Slashdot Mirror
The Case Against E-readers -- Why Digital Natives Prefer Reading On Paper
HughPickens.com writes: Michael Rosenwald writes in the WaPo that textbook makers, bookstore owners and college student surveys all say millennials still strongly prefer reading on paper for pleasure and learning. This bias surprises reading experts, given the same group's proclivity to consume most other content digitally. "These are people who aren't supposed to remember what it's like to even smell books," says Naomi S. Baron. "It's quite astounding." Earlier this month, Baron published Words Onscreen: The Fate of Reading in a Digital World, a book that examines university students' preferences for print and explains the science of why dead-tree versions are often superior to digital (PDF).
Her conclusion: readers tend to skim on screens, distraction is inevitable and comprehension suffers. Researchers say readers remember the location of information simply by page and text layout — that, say, the key piece of dialogue was on that page early in the book with that one long paragraph and a smudge on the corner. Researchers think this plays a key role in comprehension — something that is more difficult on screens, primarily because the time we devote to reading online is usually spent scanning and skimming, with few places (or little time) for mental markers.
Another significant problem, especially for college students, is distraction. The lives of millennials are increasingly lived on screens. In her surveys, Baron was surprised by the results to the question of whether students were more likely to multitask in hard copy (1 percent) vs. reading on-screen (90 percent). "When a digital device has an Internet connection, it's hard to resist the temptation to jump ship."
Her conclusion: readers tend to skim on screens, distraction is inevitable and comprehension suffers. Researchers say readers remember the location of information simply by page and text layout — that, say, the key piece of dialogue was on that page early in the book with that one long paragraph and a smudge on the corner. Researchers think this plays a key role in comprehension — something that is more difficult on screens, primarily because the time we devote to reading online is usually spent scanning and skimming, with few places (or little time) for mental markers.
Another significant problem, especially for college students, is distraction. The lives of millennials are increasingly lived on screens. In her surveys, Baron was surprised by the results to the question of whether students were more likely to multitask in hard copy (1 percent) vs. reading on-screen (90 percent). "When a digital device has an Internet connection, it's hard to resist the temptation to jump ship."
Considering that most likely 2/3 of the people polled are textbook publishers and bookstore owners, and 1/3 students that isn't a surprising finding, How about JUST polling readers.
This survey was obviously done not taking into consideration dedicated e-readers and only focuses on smartphones and tablets. There's a world of a difference between the two types of devices. I'd like to see a study done just with dedicated e-readers.
I read at least two novels a month (sometimes more if I get the time) on my tablet and my phone. Most of my reading is on my tablet, because it's a 7" and a damned good size to read on, but when I'm on the road, I'll use my phone. The app syncs between the two so I can swap between the two. I generally use the Kobo app, and by and large it hides the status bar at the top so I'm not bothered by incoming emails. I've never had a problem.
Actually, the very first book I read on a portable device was a crappy little LG Keybo feature phone that I installed a nice little J2ME reader on. The font size was punched up a bit so I usually only got a paragraph of text per screen, but still didn't have any problem.
I'll be honest, I haven't bought a physical book in over a year. Even the technical books; a Powershell book and the OpenVPN official manual, are all eBooks.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I like having and reading physical books. I really can't explain why, so I do not have much to contribute.
Having the ability to touch any word on the screen and have definitions, translations, and wikipedia entries pop up as you read (which is great for many of the older books) is a fantastic benefit over and beyond the simple fact that so many of the world's classics are available free of charge wherever you have internet access is a bonus that can't be overlooked. Honestly, in terms of studying books such as Gibbon's Fall of the Roman Empire, I find myself eternally grateful for such capabilities.
I agree wholeheartedly that the eBook experience *could* be much better than physical books, but it isn't.
As an experiment, I recently picked up a reader and tried it (Sony eReader). Here's what I found:
Um... well. .. well, There’s Your Problem....
I've had a Kindle for 5 years now. My first was the Kindle keyboard. I now have the new Kindle Voyage. Not only that, but I can actually speak to the topic of using a Kindle for University as I bought text books for one of my Masters Degree classes, as an experiment.
- The Kindle e-reader has no glare. In fact, the e-Ink screen is SO good that you can read outside in bright sunshine with no problems whatsoever. I love being able to read on the beach.
- The Kindle is instant on when in sleep mode and can last for weeks. Just make sure to turn Wifi off.
- You can look up words
- I'm not sure how well it handles PDF files as I never use it for that. That's what I have my Android tablet for.
- You have all kinds of text formatting options with the Kindle
- You can easily bookmark locations in the Kindle and got back to that exact spot.
The Kindle is great for reading books. It lets you annotate, you can perform search, etc.
That being said, it isn't a book. With a book you can highlight, dog ear, make notes in the margins, etc. When I used a Kindle for my Masters course, I found that it was very good in some respects. For example, you don't have to carry a heavy book with you, it's more convenient to read when in the office, you can search for terms and look them up, etc. However, note taking was too restrictive. You can't, for example, draw a diagram or draw on the existing diagram. It's easier to find a place/topic in a book by just flipping through it or dogearing a page. You can use different colored highlighters, etc.
One of these days Amazon will come out with a touch screen color e-ink e-reader with a stylus that lets you create free-form notes. When you can actually take hand written notes in class and insert those notes as pages in between the actual pages of the e-textbook, that's when you will see e-readers take off as text book replacements.