Thoughts on when my students say they don't read

Photo by George Milton

I teach journalistic writing at university, and if I’m honest, I feel slightly depressed. Because writing seems increasingly old school. Of course, people still read. But just not for long. We scan headlines, posts, captions, glib advertisements and maybe, just maybe, read half a paragraph before scrolling again.

Journalists are always grappling with how to attract the next generation and it’s easy—just go to TikTok. I’m not going to discuss its efficacy because it’s here to stay (and my students don’t even Google information, they ‘TikTok’ them). But I do feel deflated hearing my students proclaim, “I don’t read.” They can’t list media websites, either; they often write terse headings and cliches because everything else is so….. long.

 The shift to digital

I’m not saying all students are like this, but their numbers are growing because obviously, we get our news online (if not everything else). According to Pew, 21% of Americans (and 37% of those under 30) get their news from social media influencers. (That same Pew study found that 77% of news influencers have no journalistic experience. But that’s for another blog.) A report from Cisco predicts that online videos will make up 82% of all consumer internet traffic this year.

Humans love visual content. Our brains process images 60,000 times faster than text, making visual content immediately engaging. It is multi-sensory, immersive, emotional, and memorable. Hurix Digital, a company devoted to digital learning, argues that videos outshine texts because they are more interesting and interactive. I get it and I’m not a Luddite—these are incredibly effective tools, should be used to engage audiences. But the thing is, I teach WRITING, that old school tech.

Distracted smartphone readers

Most people get their news from their smart phone. Online, we encounter information overload, multiple distractions, the tendency to multitask, and we receive information passively.

The nature and design of smartphones encourages passive news consumption. It urges scrolling, swiping, scanning and watching behaviours—so reacting to the news—rather than proactively exploring and analysing it.

As most of us intuitively know, reading is active; it activates, and it gets us thinking. Only reading online is also different; reading researchers say there is a shallowing effect, meaning people approach digital texts like they’re reading social media posts; they don’t make as much effort. We have an entertainment mindset online, which means we don’t focus for long. Writer Linda Stone calls it “continuous partial attention.”

Now there’s GenAI

If we’re already reading less, what happens when machines begin generating the reading itself?” 

Generative AI can tirelessly generate content in seconds, summarize and reflect for us. I imagine the news of the near future will be created, edited, and summarized by computers, served up to time-pressed consumers in bite sized chunks.  OpusClip AI already does this with video, turning longer interviews or footage into viral shorts (because who can pay attention for 10+ seconds anymore?)

The way things are going, there won’t be a need for anything lengthy, text or visuals, and this blog alone will resemble a hefty book.

Why written journalism remains relevant

So TikTok, videos and visuals are here to stay, and I watch them, too. But written journalism allows for complex ideas to be explored thoroughly. Research repeatedly shows that readers retain information on complex topics better when reading text than video.

Professor Maryanne Wolf, director of the Center for Dyslexia, Diverse Learners, and Social Justice at UCLA, advocates for deep reading, which helps us learn empathy (when we read diverse perspectives) and critical thinking. While Wolf focuses on young children, I think her research applies to the adults in the room.

She says imagine the brain like a series of muscles—if you don’t read, and therefore, don’t exercise or challenge the brain to evaluate things and then articulate its thoughts (same goes for writing), your brain circuits and connections won’t grow. You are stunting the growth of your own brain. Naturally, most of us know it’s important to think critically, but putting it into practice is something else. That takes effort and time, which we often sacrifice for the sake of efficiency.

I do have to admit that writing is not the only path to deep engagement...but as a writer, I see it as an irreplaceable one for honing logical reasoning, nuance, and narrative depth (all qualities that also apply to video).

Final Word

I keep trying to change with the times, but in my heart of hearts, I am old school. I love writing and reading longer work. Books even. Most of my world still happens offline, interacting with people face-to-face, and this unedited, direct interaction happens in real time.

While I acknowledge how things have changed in our digital age and how sadly, many of my students just don’t read much, I will continue teaching writing. Just a bit longer. Publications like the Atlantic or New Yorker still publish longform journalism, seeing its value. So I will do my best, realising that while the spark might fade, it won’t die out completely.

The question is—will enough of us still tend the flame?