Reader's block: a systematic review of barriers to adoption, access and use in e-book user studies

Introduction. This review of barriers to e-book use systematically identifies obstacles to engaging reading experiences. Through the use of an analytical framework, the users being studied, study setting, and methods used in previous work are described in order to identify promising areas for future research. Method. The method used is a systematic literature review which gathers data from core library databases. Explicit inclusion and exclusion criteria are identified to ensure the review is free from bias. Analysis. An analytical framework based on previous research in the areas of user studies and the barrier concept identifies common trends regarding who is being studied, in what setting, and the methods used. Additionally, physical, cognitive, social, and cultural barriers from previous research are identified. Results. User studies on e-books and e-readers commonly focus on students in the university setting and physical barriers (software and hardware) that they face while reading electronically. Many studies focus on adoption rather than use, and rarely focus on fiction reading. Conclusions. The results provide a clear picture of the character of e-book user studies. Although previous user studies on e-books are particularly useful for policy decisions about collecting e-books in libraries, they provide a limited Reader's block: a systematic review of barriers to adoption, access and use in e-book user studies http://www.informationr.net/ir/19-2/paper624.html[7/10/2014 2:35:24 PM] understanding of how people actually read electronic books. Several aspects of the e-book reading experience are identified which have gone under-explored to date. Future areas for fruitful research include the incorporation of cognitive processes and social or cultural intervening factors for e-book use. Incorporating these factors may be particularly valuable outside the university, student, and library settings where user studies typically take place.