Data Collection and Analysis
The first two phases of META 2 paralleled META 1. The last looked at public libraries in the life of the user.
Meta 2: Furthering Our Understanding of the Economic Value of Public Library Services: A Review of the Literature and Meta-Analysis is a five-year, three-phase research project that expands and updates the results of previous META 1 research conducted under IMLS Grant #: 11RE-04-08-0047.
Since the conclusion of META 1, researchers have continued to examine the economic value of public libraries both in the U.S. and abroad. Almost all of these studies concentrated on two basic questions:
- Whether there is evidence that public libraries contribute to the economic prosperity of the communities they serve; and
- How these benefits might be reliably characterized.
META 1 and 2 differ significantly from these and prior studies. while making extensive use of their findings. First, the META projects have a broad scope that is neither population nor geographically specific. Secondly, the META projects use statistical and meta-analysis techniques to draw conclusions developed by integrating the results of prior studies and probing them for patterns.
Results
The results suggest a pattern of mounting evidence. Public Libraries’ contributions to the prosperity and well-being of their communities is strong. Their predictable magnitude in typical periods continues to be in the $5.00 to $6.00 range.
Research Team
A number of people have generously provided time and resources to further this project, including fellow faculty members and public library users and experts. The following is a list of the major contributors.
Bibliography and Coding of Public Library Valuation Studies and Commentary
Results of initial searches for literature related to public library value published between January 2013 and April 2019 conducted in Google, Google Scholar, and a broad range of academic databases in order to update this section in META.