An Exploratory Study of the Description Field in the Digital Public Library of America

Abstract

This paper presents results of an exploratory quantitative analysis regarding the application of a free-text Description metadata element and data values associated with this element. It uses a dataset containing over 11.6 million item-level metadata records from the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA), originating from a number of institutions that serve as DPLA’s content or service hubs. This benchmark study provides empirical quantitative data about the Description fields and their data values at the hub level (e.g., minimum, maximum, and average number of description fields per record; number of records without free-text description fields; length of data values; etc.) and provides general analysis and discussion in relation to the findings.