Book vs. Audio: Comprehension
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A few years ago, when people heard I was a reading researcher, they might ask about their child’s dyslexia or how to get their teenager to read more. But today the question I get most often is, “Is it cheating if I listen to an audiobook for my book club?”
Audiobook sales have doubled in the last five years while print and e-book sales are flat. These trends might lead us to fear that audiobooks will do to reading what keyboarding has done to handwriting — rendered it a skill that seems quaint and whose value is open to debate. But examining how we read and how we listen shows that each is best suited to different purposes, and neither is superior.
In fact, they overlap considerably. Consider why audiobooks are a good workaround for people with dyslexia: They allow listeners to get the meaning while skirting the work of decoding, that is, the translation of print on the page to words in the mind. Although decoding is serious work for beginning readers, it’s automatic by high school, and no more effortful or error prone than listening. Once you’ve identified the words (whether by listening or reading), the same mental process comprehends the sentences and paragraphs they form.
Writing is less than 6,000 years old, insufficient time for the evolution of specialized mental processes devoted to reading. We use the mental mechanism that evolved to understand oral language to support the comprehension of written language. Indeed, research shows that adults show better comprehension and overall better scores on a reading test if they listen to the passages instead of reading them. A study done by the Department of Psychology at Harvard University have found as much as 55 more knowledge is retained listening to a audiobook than reading, in ages 30 and younger. However readers over the age of 40 respond differently to written and verbal learning.
Nowadays we’ve become accustomed to the good old fashioned hard bound book. Many are hesitant to use the new audio technology for many reasons surrounding these new technologic advancements. For some, reading hardback books will never be replaced due to the feel and significant of a page turn. Is sitting down and flipping the page good enough for you? Or will you take a step into the future and learn by the power of audiobooks?
This is a satirical website. Don't take it Seriously. It's a joke.
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