WHY PEOPLE USE THE LIBRARY 53

is next, and the other services rank as minor compared to
these two.

CIRCULATION SERVICES OF THE PUBLIC LIBRARY: INTRODUCTORY
COMMENTS What does the professional literature have
to say about the nature of library book circulation? What
kinds of books are withdrawn? Does the public library supply
“better” or “worse” books than other sources within the
community or different kinds? What services does the term
“circulation” include?

Aside from the simple division of circulation into adult
and juvenile categories, much of the data on such questions
deals only with the usual classification of books by form and
subject matter. A few special studies, however, go beyond
this into other categories, such as “currency” and “quality.”
Whatever the classification, it is important to describe not
only what the public library circulates, but also how that cir-
culation relates to library holdings and how it compares with
the circulation of books by other distributing agencies within
the community.

CIRCULATION TO ADULT-JUVENILE BORROWERS From 4o
percent to 45 percent of the public library’s circulation is
composed of juvenile titles; that is, books from the children’s
room (Table 27). Regardless of the size of the city (from
25,000 up), the figure remains fairly constant, despite the
variation in school library facilities throughout the country.
This figure corresponds well with the data on the propor-
tion of public library users in this age group.

Not only do children use the public library in greater pro-
portion than do others, but as clients of the library they make
disproportionately heavy demands upon library facilities.
The circulation of children’s books in each group of li-
braries is high in proportion to the holdings of juvenile titles