I still remember the good ‘old’ days in which I would go weekly to the library, sit there for hours and bring home a huge pile of often non-fictional books. I would get caught in the narrative, loose myself in the material and read the books I borrowed in less than a week. Unfortunately this isn’t the case anymore. Nowadays I don’t seem to get through a book easily. I get bored, can’t focus myself, get frustrated when in my opinion the author doesn’t seem to get to the point fast enough, loose the author’s argument(s) and miss CTRL+F so I can search on keywords in the book. What has happened? Let’s face it: we aren’t used to reading anymore
Blame the WWW
For all that has been written about the Internet, little consideration has been taken in account about the way the Internet reprograms us [1]. Nowadays we have become surfers, trippers from one link to another, navigators of the WWW through search engines. With a few Google searches, some clicking on result pages, and you have the right piece of information you were looking for. While working we often interrupt ourselves to respond to incoming e-mails (viva the e-mail notifiers!), scan RSS-feeds, look at videos or listen to podcasts and react to messages from colleagues or friends on IM clients. According to Nicholas Carr:
The Net has become a universal medium, the conduit for most of the information that flows through the eyes and ears and into my mind. The advantages of having immediate access to such an incredibly rich store of information are many, and they’ve been widely described and duly applauded. [1]
How Internet use affects our cognition
But this development has a price we have to pay for. According to media theorist Marshall McLuhan [2] technology shapes the process of thought. And this is basically what is going on right now. Search engines like Google are chipping away our capacity for concentration and contemplation of information. We expect to take in information just like the Internet (read: Google) distributes and presents it to us ‘in a swiftly moving stream of particles’. [1]
A study – conducted by scholars from the University College of London – covering among others our online reading and research habits, suggests that we, the ‘Google Generation’, are in the middle of huge changes considering the way we read and think. We are exhibiting more and more a form of skimming activity, read horizontally through titles, content pages and abstracts to search for the quick wins, ’scan, flick and ‘power browse’ our way trough digital content, hop from one source to another and rarely return back to the original source. Besides, we make very little use of advanced search facilities assuming that search engines ‘understand’ our queries and read no more than one or two pages of an article or book before we loose our focus and hop to another website. ‘It almost seems that they go online to avoid reading in the traditional sense.’ [3]
We are not really readers
This kind of reading suggests that behind it lies a different kind of thinking. And unfortunately this may weaken our capacity to develop a deep kind of reading. According to Maryanne Wolf, development psychologist at Tufts University, we have become ‘mere decoders of information’ [4]. Our ability to interpret text, to make rich mental connections that are formed when we read deeply and without distraction, remains largely disengaged [2]. But actually we are dealing with a problem here that we have to cope with because our ancestors, like Plato, believed that writing and reading was a good thing.
But is it really so? Actually not. Reading is not an instictive skill for human beings [4]. It is not etched into our genes the way speech is. We have to train our minds how to translate the symbolic characters on the screen into a language that we understand. And the media and the technology we use transform the way we write and read. And thanks to our brain we have the ability to reprogram ourselves on the the fly, altering the way our brain functions and adapts to the technology we use [3].
So, well I hope I was able to grab your attention until this last paragraph. And if not, I don’t blame you. Taking in account the way the Internet reprograms us may help e.g. webdesigners and webwriters understand better the importance of how we must write for the web. We have been saturated with the inheritance the WWW has given us. And due to this inheritance we have to be aware of how we make information available for the ‘Google Generation’.
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For further reading on this subject, take a look at the following sources:
[1] N. Carr (2008), ‘Is Google Making Us Stupid?’ Atlantic Monthly, July / August.
[2] M. McLuhan (1994), Understanding media: the extensions of man, MIT Press.
[3] Ian Rowlands et al (1998) ‘Information behaviour of the researcher of the future.’ University College of London
[4] M. Wolf (2007). Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, Icon Books Ltd.
Good piece of work Denise, thanks.
I think reading online can be made easier by a few things.
1. Writing in extremely concrete language. Using words that eachs reader will interpret in exactly the same way. Make images pop up in their heads.
2. Writing scannable web pages. I would have liked your article to be a bit more scannable too
Use a lot of headings and make 1 or 2 words in each paragraph bold. If you ask me, most bloggers could use this to improve their writing.
3. People only ever remember 1 thing you tell them. That’s the stories you tell. So tell little stories and big stories, all the time.
Hi Aartjan,
thanks for the reply! Nice recommendations.
Totally agree with you, extreme concrete language is essential when writing for the web. This also helps with the withdrawal and processing of info on the web.
…and yes – busted – also a reminder for me
.
Denise
I usually let this go, but one of the reasons articles are hard to get through is the lack of proofing. It is the fastest way to reduce credibility.
You’ve misspelled ‘lose’ as ‘loose’ twice here.
The level of English in this and alsmost any article on the site is not good enough to attract a native English speaking (or should I say: anyone other then Dutch speaking).
The above might be a reason to write in Dutch, especially since -on top of this- the English is really anoying to read; e.g. the “stonecoal
” English and the 1-on-1 translations of Dutch into English.
- Why don’t we actually read anymore?
- Writing in concrete language (actionable language) etc etc.
On top of that, one of your authors (from her profile page) “does research” (you can do your girlfriend, but research…)
Who are you trying to attrackt with these articles? Stick to Dutch or improve the English!
The biggest problem I find in reading either online or on paper, is the quality of the writing or the quality of the layout. I think before we blame technology we must improve the quality of the writing itself. To often we are confronted with poorly written prose that does not engage our minds or emotions. Just because we can put letters together does not mean we can create meaningful and engaging prose.
I enjoyed your post Denise.
I rarely take the time to read an entire post anymore. Unless it’s something I truly care about. When I do care, I usually read the whole thing. I even look at the sources and comments and even try to comment myself.
In my opinion, there’s way too much noise on the internet. It’s increasingly difficult to filter through that noise and get to the things that matter to you as the reader. Probably why I skim more, and read less.
Keep up the studies and the good work.
-matt
Denis, you spelt “lose” wrong.
Couldn’t resist it, darling, sorry. Some of do still care, you see!
Great article though, and I have to confess to a little death on the inside each time I read about stuff like this. I think major centers like NYC, London, Sydney – the fashionable metropoli – are more likely to come to these types of conclusions.
If you were to test in secondary centers, like Chicago, Manchester and Melbourne, I bet the results aren’t quite so extreme…and in tertiary centers even less so. I think this effect is due to people in the busier hubs feeling almost obliged to characterize their citizens as being ahead of the curve. Just a thought…I think I’ll call it the “Cosmopolice Dilution Effect”. It’s been around a very long time…it predates the internet.
I think as “proper” reading is a skill to acquire, it is a skill to maintain through practice. I am constantly connected, and love my access to loads of data (and Google) but I still find it enjoyable to read many things from the Bible to classics to cheesy sci-fi. Given the popularity of e-books these days, I suspect (and hope) I’m not alone.
I love the topic of this article. It is 100% true. But what is most ironic about it (and probably what kept me reading right down until the end) is that you have made a couple spelling mistakes which were really easy to spot. You also used the word ‘And’ to begin two consecutive sentences, and there were a few other wordings and phrasings that indicated to me just how lazy our minds have become when it comes to both reading, and writing. It’s not your fault, I don’t judge you for it… and I don’t blame you at all.
As a society, we’ve become so thirsty for information that on a whole we no longer hold written pieces of information to the same high standards.
I can’t tell you how often I come across words in newspaper headlines or subheadings misspelled. Thank God there is a spell checker that automatically pops up on my Mac. On television, names, small words, and even some straightforward words are spelled incorrectly. A lot of people probably think the word “spelled” is actually “spelt”. That is because we get away with saying it aloud. There is so much bad grammar, spelling, and punctuation being downloaded into our collective consciousness on a daily basis that I don’t ever see it changing. Having good reading and comprehension skills simply isn’t a requirement to becoming a highly functional human being any longer.
I’d be surprised if most of us had the attention span to read a road map any more, with things like GPS, Google Maps, MapQuest, and other crutches so easily accessible at our fingertips.
@Matt Thx. Your right: the web has too much noise. My article isn’t flawless too
. However, it is up to us (e.g. web / graphic/ interaction designers) to decrease that noise and try to come up with interesting solutions to reduce noise on the web.
@BannedfromTwitter Interesting thought. I do believe that there is a huge difference between readers that have grown up with the www and those who haven’t. Might be interesting to dig into that. How do their reading patterns differ from each other?
another (rather glaring) typo is the last sentence of the first paragraph. Should be – Let’s face it: we aren’t used to READING anymore.
Apparently the author isn’t used to writing either – or at least not proofreading.
and the deeper aspects brought on by reading, the contemplation, can easily happen away from the computer. There’s no mention of the measurement of that at all.
I had to read every word because of the title and actually found myself wanting to skip and scan ahead, literally had to force myself to move through every word. Now I’m totally scolding myself for not reading non-fiction anymore. I’ll be at the library Monday, mark my words! Thanks for a well written and uncomfortably revealing article.
‘cmon – isn’t it wonderful that language provides enough redundancy that we can still get the message? Typos might distract the reader, and waste their time. Hence I do not argue not to pay attention to proper spelling. On the other hand this seems to be the price tag for fast decentralized communication, ie. blogs. Automated spellchecking today is just a first line of defense. (I have 2 red lines until now.) It does not catch grammar and gives no guidance regarding style. So after all, everything depends on the author’s abilities and the willingness of the readers to get engaged in the topic. _Matthias
[1] Link_ http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200807/google
However, I do not agree to the following paragraph:
“Taylor’s system is still very much with us; it remains the ethic of industrial manufacturing. And now, thanks to the growing power that computer engineers and software coders wield over our intellectual lives, Taylor’s ethic is beginning to govern the realm of the mind as well. The Internet is a machine designed for the efficient and automated collection, transmission, and manipulation of information, and its legions of programmers are intent on finding the “one best method”—the perfect algorithm—to carry out every mental movement of what we’ve come to describe as “knowledge work.””
This takes a wrong twist. Knowledge work happens outside the net, between the ears, so to speak. At best it is a dialog between mind and net.
Significant reasoning is not routine and cannot be automated in a tayloristic sense.
“We shape our tools; and thereafter the tools shape us.” – Marshall McLuhan
“And it is the tools, that make us smart.” – Don Norman
http://www.mprove.de/script/09/kiel/
http://www.mprove.de/script/09/reboot/coevolution.html
http://www.mprove.de/script/09/cognitivedesign/
Hello Denise, it’s me again.
you are right in demanding that x-designers should be responsible to create well formed texts for the web. To me this includes also page layout and typography to optimize for legibility: font, size, line length, other distracting elements on the page, stupid pagination, etc.
I find most of the content on the web cannot be read because of basic mistakes in these areas. Hence, if I really want to read an article –like yours or the Atlantic Monthly’s– I switch over to Tofu on Mac.
This provides much better typography and eliminates all other distractions by using a full-screen mode for the text.
Another aspect is the lack of options to interact with the text. 15 years ago some guys forgot that the web was supposed to be a read-write medium, and the commercial read-only web took over. Everything what came thereafter is just a bad hotfix to overcome the most severe problems. BTW_ I am talking about wikis and blogs here; and this tiny little textfield to enter my comments. All this is ridiculous given the capabilities of the computer and internet as such. There is much left to be done!
_Matthias
Nice article Denise.
I read a lot both web as well as print. I prefer print more.
Being a designer, i hv had experience with a few clients who don’t like large front in their websites. They still prefer running font to be max. 11 pnts. I can guarantee that most of the people who visit those sites may be having a hard time straining their eyes.
If we take care of certain basic layout arrangement and font ideas, reading online can be made gr8.
@mprove: thx for your interesting comments!
On your comment about Taylor’s system: I believe that Carr tries to underline the fact that the Internet works on a tayloristic way and I think he tried to make a comparison between WWW and Taylor’s system.
Taylor’s system had an influence on how tasks were managed; instead of working with thumb rules, precise procedures (algorithms) were used to accomplish tasks. Point is that these proceedings – to accomplish tasks – delivered other outcomes. The use of Taylor’s system had an positive effect on the outcome; i.e. the product. Tasks were performed on a more efficient way and waste decreased.
Knowledge can be seen as a product and the Internet, ‘a machine designed for the efficient and automated collection, transmission, and manipulation of information’. It molds how we accumulate, store and process information due to its nature. Accumulation and processing of information occurs on another way and in effect e.g. our reading habits change.
So I believe ‘knowledge work’ also happens inside the WWW due to the fact that it molds how we collect and process this knowledge in our minds. However, as you mention significant reasoning is not routine. Thank God this is something that we can do by ourselves!
–
Denise
I just want to give you some kudos for exerting effort in posting this entry and in coming up with this. I’m looking forward to more of your blogs.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NVuUAr4MMs