In the second of our three survey results posts, we look at post-arrival reading.

Out of 115 respondents to the survey, 56% of students did purchase further books after attending lectures.

The reason behind this decision to purchase books later rather than earlier was mostly reported to be due to having a better understanding of which books were needed, or because the books were recommended by a tutor or fellow student. A large number of students who purchased text books after attending lectures had not previously been given a reading list, and so would need to wait for tutor recommendations.

Of the 15 people who received their pre-arrival reading list but didn’t use it, 2/3 of them purchased books after having attended lectures, as students most likely wanted to be sure of the necessity of purchasing books before doing so.

Just over half of the people who bought books off of their pre-arrival reading list still bought further books after their first lectures. However, there was a large number of students who did not purchase any books at all; this was often reported to be due to students considering the books to be too expensive, or because student’s felt they’d be able to access them elsewhere (e.g. online or from the library).