Library support of bibliographic management tools: a review

This study aims to review the current level of service and support provided for the bibliographic management applications, EndNote and RefWorks providing research libraries with a baseline for benchmarking their support of these tools.

The 111 web sites of the Association for Research Libraries (ARL) academic libraries were systematically reviewed in 2009 for any information provided on the support for bibliographic management applications. This information was recorded and examined by type of library, US publicly supported college or university, US private college or university, or Canadian college or university.

The majority of ARL libraries provide support for one or more of these applications with the largest percentage, 42 percent, providing support for both applications. The US privately supported colleges and universities were more likely to have licensed an application and to provide support for both applications. A large percentage of libraries provide instruction on the supported application and instructional materials. The libraries supporting RefWorks were more likely to use the instructional materials provided by RefWorks where more libraries produced supporting materials for EndNote in‐house.

Examples of extemporary libraries supporting EndNote, RefWorks and both applications are provided along with other information to aid in the design and or development of support for bibliographic management applications.

This is the first large academic library study examining the overall support provided for these important and widely supported applications designed to work with library resources to aid in the research process.