Abstract
In a recent paper1 Burrell shows that libraries with lower average borrowings tend to require a larger proportion of their collections to account for 80% of the borrowings, than those with higher average borrowings. In that study, the underlying frequency distribution was a negative binomial. We are dealing with a case when the underlying distribution is of Lotka type. It is also shown that the “80/20-effect” is much stronger in this case.
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References
Q. L. BURRELL, The 80/20 rule: Library lore or statistical law? Journal ofDocumentation 41 (1985) No. 1, 24.
Q. L. BURRELL, V. R. CANE, The analysis of library data (with discussion),Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, A. 145 (1982) 439
L. EGGHE, Consequences of Lotka's law for the law of Bradford,Journal of Documentation, 41 (1985) 173.
L. EGGHE, The duality of Bradford's law, to appear inJournal of the American Society for Information Science, (1986).
R. W. TrUESWELL, Some behavioral patterns of library users: The 80/20 rule,Wilson Library Bulletin 43, (1969) 458.
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Egghe, L. On the 80/20 rule. Scientometrics 10, 55–68 (1986). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02016860
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02016860