A couple of years ago, we conducted an informal survey of reference
questions patrons asked at our periodicals service desk.  Of the
50,000 questions our staff answered, about 1% were answered using
series statements in bib records.  But it's important to keep in
mind that people generally would not ask for monographic sets and
series titles at our periodicals desk, since those are shelved
in a different building with our monographic collection.  Most
questions related to series would logically be asked at our Reference
Dept. desk.  Do any Reference staff on SERIALST have any information
related to this question? (Are there any reference staff on the list?  Given
that the majority of reference materials are serials, and the majority of
patron use of research collections involves serials, I'd certainly hope so!)

Steve Savage
University of Kentucky Libraries

On Tue, 22 Feb 1994 21:09:54 EST Renette Davis said:
>This is being cross-posted to SERIALST, COOPCAT, LIBREF-L, and AUTOCAT.
>Please excuse duplication.
>
>Has anyone done a study, or heard of a study which has been
>done, on use of series access points in bibliographic records by
>patrons, or by reference, collection development, acquisitions,
>or serials staff?  We are thinking about what our response should
>be to the LC Series Report, and are particularly interested in
>quantitative data relating to what loss of collocation for
>series would mean to all of these users of the catalog.  Please
>respond directly to me. Thank you.
>
>Renette Davis
>Senior Serials Cataloger                     Internet: rd13@midway.uchicago.edu
>University of Chicago Library                               Voice: 312-702-8769
>1100 E. 57th St., Chicago, IL 60637