European Researchers’ Online Behaviour 2008

Intute website is one of the top sources for researchers

By Angela Joyce.

This Summer I carried out some research on the online behaviour of researchers engaged in European Studies (covering politics, EU policy, law, gender studies and other social science areas). The results have just been published in the JCER (Journal of Contemporary European Studies) (a UACES journal) in the form of a research report called ‘Usage of Online European Union Information Resources 2008.’ Little research had previously been done on how researchers are accessing and using European resources. I built an online survey using Bristol University’s BOS software and also did some email interviews, to find out more. This was my first piece of European research, so it was also a valuable learning experience for me.

The survey was sent out to three European email lists: Euroresearch, the UACES list and Wesline. There were 145 respondents. The findings? 46.4% of the sample used online resources every day, not more. Many online resources were praised. The Europa website was the most used but unfortunately also the most criticised in terms of navigation, search and transparency. Other most used websites? EurLex, EUObserver, EurActiv, Google, BBC News, FT.com, UACES and Intute. Web 2.0 has yet to be widely adopted by the sample of respondents, though some are open to it. I also asked how EU online services could be improved. Replies included better navigation, increased openness, more access to newsfeeds, fewer passwords and simpler interfaces. Paper-based resources are still in favour with some, for environmental reasons or because the equivalent is simply not available online.

The final survey question, ‘Do you have any other general comments about how you access and use online EU information? ‘ yielded some interesting qualitative feedback. One researcher said ‘Access has never been better’, another ‘there are too few authoritative independent (ie. Not part of the EU institutions) sites.’ A more desperate respondent wrote ‘It’s a pain’. The final comment perhaps sums up the Europa situation nicely ‘My main comments are that it is still quite impenetrable to the ordinary person, and this works to keep alienation of the EU from the people. When I see people using EU information, they try and avoid the Europa website and generally Google search for it first, as Europa is a bit of a maze.’

JCER are interested in us continuing this research on an annual basis and it certainly would be fascinating to see how online usage evolves.