Young Adults Not Reading

[Eric]

I just came across a very interesting (and very depressing) survey published by the National Endowment for the Arts. It's called "To Read or Not to Read: A Question of National Consequence". The complete survey can be found at http://www.nea.gov/research/ToRead_ExecSum.pdf. It shows that young people are reading less for pleasure than they were a few years ago. This is true even among college students. I hope that this is a trend that we can reverse in the near future, but I'm not overly optimistic that it will happen.

[IanBookMan]

it will be interesting to see how this trend will pan out, video games, internet are the "new" thing although yes, been around for decades, but it's new enough to teens now with the technology changes.

The next gen kids who now are under 3 will be growing up surrounded by these constant noises, flashing lights and instant information overloads and may reflect back to something more quality like reading books.
I think there's a chance in the future reading books might be almost a way to "rebel" against the super electronic monsters and therefore, become cool...?

Would be an interesting twist in society.

History shows us book reading has been associated with many classes, at one time it was the rich that read, then the poor, then privileged, oppressed the cool and uncool etc.

[Nandhini]

I find it really funny when people mention this and that movie as being great - like Shawshank Redemption, Lord of the Rings, Godfather - and I tell them the book's even better, they go, "Why do they have to turn everything into a book?"

Personally I've always loved to read and I'll pick a good book over a movie any day. Maybe imagination's what the current generation lacks, since all other entertainment is very visual and less sensory.

[IanBookMan]

turn everything into books... LOL

Now it's Books to Movies to Video Games.
And you think a movie can ruin a book, play some video games - they are sometimes insulting to the original.

[blue_diamond21]

Not sure which side of the fence I'm on here. I've been a total bookworm since I was a little kid and it was encouraged by my family but my boyfriend, despite his mother being a deputy head teacher and very into reading is just not interested in it, he would rathre take 2 hours to watch the movie than 2 weeks to read a book purely because he doesn't have a very long attention span. His brothers on the other hand read alot so family influence must play a part but so does individual choice.

I think it's best to get kids interested in reading when they are small so it becomes an ejoyable habit rather than a chore. Good, enthusiastic teachers also help massively at school. If a teacher isn't passionate or enthused with a book (which they are being paid to teach!) why would the kids want anything to do with it?

[Canada.Eh?]

I work in the Young Adult/ Audio Visual Dept. at our Regional Library, and most of the teens come in to use our computers. I'm always so thrilled when someone asks me to help them find a book! But I myself am in the 18 to 24 range (20) and I read like a madwoman! It just takes differnt types I guess. I do notice (and I mean no offense to anyones cultural values) that the majority of kids who come to read are very good natured, quiet types, whose intelligence impresses me. On the other hand, the kids who come only to use the internet (and who are often kicked out for bad behavior), are the " I'm a gangster, or I'm too cool for school " types. It's sad though, because after school, their parents just dump them there, usually till we close, like we are there to watch their kids or something. It's very sad. I blame lack of reading, and the attitudes I see, with bad parenting. It's not the teens at all.

[IanBookMan]

That's a pretty bold statement Canada.EH?
About lack of reading being the parents fault - however i do agree with you 100% on that point.
And I think a lot of people on this forum would as well.
But I guess this problem goes back even further than their parents, maybe the parents of parents etc?

I'm curious, the town your library is in, big, medium or small town?

The town I frequent is small, kids are in there on the internet but also get up to flip through a book the odd time as well, and when waiting for a computer (only 4 of them)

[Canada.Eh?]

I live in a "college town", and we are the Regional Library. We are the center of a large system, and provide most of the materials to many smaller libraries around us. In the Young adult section alone we have 29 computers for the public. These are split into a Young adult section, and a Family computer section. But we also have MANY more in the Adult, and childrens sections as well. We are on the lower floor, all of the Adult computers are on the second floors. And yes, I agree with you, a parent is probably a bad parent because their parent was a bad parent, and on and on and on etc. But as adults, they can make bigger choices, to change their lives, and give their children a better childhood than they had.

[MrWright]

I think young people today read less as there is simply more in the way of leisure opportunities available to them. Those hand-wringing types who attempt to write off today's delinquency ills as being related to "kids having nothing to do" have always astonished me. What planet are these people on. This generation is utterly spoilt for things to do. They have more things offered to them as entertainment than any other generation in history. Much of it can be accessed for free as well. Even a few decades ago, as recently as the 1970s, most of this stuff wasn't available: no home computers, no video games, no VCRs or DVDs, no CDs, no Ipods, no internet (unless you worked at the Pentagon) - so no Facebook, Myspace or Twitter! Hours just sitting around in your room listening to ELP and Yes, waiting for punk to happen! Slouched on the couch in front of Love Thy Neighbour or whatever else your 3-channel TV was airing that evening. I'm surprised youth crime and teenage pregnancy rates weren't a lot higher back then. I guess youngsters were better behaved, and read books or they'd have gone out of their minds with boredom - let's face it, if you weren't particularly sporty, sociable, or musical, what else was there?

[IceM]

I do find it sad that so many people are missing out on something so rewarding.

Alas, this is only if people read the right material. Crime and Punishment, War and Peace, A Tale of Two Cities: they offer far more than Harry Potter, Twilight, or Stephen King novels. And because teenage society tends to perpetuate easy entertainment and boycott items of concentrated focus, chances are young adults would read Twilight and Harry Potter. In that case, I'd rather not see young adults read than read soporific crap like this.

[readingaddict]

I'm assuming this report was done in America judging from where the people commenting are from?

I'm an Aussie and ever since I could read I have read. My three younger brothers read and everyone I know reads. There are of course quite a few people I know that don't enjoy reading but once everyone is talking about a book they begin to read. Take Harry Potter for example, one of my friends read it "because everyone else was" (*gasp*) even though she didn't like reading. Try stopping her now!
I think that getting kids/teenagers to read is really about finding them the right book that suits their maturity and interests. For me it was Tomorrow When the War Began, for my brother it was Vince Flynn and Anthony Horowitz and for one of my other brothers it was Fiona McIntosh and the other Horrible Histories

The most important thing involved in getting kids/teens to read is to not make it a chore or force it on them. My brother (the Vince Flynn one) hates school and dropped out but all it took was "have you read this book! I couldn't believe that someone could blow up a car like that, could you? Do you reckon it could happen?" and he was hooked. Once you find the book they like ask a book store assistant for something similar.

For people who don't like reading take the same approach as you do with kids who don't eat vegetable...don't tell them it's good for them!

[MrWright]

@readingaddict

I agree with you about finding the right books for children. Around the time I learn't to read I was obsessed with the Starwars films - the boring fiction books I was offered in school simply couldn't compete. I'm slightly embarrassed to admit that I actually came around to enjoying fiction a lot later on.

Although I think I got a bit carried away in that earlier post, I still think kids read less, certainly fiction, as there is more entertainment available. Up until quite recently computers were generally viewed as being for geeks and nerds (I speak as someone who was a big video games fan when an adolescent) but now the pendulum's completely swung the other way. I suppose reading was never particularly cool (maybe in Dickens' time) although after looking at some of the posts from America, both on this site and other forums, reading fiction seems practically on the same level as trainspotting over there. I find this a bit odd, as I thought the Harry Potter books at least were really popular. Then again I don't have much to do with children - I suppose the oeuvre of J.K. Rowling might be considered 'sooo five years ago' by today's kids. I don't know.

[Fran]

I'm a bit sceptical of these surveys as in my experience a lot of kids will deny being readers because they see it as "not cool" or are afraid of being called nerds!
I am a regular at my local library and while certainly a lot of the younger people, and the not so young, are on the net I still think it is a positive sign that at least they are in a library and in the presence of books and book lovers.
English teachers have a huge influence on whether or not students become readers, there is no substitute for an enthusiastic & inspiring teacher.

[Stinkin' Fascist]

It's sad that the majority of teens don't read anymore, but we can't really blame it on them.
The teen years are very impressionable and nowadays reading is for "dorks, losers, nerds, losers, and the smart ones."
Of course they're not going to read, it's not a big enough profit for companies compared to electronics.

Like in Freedom Writers, if classes chose a book that the students could better relate to, or one at least focused or set more on their time period, then i'm sure reading levels would increase. even if done in secret...

Shoot, i get comments all of the time for reading, i'm not a "nerd" I just enjoy it. and who are they to talk, I have higher comprehension and test scores, haha.

[callybee]

I'm assuming this report was done in America judging from where the people commenting are from?

I'm an Aussie and ever since I could read I have read. My three younger brothers read and everyone I know reads. There are of course quite a few people I know that don't enjoy reading but once everyone is talking about a book they begin to read. Take Harry Potter for example, one of my friends read it "because everyone else was" (*gasp*) even though she didn't like reading. Try stopping her now!
I think that getting kids/teenagers to read is really about finding them the right book that suits their maturity and interests. For me it was Tomorrow When the War Began, for my brother it was Vince Flynn and Anthony Horowitz and for one of my other brothers it was Fiona McIntosh and the other Horrible Histories

The most important thing involved in getting kids/teens to read is to not make it a chore or force it on them. My brother (the Vince Flynn one) hates school and dropped out but all it took was "have you read this book! I couldn't believe that someone could blow up a car like that, could you? Do you reckon it could happen?" and he was hooked. Once you find the book they like ask a book store assistant for something similar.

For people who don't like reading take the same approach as you do with kids who don't eat vegetable...don't tell them it's good for them!

Word from South Africa/New Zealand contingency