Deep Reading vs. Superficial Reading

[Steve]

I read an interesting article from KQED's Mindshift blog entitled The Case for Preserving the Pleasure of Deep Reading.

Some quotes:

Last month, for example, Britain’s National Literacy Trust released the results of a study of 34,910 young people aged eight to sixteen. Researchers reported that 39% of children and teens read daily using electronic devices, but only 28% read printed materials every day. Those who read only onscreen were three times less likely to say they enjoy reading very much, and a third less likely to have a favorite book. The study also found that young people who read daily only onscreen were nearly two times less likely to be above-average readers than those who read daily in print or both in print and onscreen.

The “reading circuits” we construct are recruited from structures in the brain that evolved for other purposes—and these circuits can be feeble or they can be robust, depending on how often and how vigorously we use them.

Observing young people’s attachment to digital devices, some progressive educators and permissive parents talk about needing to “meet kids where they are,” molding instruction around their onscreen habits. This is mistaken. We need, rather, to show them someplace they’ve never been, a place only deep reading can take them.

Today, with billions of books in print and stored online, the endangered breed is not books but readers. Unless we train the younger generation to engage in deep reading, we will find ourselves with our culture’s riches locked away in a vault: books everywhere and no one truly able to read them.

[Tuly]

Great article. I agree, I also believe deep reading also helps with comprehension which seems to be a problem with some children. Even though I believe if we were allowed to read a book over and over (like we do with our scriptures) we would not have comprehension problems.

[Tuly]

I got this info from Lumosity's website. Goes along with deep vs. superficial reading. It is interesting they picked Austen's Mansfield Park (her Gothic book). I think I would have picked another book like C.S. Lewis' - Till We have Faces.

Casual versus critical reading
As a longtime literary scholar, Phillips had always been interested in how reading literature could shape how people viewed the world. From anecdotal evidence, at least, it seemed as if the type of critical textual analysis taught in classrooms heightened attention when compared to casual reading.

To test this theory, Phillips and researchers from the Stanford Center for Cognitive and Neurobiological Imaging used an fMRI machine to scan the brains of 18 participants as they read a chapter from Austen’s Mansfield Park. First, the participants were asked to read the chapter casually, as they would for fun. Then they were asked to switch to close reading, a common term for the type of scrutiny to detail and form required to analyze text in a literary course. To ensure that participants could successfully switch between these two modes of reading, all participants were PhD candidates pursuing literary degrees.

Researchers observed a significant shift in brain activity patterns as the PhD students went from casual to critical modes. Critical reading increased bloodflow across the brain in general, and specifically to the prefrontal cortex.
Executive function and the brain
The prefrontal cortex is known to play a role in executive function, which refers to a set of higher-order cognitive processes that manage how you divide your attention and coordinate complex activities. Phillips and her team posit that executive function may help explain the observed changes in participants’ brains.

This field of “literary neuroscience” is a new one, and Phillips hopes that these preliminary results will lead to further research on how reading can shape and shift cognition. Though it’s still too early to understand exactly what the future of this new branch of research holds, Phillips suggests that critical reading could one day be seen as a valuable tool in “teaching us to modulate our concentration.”

[Edward]

This is interesting. I tried reading on my phone for a phase but was invariable displeased with it, and it actually took me LONGER to read. A 400 page book takes a few hours to finish when I read in print, but on a screen it would take me almost TWO DAYS to read the same amount. Plus, I often had to re-read parts because it wasn't all sinking in. I only read in print now whenever I can help it.