The Scoop on College Textbooks

UNI STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS COLLEGE TEXTBOOKS

Research Conducted by:

Ayslyn Garnette

& Students of LYHS 4070 Research & Evaluation in LYHS

Kathleen Scholl, Project Director

University of Northern Iowa

Spring 2019
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Tables 1

Introduction 2

Background Information 2

Methodology: 3

Survey Instrument 4
Sampling Procedures 4
Limitations 5
Results: 6

Demographics 6

Student Textbook Purchase 7

Student Textbook Use 8

E-textbook and open access textbook use 9

Conclusions & Recommendations 11

References 12

Appendix A: Questionnaire 13

TABLES AND FIGURES

Table 1 Location and Time of Survey 5

Table 2 Student Demographics 6

Table 3 Student Textbook Purchase 8

Table 4 Student Textbook Use 9

Table 5 E-textbook Use 10

Table 6 Open Access Textbook Use 10

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Introduction
College textbooks can be a touchy subject for a few reasons. They are
arguably one of the most important factors contributing to the success or failure of
college students’ education. The keyword here is arguably. Some would say
textbooks hold the bulk of information you will use for classes, others might say
they are simply extra weight to haul around campus. What I wanted to find out in
this study was who believed what of textbooks, and what patterns I could find in
students attitudes towards college textbooks. As a college student taking classes
that require textbooks for most of my classes and as an employee of our own
university bookstore I am intrigued to know how other students feel about their
textbook purchases, uses, and the impact of both. The components used to analyze
and draw these conclusions include; cost (and opinions on cost), renting or buying,
reasons for not buying, place of textbook purchase, textbook usage, e-textbooks,
and open access. This paper offers data, evaluations, and observations of college
textbooks and attitudes towards them from surveying a random sample of students
from the University of Northern Iowa.

Background Information
Affordability of textbooks has been an issue on the rise in the past few years.
Benoit (2018) noted that “the high costs of college textbooks are influencing
students’ purchasing behavior (not purchasing, not registering for courses, taking
fewer courses), with related impacts on their success. Students are faced with a
difficult situation: they can either buy the textbook and increase debt; work more
and have less time to study; or not buy the textbook and face the possible
consequences.” (p.1). This statement can be slightly terrifying for college students
who have already enrolled and committed to obtaining their degree, as well as

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individuals considering college. Therefore the cost of textbooks could possibly
deter students from continuing their education for fear of debt and not succeeding
for financial reasons.

With affordability in mind, open access textbooks have started to emerge. A

direct definition from Wikipedia of open access textbooks is “a textbook licensed
under an open copyright license, and made available online to be freely used by
students, teachers and members of the public. Many open textbooks are
distributed in either print, e-book, or audio formats that may be downloaded or
purchased at little or no cost.” Andrea Everard and Kent St. Pierre stated in their
research of open access textbooks that “94% of students agreed that the open
textbook was affordable. This addresses the major benefit of open textbooks (p.72).
There are challenges to open access texts due to their digital-technology based
platform. Everrard, et al. mentioned found students are still generally accustomed
to using traditional textbooks where they may choose to highlight sections of a
book with a pen or write comments in the margin. While open textbook publishers
are increasing and improving the number of features and functionality of their
e-readers, students are now the ones who need to access and learn to use the tools
that are available to them.

Methodology
This study explored undergraduate and graduate students’; thoughts and
attitudes on college textbooks, textbook usage, awareness of e-textbooks and
open-access books, and the role textbooks have on their academic success.
Students in the LYHS Research and Evaluation course of spring 2019 developed a
questionnaire, gathered and compiled responses from students at University of
Northern Iowa (UNI), and input the data under the leadership of Dr. Kathleen
Scholl for analysis.

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SURVEY INSTRUMENT

The researchers made their questionnaire using a few forced-choice

questions to obtain information such as demographics. One open-ended question
at the end of the questionnaire was used so students could share their thoughts
and opinions on the impact textbooks make on their college experience after some
reflection throughout the questionnaire. Close-ended questions were used in
finding information about students purchasing habits and their knowledge of
open-access and e-textbooks. Likert scales were used to find the level of which each
respondent agrees or disagrees with the cost of textbooks and their contribution to
success, the likeliness of using their textbooks, and situational use of e-textbooks.
These questions enabled the researchers to rank the level of influence for
respondents and allow respondents a neutral response option. (See Appendix A).

SAMPLING PROCEDURE
The research and evaluations are based on the surveys given to 370 students
at UNI, including both undergraduate and graduate students. To get a fair
representative sample of the students the researchers collected data in 20 different
locations on and off campus as well as three time periods of the day including;
morning (8 a.m. – noon), afternoon (noon- 5 p.m.), and evening (5 p.m. –
midnight) (see Table 1). Once all of the researchers obtained their data the
compiled them and put their data into Statistical Packages for the Social Sciences
(SPSS) to analyze the responses. The researchers used a combination of descriptive
and inferential statistics to evaluate the patterns and report their findings.

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Table 1: Location and Time of Survey

Location Frequency Time of Day Frequency

Candeo Church/ Salt 15 8 a.m. – noon 90

Company

Spectrum Project 15 Noon – 5 p.m. 189

River College Ministry 15 5 p.m. - midnight 91

Bartlett- North American 15

Review

WRC- Graduate Class 16

Redeker Center 30

Rod Library 45

Maucker Union 45

McCollum-Lecture + Lab 14
Class

Curris Business Building 26

Schindler Education Center 30

Sabin Hall- Conflict 3

Resolution Class

Latham 15

CAC- Communication Arts 19

Center

Speech Pathology Class 10

Seerley- Non-western 22
Culture Class

Lang 15

23rd Street Market 15

ITTC 5

Total 370

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LIMITATIONS
There were limitations when using convenience sampling only in Cedar
Falls, Iowa. A more random sample may have yielded better results. We found
decent range of 17 years in the age of participants, and the average age was about 20
years old. This meant most of our participants were juniors and seniors, which
shows a slight bias of the researchers asking students their own age to complete
the survey.

Results
DEMOGRAPHICS
In the researchers’ questionnaire, demographics were left at the end of the
survey for respondents to complete last. Respondents were asked to provide their
sex, age, college credit classification, how many credits they were enrolled in for
that semester, whether they received financial aid or not and if they used that aid
to purchase textbooks, ethnicity, and their specific college at UNI. Of the 370
participants 136 (36.8%) were male, 229 (61.9%) were female, and the remaining 4
(1.1%) indicated other (see Table 2).

Table 2: Student Demographics

College Credit Classification Male Female

Freshman (n=50) 16 11.7% 34 14.8%

Sophomore (n=75) 27 19.8% 48 20.9%

Junior (n=100) 35 25.7% 65 28.3%

Senior (n=109) 46 33.8% 63 27.5%

Graduate (n=31) 12 8.8% 19 8.2%

Academic College of Major Male Female

College of Business (n=52) 31 23.8% 21 9.2%

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College of Education (n=114) 35 26.9% 79 34.5%

College of Social and Behavioral Science (n=53) 12 9.2% 41 17.9%

College of Humanities, Arts, and Sciences 43 33.1% 79 34.5%

(n=122)

General Studies (n=11) 9 6.9% 2 0.9%

Undecided (n=7) 0 0% 7 3.1%

Did you receive financial aid this semester? Male Female

No (n=121) 45 33.1% 74 32.3%

Yes (n=248) 91 66.9% 155 68.7%

Did you apply aid to buy textbooks? Male Female

No (n=200) 70 70% 128 74%

Yes (n=75) 30 30% 45 26%

STUDENT TEXTBOOK PURCHASE

Participants were asked how much money they spent on their
textbooks/e-textbooks. There was a large range between how much students spent
on their college textbooks, the lowest being $0 and the highest $1,500. The average
amount spent on textbooks from the sample was around $260. Respondents were
also asked about the level to which they agreed or disagreed with the following
statement, “the cost of textbooks is too high” on a Likert scale from 1-5 (1 being
strongly disagree and 5 being strongly agree). The average from all respondents was
4.5637 (see Table 3), which is in the middle of agree and strongly agree. However,
graduate students less often agree that the cost of textbooks is not too high,
whereas undergraduate students, especially juniors and seniors, tend to believe
they are too high a price. Throughout the undergraduates freshmen and
sophomores answered more often that they disagreed with the cost of textbooks

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being too high. From this I can put together a short story, that in the beginning of a
student’s college career textbooks are perceived as important to their success in
college therefore the price is somewhat fair. However as time goes on many
students find themselves not using their textbooks or find alternatives to their
textbooks, which causes them to believe that textbooks cost too much for how
little they provide to their academic success. As time goes on and students find
themselves in graduate school and using their college textbooks more often for
their academic studies.

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Table 3: Student Textbook Purchase

The Cost of Textbooks is too high

Freshman 4.5200

Sophomore 4.5325

Junior 4.6535

Senior 4.6330

Graduate 4.1935

** 1=strongly disagree, 2=disagree, 3=neutral, 4=agree, 5 strongly agree

STUDENT TEXTBOOK USE

As stated earlier, graduate students agree less with the cost of textbooks
being too high statement, which makes the findings in student textbook use even
more interesting. Graduate students’ likelihood of using their textbooks before
material is covered in class and while studying for an exam is slightly higher than
undergraduates. Both pieces of data show a possibility of professors in graduate
school using their textbooks more heavily than undergraduate professors. Overall
there isn’t a huge difference in all of the students’ textbook usage. All of the
students tend to be more likely to use their textbooks while studying for exams
rather than reading the material before class, which shows a theme of
procrastination. In Table 4, you can see the majority of all students
(freshmen-graduate students) are either very likely, or somewhat likely to use their
textbook when studying for an exam. On the reverse, the majority answered the
opposite to be true for using their textbook before the material is covered in class.

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Table 4: Student Textbook Use

When Studying for an Exam

Freshman Sophomore Junior Senior Graduate

Very 3 (6.1%) 2 (2.6%) 1 (1%) 4 (4%) 1 (3.6%)

Unlikely

Somewhat 5 (10.2%) 0 (0%) 10 (10.1%) 11 (11%) 2 (7.1%)

Unlikely

Neutral 11 (22.4%) 4 (5.2%) 6 (6.1%) 8 (8%) 3 (10.7%)

Somewhat 13 (26.5%) 38 (49.4%) 41 (41.4%) 39 (39%) 12 (42.9%)

Likely

Very Likely 17 (34.7%) 33 (42.9%) 41 (41.1%) 38 (38%) 10 (35.7%)

Before Material is Covered in Class

Freshman Sophomore Junior Senior Graduate

Very 18 (36.7%) 32 (42.1%) 33 (34%) 48 (48.5%) 6 (21.4%)

Unlikely

Somewhat 11 (22.4%) 20 (26.3%) 28 (28.9%) 22 (22.2%) 12 (42.9%)

Unlikely

Neutral 7 (14.3%) 8 (10.5%) 13 (13.4%) 12 (12.1%) 3 (10.7%)

Somewhat 11 (22.4%) 13 (17.1%) 17 (17.5%) 15 (15.2%) 4 (14.3%)

Likely

Very Likely 2 (4.1%) 3 (3.9%) 6 (6.25) 2 (2%) 3 (10.7%)

E-TEXTBOOK AND OPEN ACCESS TEXTBOOK USE

Respondents were asked a few questions about their e-textbook and open
access textbook experiences and opinions. From the sample, the findings
concluded that a little over half of college students have used an e-textbook while
attending UNI. Contrasting with open access textbook usage, where only 24.1% of
students answered “yes”, they have used an open access textbook during their
college career at UNI, and 40.4% answered “not to my knowledge”. 54.4% of the
respondents said they have never heard of open access textbooks before taking the

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survey (see Tables 5 & 6). As mentioned earlier, open access textbooks have the
potential to help more students succeed in college being a free resource, which is
why finding such a low percentage of students who know about open access
textbooks is shocking. While looking at the findings you will also see that only
58.5% of students agree/strongly agree that they know where to access e-textbooks,
and the majority of students disagree and strongly disagree with the statement “I
prefer e-textbooks over hard cover books” (Table 5).

Table 5: E-textbook Use

Have you ever used an e-textbook in a class taken at No
UNI? Yes
132
(35.7%) 236 (63.8%)

I know where to access e-textbooks.

I’ve never used an Strongly Disagree Neutral Agree
e-text disagree Strongly
agree
34 (9.4%) 18 (5%) 47 (13%) 51 138
(14.1%) (38.1%) 74 (20.4%)

I prefer e-textbooks over hard cover books.

I’ve never Strongly Disagree Neutral Agree
used an disagree Strongly
e-text agree

41 (11.3%) 105 (28.9%) 83 (22.9%) 81 (22.3%) 33 (9.1%) 20 (5.5%)

Table 6: Open Access Textbook Use

No Yes Not to my
Have you ever used an open access knowledge
textbook in a class taken at UNI?
131 (35.5%) 89 (24.1%)
149 (40.4%)

No
Have you ever heard of open access Yes
textbooks?

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199 (54.4%)
167 (45.6%)

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Conclusions & Recommendations
College textbooks are considered one of the most influential factors to a
student’s education. Students however are struggling to pay for their textbooks and
financial aid isn’t readily available to many. This means a lot of students are having
to choose to go without their textbooks and sacrifice a part of their learning
experience in order to survive financially on their own. There is a slight difference
as time goes on for college students and their opinion on the cost of textbooks.
This difference has to do with their attitudes towards the textbooks usefulness.
From the respondents answers one can claim that undergraduates slowly start to
believe they no longer need their college textbooks, therefore stop purchasing
textbooks. Graduate students and professors however, must rely more heavily on
their textbooks for their supplemental learning. Some students have tried using
e-textbooks and found that they enjoy and even prefer using them over a hard copy
text, while others do not enjoy the experience most likely do not go back to
e-textbooks. A “combination” of the two needs of college students is open access
textbooks. These textbooks are typically free of charge and contain a tremendous
amount of information that professors can use for their classes and students can
take advantage of to supplement their learning. The problems with open access
textbooks is that many students have never heard of open access, they are usually
online (which most students do not enjoy e-textbooks for that reason), and there is
a limited amount of open access available at the moment. Since so many students
claim that the cost of textbooks is too high, open access textbooks would be a great
solution. A way to get the word out about open access on UNI’s campus would be
to inform advisors and professors and encourage them to explore the web for some
open access textbooks to share with their students. Another recommendation for
spreading the word about open access is using the campus computers that have

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waiting screens with different tips and events on campus. With spreading the word
about open access we can hopefully see growth in the amount of it offered online.

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References
Open textbook. (2019, February 27). Retrieved from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_textbook

Benoit, A. M. (2018). Textbook Affordability and Student Acceptance of

eTextbooks: An Institutional Case-study.The Canadian Journal for the
Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 9(2). Retrieved from
https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cjsotl_rcacea/vol9/iss2/3

Everard A. &  St. Pierre K. (Fall 2014) A Case for Student Adoption of Open
Textbooks Retrieved from
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cfc10e0/3297481?response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%2A%3
DUTF-8%27%27a%2520case%2520for%2520student%2520adoption%2520of%
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CS23L3LEJQ%2F20190502%2Fus-east-1%2Fs3%2Faws4_request&X-Amz-Sig
nature=b153229a6e92084cc6b7ac4296ec6cf171b09534c0192ff487e02f54bfb96
5f2

R. Eric Landrum , Regan A. R. Gurung & Nathan Spann (2012) Assessments of

Textbook Usage and the Relationship to Student Course Performance, College
Teaching, 60:1, 17-24, DOI: 10.1080/87567555.2011.609573

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