A study of graduate student end-users' use and perception of electronic journals

The growth and diversity of electronic journals (e-journals) in the past five years has led many to predict the extinction of print journals and that a new paradigm is sweeping scholarship. Some others, however, believe that future electronic scholarly journals will be different from their print antecedents and fill a different niche, and will be necessary for the growth of knowledge. This paper considers the future of e-journals in the light of the use and perception of graduate student end-users, and their expectations of future e-journals. Some results from a recent user study presenting significant implications for the design of future e-journals are reported. The results shaw a significantly high acceptance of e-journals by this category of users. Generally, e-journals are expected to be different from print journals, with novel forms of functionality not possible in their print counterparts.