The relationships between the expenditures and resources of public libraries and children’s and young adults’ use: An exploratory analysis of Institute of Museum and Library Services public library statistics data

Abstract

Children’s librarians have long recognized the value of libraries for the development of children and adolescents and have championed for appropriate funding to support programs and services targeted to children, adolescents, and families. Using data from the Institute of Museum and Library Services National Public Library Survey, this study examined the relationships between the expenditures and resources of public libraries and children’s and young adults’ use. Three groups of variables were chosen from the dataset to represent expenditures, resources, and children’s and young adults’ library use respectively. Correlation analysis results reveal that most of the expenditures and resources variables were significantly correlated with children’s and young adults’ library use in libraries of all sizes. Further, analyses of material circulation and program attendance rates reveal that children’s materials account for more than one-third of total library material circulations and 70% of public library program participants attend programs designed for children. The findings of this study provide empirical evidence to support the investment in library resources and services for children and young adults and are discussed in light of expansion of library services and programming focused on informal learning.

Keywords

Children Institute of Museum and Library Services library resources public library young adults

Introduction

More than a decade ago, Virginia Walter (2003) made an argument for a ramped-up research agenda focused on investigating public library service to children and teens. The study reported in this paper connects research to practice, one of the themes that emerged from a recent Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) focus session (Hill et al., 2015), and addresses one of the significant gaps identified by Walter: why policymakers should fund public library services for children and young adults (YAs).

Through manipulation and analysis of data collected through the IMLS Public Library Survey (IMLS-PLS), this study examines the relationships between the expenditures, resources, and programming that libraries devote to meet the needs of children and YAs, and the actual use of the public library by children and YAs. This study takes into account traditional expenditures and resources, such as print material budgets, but also examines “other material” expenditures that are required to transform libraries into informal learning spaces (Diamant-Cohen et al., 2012; Dickerson, 2012; Ralli and Payne, 2016; Valdivia and Surbramaniam, 2014). Findings confirms what children’s librarians have deduced from day-to-day experience: children are one of the main user groups in public libraries and levels of funding and access to appropriate resources and services affect their levels of use.

Because there are few investigations of children’s and YAs’ public library use that draw on statistical data collected on a national scale, this study contributes to the professional literature on public library service to children and YAs by providing empirical evidence to support librarians’ professional wisdom.

Literature review

Public library service to children and youth

Though library service to children was virtually non-existent and even frowned upon prior to the 20th century (McDowell, 2014), library leaders now recognize the necessity of aligning library services to community goals and staying true to their missions of providing access to knowledge and promoting literacy for all citizens, including children (Garmer, 2014). Through family literacy programming and outreach (Prendergast, 2011; Public Library Association & Association for Library Service to Children, 2011), storytimes designed to promote literacy (Campana et al., 2016; McKechnie, 2006) and incorporation of informal learning opportunities (Sanchez, 2014; Subramaniam, 2016), public libraries are seeking to promote knowledge building and literacy development for children and YAs, and an overwhelming majority of Americans (Horrigan, 2015) believe public libraries should be doing just that: playing a role in supporting children’s learning through coordination with schools, program offerings focused on digital literacy, and literacy programming for young children.

A strong public library impacts all sectors of the community it serves. For example, libraries that offer programming to support early literacy contribute to the health of their local economies. Indeed, most urban libraries provide some type of programming to support new and at-risk parents with the school readiness needs of their children through offerings of workshops for the parents themselves as well as workshops designed specifically for early childcare providers (Urban Libraries Council, 2007). Yet, less is known about the quality of service to children and youth in rural settings. What previous studies have revealed about libraries serving children in these communities is that they are under equipped in terms of library funding, numbers of print resources, numbers of electronic resources, and highly qualified staff to support programming and services (Davis, 2010; Real et al., 2014; Sin, 2011). Nevertheless, nationwide efforts have affected library service to children in all types of communities (IMLS, 2013, 2014), and libraries are particularly interested in measuring the outcomes of those services (Reid, 2015).

Statistical analyses of large-scale data related to public libraries

A number of previous investigations have used data from the IMLS-PLS as well as other large-scale data sets to identify important factors associated with public library use. Using national level data, investigators have uncovered several relationships related to adult use of libraries. For example, patron income level, ethnicity, and age all translate into differences in public library use (Sin and Kim 2008), as do differences in the number of children living in a household (Hemmeter, 2006). Not surprisingly, the distance that a person lives from the library also influences levels of use (Sin and Kim, 2008). In turn, these differences impact the amount of time adults spend reading, and the amount of time they spend reading to their children (Bhatt, 2010). Contrary to conventional wisdom, individuals who use other types of libraries are more likely to use public libraries (Sin and Kim, 2008).

Just as individual differences affect the likelihood of library use, so too do differences in the libraries themselves. Individuals who live in states with more public library branches are more likely to be public library users as are those who live in states where public libraries are better funded (Sin and Kim 2008). Comparing data across systems nationally, researchers have found disparities in library funding and services in low income and rural areas. These differences are particularly pronounced in terms of access to audio and video materials and programming (Sin, 2011), access to the expertise of a professional librarian (Davis, 2010), and technology training or support (Taylor et al., 2012).

A number of studies have also used large-scale and national level data to examine children’s and adolescents’ library use. Interestingly, Caucasian adolescents are more likely to use a school library; whereas their ethnic counterparts are more inclined to use the public library (Sin, 2011). Family factors also influence public library use. Like adults, children living closer to public libraries are more likely to use them, as are children with better educated parents, those whose families own a home, and those living in wealthier areas. Additionally, as the number of children in a household rises, so too does library use for school purposes and for programming (Hemmeter, 2006).

Just as public library factors influence adult use, so too do they impact children’s and adolescents’ use. Teens of all racial and ethnic groups are more likely to use libraries that are well funded and libraries that employ professional librarians (Sin, 2011). Yet, slightly more than half of public libraries do employ a full-time YA librarian (Mustafoff and Teffeau, 2008). Most teens convey that they have never attended a library program, but that they have used the public library to borrow materials for both school purposes and for leisure (Vavrek, 2004). Most public libraries do offer special services and programs to children including storytimes, outreach to schools and child care facilities, and compilations of booklists and suggestions in the realm of readers’ advisory (Roy, 1993). Unfortunately, there are disparities between libraries serving larger populations and those in more sparsely populated regions with larger library systems more likely to offer unique programming than libraries those serving smaller communities (Schneider, 2014).

Research problem and questions

A number of studies have used national data sets to examine public libraries and draw conclusions about use by adults and children. This study exclusively focuses on variables related to services and programming for children and YAs. Three research questions guided the investigation:

How are expenditures and resources related to children’s and YAs’ use of public libraries?

What are the proportions of children’s material circulation in public libraries?

What are the proportions of children’s and YAs’ programs and program attendance in public libraries?

Methodology

Description of IMLS public library statistics

Since 1988, public library systems across the United States have collected standardized data on a range of variables such as circulation, collection size, operating budget, staffing, and more, and those data from approximately 9,000 libraries across the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and other outlying territories have been compiled into a single data set. Since 2006, IMLS has spearheaded the collection and publication of this data, and prior to that time, this responsibility was under the domain of the National Center for Education Statistics (IMLS, n.d.). As a consequence of its scope, the publication of the data falls about two years after its collection, and as Bertot and Jaeger (2008) caution, its quality is imperfect but sufficient. This study analyzed the most recent data set, Fiscal Year 2013 (IMLS, 2015).

Grouping public libraries by size

As libraries exhibit different characteristics by size, it is necessary to analyze them at three different sizes – large-, middle- and small-size libraries. The criterion of “Population of the Legal Service Area (PLSA)” was adopted to classify data by library size. According to the IMLS-PLS, PLSA refers to:

the number of people in the geographic area for which a public library has been established to offer services and from which the library derives revenue, plus any areas served under contract for which the library is the primary service provider. (IMLS-PLS, n.d.: 6).

The US Census Bureau (2010) categorizes population as follows: (a) urbanized areas of 50,000 or more people, (b) urban clusters of at least 2,500 and less than 50,000, and (c) rural areas of all populations, housing, and territory not included within an urban area or cluster. The same criteria were used to group the public libraries into the three categories: (a) large-size libraries (PLSA ⩾ 50,000); (b) middle-size libraries (PLSA < 50,000 and PLSA ⩾ 2500); and (c) small-size libraries (PLSA < 2500). Based on these criteria, there were 1,144 large-size libraries (12.3%), 5,569 middle-size libraries (59.9%), 2,582 small-size libraries (27.8%) in the dataset.

Selection of variables

This study focuses on the relationships between two groups of variables in the IMLS-PLS dataset: (1) expenditures and resources and (2) children’s and YAs’ use. In this study, “expenditures and resources” refers to the amount of money spent and/or the input of staff, materials, or other assets necessary for providing collections and services to library patrons. The variables related to “expenditures” include total staff expenditures, operating expenditures for print materials, total collection expenditures, and others. The resources variables comprise total employees, printed materials, electronic books, and others. “Children’s and YAs’ use” indicates actual materials and services used by children or YA users, measured by circulations of materials and program attendance. We selected nine expenditures variables, 11 resources variables, and three children’s and YAs’ use variables. Table 1 presents the selected variables and corresponding variable codes. For simplicity sake, variable codes are used throughout the article.

Table 1.

Research variables.

Category	Variable code	Variable per PLSA
Expenditures	TOTSTAFF	Total paid FTE employees.
	TOTINCM	Total Operating Revenue
	STAFFEXP	Total Staff Expenditures.
	PRMATEXP	Operating expenditures for print materials.
	ELMATEXP	Operating expenditures for electronic (digital) materials.
	OTHMATEX	Other Materials Expenditures.
	TOTEXPCO	Total Collection Expenditures.
	OTHOPEXP	Other Operating Expenditures.
	TOTOPEXP	Total Operating Expenditures.
Resources	BKVOL	Print Materials.
	EBOOK	Electronic Books.
	AUDIO_PH	Audio – Physical Units.
	VIDEO_PH	Video – Physical units.
	DATABASE	Total Licensed Databases.
	SUBSCRIP	Current print serial subscriptions.
	LOANFM	Inter-Library Loans Received From.
	KIDPRO	Total children’s programs.
	YAPRO	Number of young adult programs per.
Children’s and YAs’ use	KIDCIRCL	Total annual circulation (including renewals) of all children’s materials in all formats to all users.
	KIDATTEN	Total audience at all children’s programs.
	YAATTEN	Young adult program Attendance per.

Another important step was to standardize the observed values of each variable by PLSA. Library size can influence the amount of expenditures and resources. Thus, to control for the unwanted size effect of libraries, all the variables are standardized by PLSA. That is, all values of the selected variables represent “per PLSA” (e.g. total paid FTE employees per PLSA).

Data analysis method

This study is an initial exploration of the IMLS-PLS dataset focusing on children’s and YAs’ use. First, we explored what relationships would exist between the two groups of variables, expenditures/resources and children/YA use (RQ 1). To examine the relationships, correlation analysis was employed using Pearson r correlation coefficients. Second, we investigated what proportions of library circulation and programing were associated with children or YAs (RQ 2 & 3). We calculated the following five proportions: (1) Proportions of children’s material circulation out of total library circulation; (2) proportions of children’s programs out of total library programs offered; (3) proportions of children attendance out of total library program attendance; (4) proportions of YAs’ programs out of total library programs offered; and (5) proportions of YA attendance out of total library program attendance. In addition, we examined the differences among the three groups based on analysis of variance (ANOVA).

Results

Relationships between library expenditures and resources and children’s and YAs’ use

Large-size libraries

Table 2 presents the correlation analysis results between expenditures/resources and children’s/YAs’ use in large-size libraries. First, most of expenditures/resources variables were significantly correlated with children’s and YAs’ use. As to children’s material circulation, the results indicated relatively higher correlations between expenditures/resources and KIDCIRCL as evidenced by r values over 0.3. Particularly, the correlation coefficients of TOTSTAFF (r=0.456) and AUDIO_PH (r=0.459) were around 0.45, revealing moderately high relationships. In contrast, correlations were relatively low between electronic resources (EBOOK and DATABASE) and children’s material circulation (KIDCIRCL). Interestingly, correlation was relatively weak (r=0.207) between print materials (BKVOL) and children’s material circulation (KIDCIRCL) in this group. In addition, LOANFM showed a relatively low correlation (r=0.240) with KIDCIRCL indicating that children’s circulation would not be highly connected to interlibrary loans in a large-size public library.

Table 2.

Correlations between library expenditures/resources and children’s and YAs’ use in the large-size library group.

Group	Variable	Children’s and YAs’ use
Group	Variable	KIDCIRCL	KIDATTEN	YAATTEN
Expenditures	TOTSTAFF	.456**	.330**	.374**
	TOTINCM	.329**	.259**	.328**
	STAFFEXP	.301**	.250**	.183**
	PRMATEXP	.406**	.268**	.333**
	ELMATEXP	.360**	.192**	.233**
	OTHMATEX	.429**	.332**	.345**
	TOTEXPCO	.352**	.220**	.315**
Resources	BKVOL	.207**	.145**	.164**
	EBOOK	.123**	.137**	.129**
	AUDIO_PH	.459**	.209**	.252**
	VIDEO_PH	.380**	.273**	.218**
	DATABASE	.115**	.095**	.152**
	SUBSCRIP	.135**	.103**	.107**
	LOANFM	.240**	0.034	.067^*
	KIDPRO	.242**	.669**	367**
	YAPRO	.185**	.251**	.771**

p<0.05; ** p<0.01.

Next, we observed statistically significant correlations in most cases between expenditure/resource variables and children’s programs and their attendance. In particular, TOTSTAFF showed comparatively higher correlations with KIDPRO (r=0.398) and KIDATTEN (r=0.330). That is, the number of staff was closely associated with library programs offered for children and corresponding attendance. Also, TOTINCM, which represents library budget, was related with the number of children programs (r=0.323). As to resources, multimedia sources, including VIDEO_PH (r=0.369) and AUDIO_PH (r=.281), turned out to be relatively highly related to KIDPRO than other sources (e.g., printed materials). Similarly, YA programs (YAPRO, r=0.358) and attendance (YAATTEN, r=0.374) were closely associated with the number of staff (TOTSTAFF). However, correlations between YAPRO/YAATTEN and resources were relatively low.

Middle-size libraries

Table 3 presents the correlation analysis results between expenditures/resources and children’s/YAs’ use in the middle-size libraries. In the middle-size library group, all correlation coefficients between the expenditures/resources and children/YA variables turned out to be significant at the alpha level of 0.01.

Table 3.

Correlations between library expenditures/resources and children’s and YA’s use in the middle-size library group.

Group	Variable	Children’s and YAs’ use
Group	Variable	KIDCIRCL	KIDATTEN	YAATTEN
Expenditures	TOTSTAFF	.553**	.475**	.284**
	TOTINCM	.517**	.416**	.243**
	STAFFEXP	.560**	.419**	.249**
	PRMATEXP	.584**	.343**	.188**
	OTHMATEX	.548**	.297**	.218**
	TOTEXPCO	.616**	.420**	.215**
Resources	BKVOL	.455**	.314**	.141**
	AUDIO_PH	.489**	.269**	.150**
	VIDEO_PH	.512**	.319**	.189**
	SUBSCRIP	.288**	.207**	.105**
	LOANFM	.426**	.200**	.076**
	KIDPRO	.373**	.701**	.308**
	YAPRO	.197**	.296**	.627**

p<0.05; ** p<0.01.

First, relatively high correlations were observed between KIDCIRCL and expenditures/resources variables. For example, KIDCIRCL was highly related to TOTSTAFF (r=0.553), TOTINCM (r=0.517), STAFFEXP (r=0.560), OTHERMATEXP (r=0.584), TOTEXPCO (r=0.616), and VIDEO_PH (r=0.512) as evidenced by r values higher than 0.5. BKVOL and AUDIO_PH also exhibited a moderately high correlation with KIDCIRCL with r=0.455 and r=0.489 respectively. Unlike the large-size group, LOANFM showed a moderately high correlation with KIDCIRCL (r=0.426), which indicates the importance of interlibrary loans for children services in middle-size libraries. In sum, in the middle-size libraries, the circulation of children’s materials was closely related to library expenditures and resources, such as staff, expenditures on staff and materials, and collections.

Second, KIDPRO exhibited a comparatively high correlation with TOTSTAFF (0.504) and BKVOL (0.414). KIDATTEN also showed the highest correlation with TOTSTAFF (0.475). This finding is consistent with the case of the large-size library group above. This implies that children’s program and corresponding attendance rate would be closely associated with the number of full-time staff. Library resources, such as books (BKVOL, r=0.414), audios (AUDIO_PH, r=0.319), and videos (VIDEO_PH, r=0.417), showed moderately high correlations with children programs (KIDPRO). Compared with KIDPRO and KIDATTEN, YAPRO and YAATTEN, however, showed lower correlation coefficients across the expenditures/resources variables with r values below 0.3 in most cases.

Small-size libraries

Table 4 presents the results of the correlation analysis for small-size public libraries. Patterns with children’s material circulation were similar to those of the previous two groups. Basically, in small libraries (PLSA < 2,500), KIDCIRCL was moderately related with expenditures, such as TOTSTAFF (r=0.400), TOTINCM (r=0.382), PRMTEXP (r=0.431), and OTHMATEX (r=0.374). Also, KIDCIRCL was closely associated with physical collections, such as BKVOL (r=0.403), AUDIO_PH (r=0.394), and VIDEO_PH (r=0.442). Not surprisingly, this finding affirms that staff and physical resources were the key elements associated with children’s material circulation. That is, the more staff, printed materials, and multimedia items, the greater the circulation of children’s materials would be expected. KIDPRO also showed positive correlations with expenditures, such as TOTSTAFF (r=0.415), TOTINCM (r=0.406), PRMATEXP (r=0.421) and OTHMATEX (r=0.346). Interestingly, the correlation coefficients between KIDATTEN and expenditure/resource variables were not as high as those of KIDPRO. In addition, the correlations between library expenditures/resources and YAPRO/YAATTEN were relatively low with r values lower than 0.2 in most cases. This result indicates that library expenditures and resources would be more closely related to children programs than YA programs.

Table 4.

Correlations between library expenditures/resources and children’s and YAs’ use in the small-size library group.

Group	Variables	Children’s and YAs’ use
Group	Variables	KIDCIRCL	KIDATTEN	YAATTEN
Expenditures	TOTSTAFF	.400**	.315**	.215**
	TOTINCM	.382**	.212**	.128**
	STAFFEXP	.217**	.089**	.010
	PRMATEXP	.431**	.208**	.082**
	ELMATEXP	.238**	.227**	.195**
	OTHMATEX	.374**	.141**	.114**
	TOTEXPCO	.454**	.222**	.123**
Resources	BKVOL	.403**	.274**	.193**
	AUDIO_PH	.394**	.222**	.145**
	VIDEO_PH	.442**	.250**	.197**
	SUBSCRIP	.287**	.122**	.061**
	REFERENC	.272**	.126**	.058**
	LOANFM	.233**	.072**	.014
	KIDPRO	.446**	.783**	.638**
	YAPRO	.144**	.162**	.455**

p<0.05; **p<0.01.

Proportions of children’s and YAs’ library use

Proportion of children’s material circulations out of total circulation

Table 5 presents the proportions of children’s material circulation out of the total circulation in the three different groups. Overall, we found that approximately 33.7% of the circulations in the public libraries were children’s circulations. According to a one-way ANOVA, there were significant mean differences among the three groups (F=46.7; d.f.=2, 9260; p<0.01). A post-hoc test based on the Tukey method confirmed that all differences were significant at the alpha level of 0.01. Interestingly, the proportion of children’s material circulations turned out to be highest in large-size libraries (37.0%) compared to middle-size (33.5%) and small-size libraries (32.5%).

Table 5.

Proportions of children’s material circulation.

	Mean	Standard deviation	Statistics
Large(L)	.370	.1298	F=46.700** d.f.(2; 9260)
Middle(M)	.335	.1184
Small(S)	.325	.1525
Total	.337	.1308
Post-hoc test^a	L-M L-S M-S**

Post-hoc test method: Tukey; ^*p<0.05; ^**p<0.01.

Proportion of children’s and YA’s programs

As shown in Table 6, 65.8% of programs offered at public libraries were designed for children. To be more specific, 64.8% in the large-size group, 65.3% in the middle-size group, and 67.1% in the small-size group (F=6.713, d.f.=2, 9113; p<0.01). The proportions of YA programs were relatively low in all three groups. On average, only 7.4% of the library programs were for YAs. In this case, the proportion of YA programs was higher in the large-size group (8.8%) than the other two groups (middle-size 7.4% and small-size 6.9%). In sum, children’s programs were dominant in public libraries whereas only small numbers of YA programs were offered.

Table 6.

Proportions of children’s and YAs’ program attendance.

	Children’s program attendance			YAs’ program attendance
	Mean	Standard deviation	Statistics	Mean	Standard deviation	Statistics
Large(L)	.727	.1765	F=3.584* d.f.(2;9114)	.062	.1006	F=8.094** d.f.(2;9136)
Middle(M)	.712	.2070		.052	.0967
Small(S)	.706	.2591		.047	.1055
Total	.712	.2191		.052	.0997
Post-hoc test^a	L-M L-S* M-S			L-M* L-S** M-S

Post-hoc test method: Tukey; *p<0.05; **p<0.01.

Proportions of children’s and YAs’ program attendance

Table 7 shows the proportions of participation in children’s and YA programs. Approximately 71.2% of library program attendees at public libraries participated in programs for children. The ANOVA confirms significant mean difference between the large- and small-size groups with the highest attendance rates in the large-size library group. Compared to children’s program attendance, the proportions of YA program attendance turned out to be much lower: 6.2%, 5.2%, and 4.7% for the large-, middle-, and small sized groups respectively. The proportion of YA program attendance was significantly higher in the large-size group than those in the other groups (F=8.094; d.f.=2, 9136; p<0.01), but it was still only around 6% of the total program attendance.

Table 7.

Proportions of children’s and YAs’ program attendance.

	Children’s program attendance			YAs’ program attendance
	Mean	Standard deviation	Statistics	Mean	Standard deviation	Statistics
Large(L)	.727	.1765	F=3.584* d.f.(2;9114)	.062	.1006	F=8.094** d.f.(2;9136)
Middle(M)	.712	.2070		.052	.0967
Small(S)	.706	.2591		.047	.1055
Total	.712	.2191		.052	.0997
Post-hoc test^a	L-M L-S* M-S			L-M* L-S** M-S

Post-hoc test method: Tukey; ^*p<0.05; ^**p<0.01.

Discussion

More than 90% of American parents view traditional literacy skills as important for their children and many attribute their own increase in library visits to book borrowing and the enjoyment they derive from taking their children to the library. Additionally, most view the public library as important for their children because there they are able to access information and use resources not available in the home. Further, they report the primary reason that their children visit the library is to borrow books (Miller et al., 2013).

Thus, it is not surprising that there are significant correlations between the number of print resources and the rate of children’s material circulation. What is unclear is why there are different patterns based on library size with relatively high correlations for middle-size (r=0.455) and small-size libraries (r=0.403), but low correlations for larger libraries (r= 0.207). Perhaps there are other important factors beyond sheer numbers of resources to account for children’s material circulation in large libraries. For example, expenditure on printed materials, which is closely related to purchasing new books, is relatively highly correlated with children’s circulation (r=.406). This implies that purchasing new books is more closely associated with children’s circulation than the amount of books overall. Similarly, in small- and middle-size libraries, expenditures of printed materials show higher correlations with children’s material circulations than the number of printed resources. This result indicates that continual investment in new materials would be important to facilitate children’s use of library books. Naturally, not all public libraries are in the position to make substantial purchases of new books; however, it is important that public library administrators recognize that just as adults seek popular new titles, so too do children.

Because YAs tend to vary greatly in their reading interests (Moeller and Becnel, 2015), YA circulation cannot be captured with this data set; thus our focus on YA library use is delimited exclusively to program attendance. Naturally, even this measure is flawed given that teens use library spaces for a variety of reasons beyond program attendance (Agosto et al., 2007; Howard, 2011). It stands to reason that libraries who employ more staff have more librarians who can offer programming to children and YAs; thus, high correlations between the number of staff and the number of children’s and YA programs offered is expected, and in turn, the number of children and YAs who attend programs. Interestingly, just as libraries with larger service areas were more likely to offer YA services a decade ago (Mustafoff and Teffeau, 2008), our findings suggest that is still the case. The relationship between total staff and number of YA program offerings and attendance is much smaller for libraries serving smaller communities.

Not surprisingly, children’s programs are a dominant offering in public libraries. About 65% of total programs are offered for children, and accordingly, they account for more than two-thirds of program attendees. These statistics reaffirm that children comprise a significant user group in terms of public library programming, and they also suggest that offering programs for children is a fruitful approach for drawing patrons into the library. On the contrary, programing for YAs comprises only 7.4% of total programs, which is significantly smaller than children’s programs, and only around 6% of program attendance. Yet, considering that YAs make up approximately 11% of the population (Mustafoff and Teffeau, 2008), libraries are doing a great job attracting this really hard to reach population (Vavrek, 2004). Considering the current library programs have heavily targeted children, libraries might need to expand their effort to reach out to adolescents, and collaborate with them to design programs of interest to them and other tweens and teens (Subramaniam, 2016).

Indeed, offering programming for children and youth seems to be a worthwhile venture for public libraries given that the proportion of attendance at library programs for children and youth surpasses the proportion of programs offered. Though most adolescents report that they do not attend library programs (Vavrek, 2004), nearly half of all children who visit a public library report doing so to attend a program, and the overwhelming majority of adults, both those with and without children, believe that libraries should offer programming for children and teens (Miller et al., 2013). Specifically, they indicate that libraries should offer more literacy programming to support the school readiness of young children (Horrigan, 2015). Libraries can also gain from offering programs for children and youth: parents of children who attend programs are more likely to use library resources and services themselves and to value the library as a public resource (Miller et al., 2013).

Interestingly, there are also sizable relationships between library expenditures on “other materials” and children’s attendance at programs and children’s book circulation. In light of current developments in public library services and programming that require significant expenditures that fall beyond traditional material resource budgets, this relationship makes complete sense. Recently, the Public Library Association and the Association for Library Service to Children (2011) added play as one of the strategies to promote literacy and school readiness. In support of that strategy, libraries are encouraged to add toys, interactive tools, and props for dramatic play (Diamant-Cohen et al., 2012; Dickerson, 2012). Similarly, libraries are also focused on supporting the digital literacy development of young children and adolescents through infusion of technology tools into regular programming (Mills et al., 2015) and library spaces for children and youth (Valdivia and Surbramaniam, 2014); thus, these other tools and resources are used to create maker-spaces and exploratory stations (Thompson, 2015).

Conclusions

This study is an exploratory analysis of multiple variables of the IMLS PLS focusing on children’s and YAs’ public library use. While there are some recent and older studies that have investigated the value of the public library and public library programs for children and youth (e.g. Justice et al. 2013; McKenzie and Stooke 2007, Waters 1996), there are few investigations that have used a large dataset of national scope to do so. Other researchers have used the IMLS PLS (and its predecessor which was administered under the National Center for Education Statistics), but few have examined the data to draw conclusions about public library service and programming for children and youth. Even though the dataset is limited in its collection of information related to children and use, findings drawn from it are generalizable to public libraries across the US.

Naturally, because the input variables are not designed to measure only children’s resources, for example, the data does not show exactly how many staff are associated with children’s services, there are limitations in the analyses that can be conducted and the interpretations made. The IMLS-PLS data does not include other significant activities of children or YAs, such as library space use or online resource use. In particular, it does not measure the circulation of YA category resources, which limits the understanding of YAs’ library use. In addition, because of the correlational design of the study, results should not be interpreted as causal. The nature of the resources/expenditure variables tends to be interrelated with each other, it was not easy to bring an adequate prediction model based on multiple regression. Also, the analysis of IMLS-PLS does not reveal underlying intention or motivation of library patrons’ use behaviors.

These limitations illustrate the need for further analyses of IMLS-PLS datasets. Because of high correlations between predictors, a logical next step in this line of inquiry is to employ more advanced analyses, in particular structural equation modeling. Also, a time series analysis will be needed to trace how library expenditures and resources have changed over time and their effects on children’s and YAs’ services. In addition, the future study will incorporate socio-economic status data by connecting to US Census to see how social and economic status would be related to children’s and YAs’ library use.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Author biographies

Soohyung Joo is an assistant professor in the School of Information Science and the College of Communication and Information at the University of Kentucky. He holds a PhD in Information Science from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He teaches courses in information seeking, digital libraries, information retrieval, and data analysis and visualization. His research areas include online information use, data analysis, information systems, and digital libraries. His recent research has been supported by the Institute for Museum and Library Services.

Maria Cahill is an associate professor at the University of Kentucky with a joint appointment in the School of Information Science in the College of Communication and Information and the Department of Educational Leadership Studies in the College of Education. Maria earned a Master of Library and Information Science at the University of South Carolina and a PhD in Literacy Education from the University of Tennessee. She teaches courses in school librarianship, educational technology, and leadership. Her research focuses on the literacy development of children and adolescents within the context of library services and programming. Her teaching and research have been supported by the Institute for Museum and Library Services and the Texas Library Association.

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