academic library. For example, an author identified as "Reference Librarian, En- gineering Library, Anywhere University." is counted as a special librarian, while an au- thor identified as "Science Bibliographer, University of Anywhere Library" is counted Test of the Olsgaard Profile I 237 as an academic librarian. Similarly, a "Tech- nic~! Information Specialist, Technical In- formation Center, ABC Corp." appears as a special librarian, while "Technical Informa- tion Specialist, ABC Corp." is considered to be a private-sector occupation. RESULTS Female authors were not represented in proportion to their numbers in the special library community in any of the five jour- nals studied. Female authors were pub- lished 9.3 percent more frequently in spe- cial library journals than in academic ones; however, females are 9. 7 percent more prevalent in special librarianship than in academic librarianship (table 1). In the spe- cial library journals studied, 56.3 percent of the authors were male, while 43.7 percent were female. In two journals, Bulletin of the Medical Library Association and Online Review, fer:nale authors were actually in the majority, representing 56.9 percent and 59.3 percent of the authors, respectively. The journal of the American Society for Information Science trailed in female authorship, with 23.5 percent (table 2). The geographic distribution of authors in this study resembles quite closely that of the Olsgaards' study (table 3). Again, as in the Olsgaard study, the northeastern por- tion of the country is represented by a sub- stantially larger percentage of articles than its percentage of the population, while the southeastern and southwestern regions are underrepresented. In special library jour- nals, the midwestern region falls slightly be- low its expected publication rate, and the west slightly exceeds expectations. Just the opposite is shown in the Olsgaard study (figure 1). TABLE 1 Co~·IPARATI\'E AUTHOR GENDER RATIOS ~I ale Female Authors in Olsgaard study 65.6 34.4 Academic librarians* 33.8 66.2 Authors in special library journals 56.3 43.7 Special librarians* National average 24.1 75.9 of all librarians* 16.0 84.0 0 l '. S. Department of Labor. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Library .\lanpou:er: A Study uf De11wrul and Supply (Washington , D.C.: Govt . Print . OfT., 1975). 238 I College & Research Libraries • May 1981 TABLE 2 GENDER OF ALTTHORS IN FIVE SPECIAL LIBRARY PERIODICALS Pe rcentage Journal Male ASIS 76.5 Late 58.8 MLA 43.1 Online 40.7 SL 52.5 Weighted average 56.3 In seeking an explanation for the greater productivity of librarians in the northeastern region of the country, the authors investi- gated the possibility that this region might contain proportionally more library schools and consequently an atmosphere that stimu- - lated scholarly pursuits both by academic li- brarians and their special librarian col- leagues. Basing their distribution percent- ages on the fifty-seven ALA-accredited graduate library school programs located in .').') .')0 -l.') -!2 .0 -lO :3.') :30 ;2.') :20 !.') 10 .') 0 Perce ntage Fe male N cl 23.5 777 126 651 41.2 328 15 313 56.9 710 53 657 59.3 156 6 150 47 .5 767 20 747 43.7 the United States as of December 1978, the authors found that library schools were re- gionally distributed as shown in table 4. 5 Since library schools are nearly evenly distributed in relation to the population of librarians, the authors concluded that no positive correlation could be made between the distribution of library schools and the productivity of librarians in terms of au- thorship. It is no surprise to find special librarian Olsgaanl study Special library study Population of librarians as a whole * Percentage ~E Percentage SE Percentage r-.1\\' Percentage S\\' Percentage \\' *l'. S. Department of Lahor. Bnrl'au of Lahor Statistics. Lihrar!i .\fw1pmn•r : .-\ Stuc/!1 11( Deuwmlaml Supp/!1 (\\"ushin)!tou . D .C. : (;o,·t. Print. on· .. HJ/.5 1. Fig . 1 Comparative Geographic Distribution Ratios Test of the Olsgaard Profile I 239 TABLE 3 GEOGRAPHI C 0ISTRIBL1TION OF AUTHORS IN FIVE SPECIAL LIBRARY PERIODICALS Perce ntage Percentage Pe rcentage Pe rcentage Percentage Journal NE SE MW sw w N cl ASIS 50.1 7.3 24 .3 4.7 13.6 781 163 618 Late 25.7 13.3 26.3 6.6 28.1 379 48 331 MLA 37.1 12.5 30.0 8.6 11.8 754 43 711 Online 44.4 1.4 25 .0 1.4 27.8 158 14 144 SL 46.9 7.3 23.2 5.3 17.3 783 67 716 Weighted average 42 .0 9.2 25 .9 6.0 16.9 TABLE 4 REGIO!\AL DISTRIBLTTION OF LIBRARY S <;: i-JOOLS Percentage Perce ntage Pe rce ntage PeR-entage PeR"t.' nhlgl• 1\E SE MW SW w Lihrarv schools 29.8 21.1 28 .1 8.8 12.3 Po~uhition of ihrarians as a whole* 30.0 16.4 27.4 10.6 15.6 *l '.S. Departme nt of Labor. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Library .\tOIIJJOu·er: A Struly of Demancla11d Supply (Washington. D.C .: Go\'t . Print. OfT .. 19i.5l. p.i . TABLE 5 0 CCL1PATIO!\ OF AL1THORS II\ FIYE SPECIAL LIBRARY PERIODICALS Library In forma- Sde nc·e Spedal Other Othe r lion Pri\'ate Journal Academic Faculty Librarian Librarian Fac·ult y Supplier Go\'e rnment .\' - d ASIS 2.2 18.3 6.1 0.8 I Au: 1.6 1.1 62.5 2.5 MLA 2.6 6.8 68 .6 4.3 Online 8.3 3.2 26.7 1.3 SL 13.6 11.4 43.8 5.6 Weighted average 5.8 10.3 41.6 3.3 authors heavily represented in this study. They constitute 41.6 percent of the authors in the five journals analyzed (table 5). It is more interesting to discover that almost all authors listing two occupations (4.3 percent of all data entries) are special librarians (102 of 119). Ylost teach either in the institution with which their library is associated-most often a law or medical school-or in a li- brary school. This dual occupation category includes 8. 7 percent of the special library authors . Library science faculty members contrib- uted 20.1 percent of . the articles in the Olsgaard study, as compared to a contribu- tion of only 10.3 percent of the articles in special library Journals. This statistic lends support to the authors' belief that the Olsgaards sampled journals of interest to 41.7 5.6 25 .3 781 23 758 21.9 1.1 9.3 379 13 366 12.3 0.8 4.6 754 - 14 740 3.2 32.5 24 .8 158 1 157 5.4 3.7 16.4 783 4 779 19. 1 4.7 15.3 the academic library community. While no exact comparisons are possible because of redefinition of occupational cate- gories, "practicing librarians" appear to be published to about the same extent in spe- cial library journals as in those s'urveyed by the Olsgaards. This .statement is based on a comparison of the "academic," "public," and "other" librarian categories in the Olsgaard study (47.2 percent of the population stud- ied) with the "academic" and "special" li- brarian categories in this study (47.4 per- cent of the total population analyzed, see · table 6). * As might be expected, the three "tradi- tional" special library journals studied, Law *The " other librarian" category in this study is not included because it also contains library science students. 240 I College & Research Libraries • May 1981 TABLE 6 COMPARATIVE OCC UPATIONAL RATIOS Olsgaard Study Academic librarians Public librarians Other librarians Library science faculty Library science students Other faculty N on'librarian/N onacademic Special Library Study Special librarians Academic librarians Library science faculty Other librarians/Library science students Other faculty/Graduate students Information suppliers/Brokers/ Associations Nonlibrary/Government/Private sector TABLE 7 PRACTICING LIBRARIANS IN FI\' E SPECIAL LIBRARY PERIODICALS 30. 1% 10.0% 7.1% 20.1% 2.8% 7. 1% 22.7% 41.6% 5.8% 10.3% 3.3% 19.1% 4.7% 15.3% ASIS Law MLA Online SL At least 8.3% At least 64.1% At least 71.2% At least 35.0% At least 57.4% also by psychologists and sociologists. Among the questions that might be raised in relation to this apparent imbalance are: 1. Do female authors submit fewer arti- cles for publication? 2. Are female librarians less career- oriented and consequently less willing to undertake extracurricular research? 3. Are male librarians more likely to be found at higher organizational levels , which encourage the expression of opinions in public forums? By merging . the statistics generated by this study with those of its predecessor, a refined profile of authorship in library periodicals emerges. The typical author writing in a library science journal is still a male from the northeastern United States who is actively employed as a librarian, but the disparity between male and female au- thorship is somewhat less than that indi- cated by the Olsgaard study. The refined profile is summarized in figures 2 and 3 and table 8. Library journal ,. Bulletin of the Medical Library Association, and Special Libraries, exhibit higher percentages of authorship by "practicing librarians" than do their cross- !JO disciplinary counterparts (table 7). * Comhint>d studies Weighted average of academic and special librarians CONCLUSIONS The authors set out to test the Olsgaards ' profile of authorship in library periodicals against another sample population to assure its validity and applicability to the whole li- brary community. While this study revealed some small differences from the Olsgaard model, it is perhaps more remarkable in its similarities, including the disturbing under- representation of female authors in all jour- nals studied (see figure 2). It is beyond the scope of this · study to analyze the causes of this apparent im- balance ; however, the authors believe that it is a matter for concern, discussion , and further research, not only by librarians but *"Practicing librarians" includes the academic and special librarian categories. HO 70. 7 10 60 .')() -tO :30 20 10 0 Pen:entage Male Percentage Female Fig . 2 Gender Ratios-Publishing Librarians Combined Studies and National Ave rage of Librarians .5.5 ,')() -t.5 40 :3.5 :30 2.5 20 }.=5 10 ,') () 40 . .5 Test of the Olsgaard Profile I 241 Combined studies Population of .librarians as a whole • Percentage NE Percentag~ SE Pt>rcentage M\V Percentage S\V Percentage \V Fig. 3 Geographic Distribution-Publishing Librarians Combined Studies and U.S . Population of Librarians TABLE 8 0CCL1PATION CO!\·IBINED STUDIES Librarv science facultv Practicing librarians · 14.8% At least 47.3% Surveys like the two discussed here are just the beginning of much needed work on the bibliometrics of library science. Still un- explored are the publishing characteristics of school and public librarians and of impor- tant subject specialties within the library profession. Also yet to be investigated are more complex bibliometric patterns, such as how ideas travel among library profession- als. REFERENCES 1. John N. Olsgaard and Jane K. Olsgaard, "Au- thorship in Five Library Periodicals ," College & Research Libraries 41:49-53 (Jan. 1980). 2. Ibid., p .51. 3. Ibid ., p.49. 4. Ibid . 5. "Graduate Library School Programs Accred- ited by the American Library Association (De- cember 1978)," The ALA Yearbook 1979 (Chi- cago: American Lib,rary Assn., 1979), p . 10-11.