How Is Technology Changing the Way We Read?
By: Jason Ward
Tags: Culture, Future, Technology, Reading, Books

The negative impact of technology on reading

Social media and information bubbles

As I mentioned before, while there is a lot of information available, how that knowledge is accessed or presented can cause problems. Continuing with the topic of news, technology has been revealed to be quite polarising.

Increasing numbers of people are switching to getting their news on social media as opposed to print newspapers. In fact, a study by Pew Research in 2019 found that that 43% of Americans get some of their news from Facebook.

This is worrying as Facebook, and other sites like Twitter, work by using algorithms that present what they think the user wants to see. As mentioned before, this can lead to information bubbles. The Wall Street Journal in 2016 to publish a graphic showing ‘Blue Feed, Red Feed’ that compared the results of this algorithm when the users were at different ends of the political spectrum.

Both Facebook, YouTube and, more famously in the latter years of Trump’s administration, Twitter, have tried to rectify this bias with fact-checkers and warnings, but it is an uphill struggle.

The extent to which these outlets are culpable for ‘damaging democracy’ is hotly debated but the polarisation of opinion is certainly not helpful when it comes to getting a balanced perspective.

Another problem with social media is that it consumes time that could otherwise be spent reading. An article in Quartz estimated that if you gave up social media and read instead, you could easily read 200 more books a year.

Distractions, hyperlinks and shallow reading

In a traditional printed book, the author has (hopefully) spent a lot of time researching and planning how to present the information. The reader will work their way through the book, focused purely on the text and information presented. They follow the lines of logic, reasoning and argument in the order it was written.

While this is still the case with some literature, increasingly things are getting more interactive. Hyperlinks to other articles or sources can take the reader somewhere else, even if just briefly, and this interruption can impede the flow. (I am aware of the irony posed by my links.)

This can lead to someone skipping around the internet and losing the thread of what they were reading. Getting lost down an informational rabbit hole is annoyingly common. Studies have shown that the average webpage is looked at for an average of 18 seconds.

Of course, reading and research on a device connected to the internet can be incredibly helpful with such a wealth of material just a link or two away. It can obviously be distracting but studies have shown it can also be detrimental to the quality of research.

A study of student reference citations in research papers in 2015 revealed that 46% of the citations came from the front page of Google. 77% featured in the first three pages.

This type of reading and studying is harmful to students for multiple reasons:

There is concern that the reliance upon shallow reading may interfere with the development of deep reading skills such as thoughtful pondering, critical analysis, and inferential thinking. It is feared that neurological connections required for deep reading such as brain areas involved in visual processing and phonological processing may not be made in those people who learn primarily via shallow reading (Loh 2015). Source: Psychology Today.

The disruption is finding a new balance

Print books are here to stay

In 2010 Amazon introduced its first e-reader and the publishing industry went into a panic. At first, this seemed pretty justifiable as at one point the growth trajectory was over 1,200%.

Then, things calmed down and in the last few years an equilibrium has been reached. In fact, there has even been a slight reversal with demand for printed books actually rising slightly in comparison to digital. This has been accompanied by a rise in independent bookstores.

There are a few possible reasons for this such as the rise of audiobooks and people suffering from screen fatigue. After all, reading a paper book is nice. It is still the preferred way to experience book and the most popular way that, for example, parents read to their children.

I have written about publishing traditionally versus self-publishing and this new equilibrium here:

Libraries are surviving but only those who adapt

Another concern brought by the rise of e-reading technology is the fate of libraries. Surely with access to the internet, they are doomed, right?

Not necessarily. The ones that survive have adapted. The demand for paper books has, as noted above, remained strong. What has changed is how long people stay in the library itself.

Modern libraries now have the technology that allow someone to search their database. Instead of searching the shelves for the book yourself, it is possible to order it and then simply pick it up. Librarians have reported that this facility has been on the rise.

Libraries are here to stay if they modernize.