Background

Previous research by the authors has focused on information seeking and reading patterns of scientists in both university and non‐university settings. For example, a survey of faculty at three US universities found that electronic journal use is high among faculty members, and particularly among science faculty (King et al., 2003). Surveys conducted on behalf of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) looked at the overall amount of reading of pediatric journals (King et al., 2006) and reading patterns of pediatricians (Tenopir et al., 2007). Pediatricians rely on scholarly articles for many reasons and continue to read heavily from personal print subscriptions for current awareness in addition to electronic journal articles for research and clinical purposes. On the other hand, readings by astronomers, studied in conjunction with the American Astronomical Society (AAS), are almost 80 per cent from electronic articles, most often from library‐provided e‐journals and second, from e‐articles in sources such as e‐print services (Tenopir et al., 2005). AAS and NASA working together have demonstrated particularly advanced journal‐related processes that portend advances by other publishers in the future.