Limitations
We anticipated some limitations in our study. Because we used only DePaul University students for our sample, this could hinder us from understanding how the majority of college students obtain their textbooks at other colleges. It also limits us to a certain age group. Also, we used a convenience sample which can skew the results of knowing the people who took our survey. These results may also not be applicable to the general population. We can also not control for any external variables that occur when the participants are taking the survey online. They could have been distracted or not answer truthfully while taking the survey. However, by incorporating free-form questions into our survey, we hoped to gain their full attention while responding to the questions.
After the surveys were taken, we noted that eight participants chose the 'other' response for how the acquire their textbooks. Most of these respondents said that they rented from the library whenever possible. If we did this study again, we could put that as an option for future participants. Another future task that could be carried out differently is to make this survey available to all collegiate schools so we can generalize what students across the nation typically use as a means to attain their textbooks for the quarter or semester.