The Centre studies Russian libraries' young users, their reading preferences including printed vs. electronic text preferences. Moreover, the Centre supports and coordinates regional and city public libraries that research young adult library services.

The Centre's staff advise colleagues from libraries in the regions on organizing research, developing programs and toolkits, and interpreting data. Russian librarians use books published by RSLYA such as Sociologist at the Library, or Librarian as Sociologist and Young Readers on the Internet.

Information and reference portal LIBRARY.RU has a Sociologist's Page, where books and articles on the social and cultural aspects of library services are published. The Page collects information on researchers, sociologists and culturologists from other libraries that research issues of interest. Librarian Union website has information about psychologists in libraries.

For years RSLYA has been coordinating sociologists and psychologists in public libraries. Meetings for sociologists and psychologists from all of Russia are held twice a year. A collection of articles is published before each meeting.

The Centre monitors the results of Russian and foreign research. Librarian Union website has published several translations of research articles from the UK and the USA among other countries.

In 2010, the Russian Ministry of Culture initiated research into the possibilities of using mobile devices for reading e-books in public libraries. The research was conducted in libraries in the Kirov and Ivanovo regions. With the help of the research results, RSLYA has created the first E-Book Museum in Russia.

LIBPLANET is another research project carried out by RSLYA. It's an online questionnaire in five languages (Russian, English, French, German and Spanish).

We mainly research young people's library behaviour, information needs, and reading habits as well as young people's subcultures and their representation among library visitors.

Head:

Ms. Margarita Samokhina, Ph.D. in sociology

Contact:

+7 (499) 161-01-01
[email protected]