Data and code for: What’s in a book exchange: Examining contents in relation to steward intentions, geography, and public library collections

Data and code for research on Little Free Libraries (LFL) in Seattle. These files are archived from a GitHub repository linked in the references field.

The peer reviewed paper is here:  https://doi.org/10.1177/09610006221124336 

We interviewed stewards from a random sample of LFLs in Seattle, WA and documented the contents of each LFL. The files here support a publication examining what is found in LFLs and how stewards manage their LFLs.

Abstract:
 In the last decade, book exchanges, most prominently those registered with the Little Free Library® network, have attracted the interest of researchers and media alike. Very little is known about what types of books are available in these book exchanges and how their collections compare to those in public libraries. To address this gap in knowledge, we selected a random sample of 42 Little Free Libraries across eight Seattle neighborhoods to inventory their contents. We interviewed the stewards about their stocking and weeding practices. Our inventory shows that most of the books available in Little Free Libraries are children’s, mystery, suspense, self-help/health, and scifi/fantasy books published in the last 10–30 years. Neighborhoods in our sample ranged in socioeconomic and racial diversity measures, but there were no significant differences in LFL contents related to those measures. We also compared our inventory to the collections of nearby public library branches and found Little Free Libraries offer a complementary rather than competitive selection scenario: books in LFLs are generally older, with a lesser proportion of children’s books and higher proportion of fiction books.

本数据集包含对西雅图地区小免费图书馆（LFL）研究的数据和代码。这些文件源自参考文献字段中链接的GitHub仓库。同行评审的论文可在此处查阅：https://doi.org/10.1177/09610006221124336。我们采访了西雅图华盛顿州随机抽取的小免费图书馆的保管员，并记录了每个小免费图书馆的内容。此处提供的文件支持一项研究，旨在探讨小免费图书馆中存在的书籍类型以及保管员如何管理他们的图书馆。摘要如下：在过去的十年中，图书交换活动，尤其是注册于小免费图书馆®网络的图书交换，吸引了研究者和媒体的广泛关注。关于这些图书交换中可提供的书籍类型及其与公共图书馆藏书比较的信息知之甚少。为了填补这一知识空白，我们随机选取了西雅图八个社区中的42个小免费图书馆进行内容清点。我们对保管员的进货和淘汰实践进行了访谈。我们的清点结果显示，小免费图书馆中大多数书籍为儿童书籍、悬疑、惊悚、自助/健康以及科幻/奇幻类书籍，这些书籍出版于过去10至30年。我们样本中的社区在社会经济和种族多样性方面有所不同，但在与这些措施相关的LFL内容方面没有显著差异。我们还比较了我们的清点结果与附近公共图书馆分馆的藏书，发现小免费图书馆提供的是一种补充而非竞争性的选择场景：小免费图书馆中的书籍通常较旧，儿童书籍的比例较低，而小说书籍的比例较高。