https://archive.ph/PhuVK>Any reader knows the unique delight of settling down with a good book.>But over the past two decades, there has been a steady decline in Americans who read for fun, according to a study published on Wednesday.>Researchers from University College London and the University of Florida examined national data from 2003 to 2023 and found that the share of people who reported reading for pleasure on a given day fell to 16 percent in 2023 from a peak of 28 percent in 2004 — a drop of about 40 percent. It declined around 3 percent each year over those two decades.>There is evidence that reading for pleasure has been declining since the 1940s, the researchers said, but they called the size of the latest decrease “surprising,” given that the study defined reading broadly, encompassing books, magazines and newspapers in print, electronic or audio form.>Many previous studies’ results could be questioned because they didn’t explicitly account for e-books and audiobooks, said Daisy Fancourt, a co-author of the study and a professor of psychobiology and epidemiology at University College London.>The study did not answer the question of why Americans were reading less. But the authors suggested some possible explanations, including increased use of social media and other technology, or more time spent at work because of economic pressure. Further research would be needed to confirm those theories.>The decline in reading could have implications for Americans’ learning, relationships and overall well-being, the researchers said.>“Even though reading is often thought of as more of an individual activity, when we read stories, we actually form connections with characters,” Dr. Fancourt said. “The empathy that we feel for them is actually real, and these connections with characters can be ways that we can feel less alone, that we can feel socially and emotionally validated.”
>The new study, published in the journal iScience, relied on data from the American Time Use Survey, which asks thousands of Americans per year to describe in detail how they spent a day. Over the 20 years the researchers analyzed, more than 236,000 Americans completed the survey.>The findings showed significant demographic disparities among those who read for pleasure. For example, in 2023, the most highly educated people were more than twice as likely to read as the least educated, and high-income people were about 1.5 times as likely to read as low-income people. Those disparities widened over time.>The researchers also found that, while more than 20 percent of people surveyed had a child under 9 years old, only 2 percent of those surveyed read with a child — a finding that stayed largely flat throughout the study period but that could contribute to further declines in adult reading going forward, the researchers said.>Research indicates that reading can have a wide range of benefits for educational attainment, reasoning and comprehension skills, imagination, empathy, mental health, cognitive health and more.>Jill Sonke — a co-author of the new paper and a director of the EpiArts Lab at the University of Florida, which studies how engagement in the arts and culture affects health — said she would like to see more awareness that reading is a resource “for our health and well-being.”>“As we’re living in this really complex and really challenging time, we really need to be intentional about the ways in which we support our health,” Dr. Sonke said.>Dr. Fancourt expressed particular concern about the increase in demographic disparities among those who read for fun. Not only were people reading less, she said, but “potentially the people who could benefit the most for their health — so people from disadvantaged groups — are actually benefiting the least.”>People may draw particular benefits from thinking deeply about what they read and talking about it with others.>It is not the case that “I can sit you down and give you a Jane Austen novel, you read it, and you come out with better mental health,” said James Carney, an associate professor at the London Interdisciplinary School and the lead author of a 2022 study on reading and mental health.>But discussing and reflecting on fiction — as opposed to just reading it — was linked to better mental health and social capabilities, including the ability to perceive nuances in interpersonal relationships, said Dr. Carney, who was not involved in the new study. Engaging with many forms of nonfiction would probably have similar benefits, he said.
>fewer people are readingFTFY
>>24727936>AmericansDon't really count as people.
>>24727936We are entering a post-literate society due to shortening attention spans and the reverse-Flynn effect.I used to read dozens a book a year, but now it takes me like six weeks to finish a novel because I’m too addicted to my phone.
>>24727952This. They count as gods.
>>24727972>now it takes me like six weeks to finish a novel because I’m too addicted to my phoneI've partially solved this by reading books from Gutenberg etc. on my phone. It now takes me about six weeks to finish two books, one that I read on my phone and another that I have by the bedside.
>>24727972I found the same problem with reading books on my phone. Once I started reading real books again, I was able to focus better etc.>>24728002I am the opposite of you lol
>>24727936So they are reading for internet clout?
>>24727972I see people posting shit like this all the time, but I cannot imagine what about your phone is so interesting.
>>24728021That's the greatest tragedy: it isn't, and yet here I am, posting on /lit/.
Fun is easily obtained in 2025.Books aren't a medium to seek fun in. Not cost effective.
>>24728021As someone who spends time shitposting on 4chan you should be uniquely fit to understand the illogical nature of this.
>>24728063Shitposting is not a large enough time commitment to prevent me from doing any of the other things I want to do. People act like phone scrolling is a full time job and I don't get it.
>>24727936>people are no longer primarily resorting to communicating with an archaic Stone Age technologyOh no. Whatever will we do with the first 10 years of a child’s education which will suddenly be free? Certainly, there’s nothing better they could possibly be doing with that time than learning to a complicated system of symbols (based on scratchings made in dried mud) that will be utilized because it’s .5 seconds faster and 5% easier than making a voice/video recording.
>>24728021It's not the phone by itself, it's social media + having the phone on him at all times allowing him to sate his social media addiction. Whenever people talk about being "on their phone" they mean scrolling through social media.
>>24728072You understand on a physiological level what it's like to get caught in some pointless (You) farm argument on 4chan, so expand that same moment of compulsion into a larger feedback loop that they refuse to opt out of. It's easy for you to understand conceptually.
>>24728079Just delete social media. Why did he even have it in the first place?
I would like to contribute, but I am simply too tired.
>>24728121>>24727936The article is talking about 2023 and is no longer relevant. Trends come and go very fast. By now, people can be reading twice as much as they were reading in 2023. Find a new study.
