Are Adults Forgetting How To Read? (economist.com) 77
One in five adults in developed nations demonstrate primary school-level literacy and numeracy skills, according to an OECD study of 160,000 people across 31 countries released December 10. The decennial Survey of Adult Skills reveals declining literacy rates over the past decade despite rising secondary education completion.
Finland topped rankings across all tested areas -- numeracy, literacy, and problem-solving -- while Japan, Norway and the Netherlands performed above average. The United States showed declining scores, with Chile, Italy, Poland and Portugal reporting high proportions of below-average performers. The study found widening skill gaps between top and bottom performers, with declining scores concentrated among lower-performing adults.
Finland topped rankings across all tested areas -- numeracy, literacy, and problem-solving -- while Japan, Norway and the Netherlands performed above average. The United States showed declining scores, with Chile, Italy, Poland and Portugal reporting high proportions of below-average performers. The study found widening skill gaps between top and bottom performers, with declining scores concentrated among lower-performing adults.
Re:Literacy stats are always questionable (Score:5, Insightful)
The OECD is run out of France, though.
And we're not looking at absolute numbers, we're looking at changes over time.
I'm all for viewing numbers a government puts out about its own success with suspicion, but this objection makes no sense in context.
Re:Literacy stats are always questionable (Score:4, Insightful)
The OECD is run out of France, though.
And we're not looking at absolute numbers, we're looking at changes over time.
I'm all for viewing numbers a government puts out about its own success with suspicion, but this objection makes no sense in context.
I feel like someone should point out that even if you're measuring changes over time, the methodology of measuring can change, as well, making old numbers not comparable to new numbers.
This happened with obesity in the US in 1993, when they changed the definitions of various categories and, with the stroke of a pen, created millions of new fat people. Ostensibly, to align the definitions used in the US with international standards, and purely by coincidence, also created millions of new customers for weight loss drugs.
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They had just taken the only effective weight-loss drug at the time off the market in 1993.
Your conspiracy theories need work.
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Which drug was that? I was thinking Dexatrim, but that was earlier than '93, no?
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I'm not sure if I did something to miscommunicate here.
"Had just" is pluperfect tense. It was already done as of 1993 was the very idea I wanted to communicate. Was there some way to phrase it that communicates the idea better?
Re: Literacy stats are always questionable (Score:2)
"had recently"
Or
"Had previously"
Depending.
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Either it wasn't rigged, and he won fair and square, or it was - by the people in charge at the time - and they still lost.
What part of that is hard to understand?
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^^ At least we have this poster here, singlehandedly raising the average... Keep up the good work, the nation depends on you.
/s
Re: Decline in general intelligence (Score:2)
There it is guys, the whole democratic political ideology in a nutshell. 200,IQ stuff.
Re: Decline in general intelligence (Score:2)
Yes, and tap water is paint thinner too.
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Tap water is paint thinner for water-based paints.
No idea what your point was.
Re: Decline in general intelligence (Score:2)
No idea what "horse dewormer" is supposed to mean either. Horses drink water too, I don't see anyone calling water "horse thirst quencher".
So is it clear now or do I break out the finger paints?
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I cannot, nor will I attempt, to decipher your incoherent ramblings. You completely failed by attempting sarcasm with a true statement in your first statement, now it seems you do not understand basic language concepts, and how words work eludes you. I cannot fathom what irrational, random pathways your thoughts take, and have zero desire to try.
Also, finger paints use tap water as paint thinner, so you have shown that despite knowing they exist, your first statement was not even consistent with your own kn
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People are increasingly getting their news from questionable video sources and don't seem to be able to research or read anything to counter completely fabricated stuff.
Re: Decline in general intelligence (Score:2)
From what I can tell they mostly aren't trying. They just reshare anything that agrees with their prejudices and refuse to read counter citations. We'll never know if they could read them or not.
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There is evidence for that. At the very least reading comprehension has been replaced with wishful thinking by a lot of supposedly adult people. Well, one of the more reliable indicators for an empire in decline. Might be a good time to emigrate.
Not surprising (Score:2)
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From what I have observed the majority of millennials and younger donâ(TM)t recreationally read.
From what we have observed with regards to speak-it-to-me technology, I’m wondering what constitutes “reading” these days. At any age.
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Hmm. I have noticed that Amazon increasingly offers me audio-books for normal ones I just bought. As I have bought zero audio-books in 25 years or so of being an Amazon customer, it cannot be anything I am doing.
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I dislike audio books because I can read far faster than the audio book reads it to me :|
Drives me crazy.
Re: Not surprising (Score:2)
You can crank up the speed on most platforms.
I'm with you, though. I'd rather just read at my own potentially variable pace. Maybe I think more about some parts than others for example. And I am a speed reader so if I increase the rate to match my reading rate it's going to sound like an auction.
The books that I prefer to hear are autobiographies or similar read by the author, when the author is an engaging reader. Stephen King's book on writing was great that way.
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From what I have observed in decades of retail work, the majority of people of any age don't read anything, ever, even if their life literally depends on it.
"Where does it say that? You should have a sign!"
"You mean, like the one you're literally leaning on?"
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Well, anecdotally, I am an older person and I've read about 60 books in the year since I retired.
More seriously, most people regardless of age do not read or write much, but those that grew up with Facebook, X-Twitter, Tik-Tok, etc. seem less capable of paying attention when trying to read long passages, not that I'm much better.
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Older people read, though?
Sure we do, we read slashdot. And by read, I mean we misread the first two words and get angry about it. Also fuck you I'm not old.
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Some don't watch TV at all ( it's a waste of time considering what is considered entertainment these days )
Given the option, I would throw the TV into the trash and replace it with a giant aquarium. However, others
in the home do still watch it so it remains.
I have no idea how many books I've read thus far this year alone.
I get them via Kindle now because my bookshelf is completely out of room for new books :|
Paywalled (Score:5, Insightful)
The article is paywalled, so it's really hard to discern what this data means. The "forgetting how to read" sounds sketchy. Is there a specific segment of adult population whose reading skills have declined from some previous study? IE is the current 30-40 year old range performing worse now than they did 10 years ago when they were the 20-30 year old group?
The part of the article I can read says "people aged 16 to 65", so are those in the younger range, like 16-20, the ones bringing down the average because they are now included in the study? That's an entirely different thing that people "forgetting how to read".
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News is a business, and it's not the business of selling news. It's the business of selling ads. There's nothing but click-bait, and there hasn't been for decades.
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Yup, comprehension issues. Who cares whether the Economist summary is paywalled? Original is here: https://www.oecd.org/en/public... [oecd.org]
Report: https://www.oecd.org/content/d... [oecd.org]
It blows my mind... (Score:4, Insightful)
It blows my mind how many people where I live (Canada) don't have library cards. When I was a kid, our trips to the library were a highlight. I loved browsing and picking books and then reading them at home for pleasure.
The library is a huge treasure-trove of reading material, and it's free. I still go to the library every couple of weeks and pick out 5-6 books. I can't imagine not reading for pleasure.
The decline of educational standards, especially in North America, is going to have an economic effect. We won't be able to compete if we don't have educated people who value learning.
Library cards (Score:3)
"It blows my mind how many people where I live (Canada) don't have library cards."
The equivalent of a library card today is a Kindle Unlimited subscription.
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A Kindle Unlimited subscription is not free.
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it's depressing to me how people think those two things are equivalent.
the *actual* equivalent is the ability to use your library card to borrow ebooks - a service most libraries in the modern world offer - seeing as you've paid for your local library system to purchase books. it seems rather silly to me to think "the same thing" as a library card is to give Amazon *additional* money for something you're already paying for.
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Lots of people pay for convenience. If you get depressed over that you're going to be depressed a lot.
Borrowing books, electronic or otherwise, from libraries is great. However, if you want to read something popular you're probably going to have to wait. If you want to read something the library doesn't have, you're probably going to have to wait, and often visit the library in person to request an inter-library loan.
And some people just like to own their books.
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Likewise, people have stopped subscribing to their local newspaper. Not to be rude, but the Internet has rendered the local library and newspaper mostly obsolete.
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Likewise, people have stopped subscribing to their local newspaper. Not to be rude, but the Internet has rendered the local library and newspaper mostly obsolete.
Facebook and TikTok replacing the local newspaper is
part of the problem.
Of course, if local newspapers can be replaced by those, that's another part of the problem.
Re: It blows my mind... (Score:2)
One cannot replace the other, but the former costs money, the latter is free, and the latter *seems* to replace to former. The similarity of gossip to news is close enough that many people miss the distinction. That has shown up in many surveys newspapers conduct to try to figure out how to stay relevant. It is a hard problem to solve: only the wealthy will have access to news IF this trend continues.
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On the contrary, newspaper corporations themselves have rendered the local newspaper mostly content free. They've abandoned local reporters and local printing which guarantees it arrives just as slowly as national newspapers. They repeat entire pages of local events as filler day after day, only changing when the date of the event passes and call that news. And they load up wire stories for news. Even local sports is minimal although that was never an interest of mine. I gave up the local paper last year af
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Yea, but which came first, the decline in newspaper revenues (partly due to free crap on the web) or the the decline in newspaper content. Based on my observations over the last 20 years, I'm going with the decline in content as only following the loss of money to pay reporters, printing facilities, etc.
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"Education standards" is misframing the problem.
We have so many fucking standards: standards for teaching practices, standards for student performance, standards for school structure, standards for testing. And they're standards we're not meeting because of declines in effective teacher pay, increases in punitive bureaucracy, socio-economic distress eroding the typically-educated middle class, and a fuck-ton of vague damage caused by the internet.
There are pockets within the failing countries where perform
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I love to read as well. Although, I've intentionally cut back from the book a day I did in 2023 (253 so far this year that I bothered to rate).
But driving to the library and walking around stacks of books? Bah. My Kindle has its own 6,000+ library of books that I've downloaded when they were free on Amazon. I'm gradually plowing through them. And occasionally I find my tastes have changed and I expunge some that are still waiting to be read. That's all my Amazon Prime subscription is good for in my opinion
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I walk to my library; I don't drive. It's 1.2km away. And browsing the stacks of books is part of the pleasure. For me, it makes the act more intentional and visceral than browsing the Internet for books.
Re: It blows my mind... (Score:2)
The library is where the homeless people all go to watch porn.
I think I'll stick with buying books.
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The library is where the homeless people all go to watch porn.
Well, you must live in a pretty terrible place. My local library is a great place; not only does it have books, but it has meeting rooms, presentations and community activities. You can also borrow musical instruments and use the 3D printers in the library's maker space. It's a real community hub.
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As to libraries, same here, although I switched to buying when I discovered that non-translated books are so much better.
As to educational standards in North America, they have never been good. What has, so far, propped up the situation is importing academics. But that is bound to get harder and harder at least for the US with everything there slowly (or probably faster from January 2025 on) going to shit.
Do I lack reading skills? (Score:2)
OK, so 1 in 5 adults read on first grade level.... but how many are better than that and how many are worse than that?
Or do I lack reading skills?
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You do lack reading skills. Primary school goes beyond first grade.
They wrong (Score:2)
I ARE READ GOOD
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kno.
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Me fail English? That's unpossible.
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I bet you do other stuff good too!
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FTFY
Real World Wizardry (Score:3)
I told my young Nephew if he wants real world superpowers in this day and age, just get good at reading, as it brings good reading comprehension.
As an IT professional, nearly 90% of the calls I get in a day stem from a lack of comprehension of the prompt. (mostly because of immigration, and English as a second language syndrome but we wont go so far as to be racist here).
Lawyers are modern wizards who take language to new heights, and are paid well.
Prompting Ai is all about relations to words.
Even in traditionally physical work like tradesman, knowing how to reference material guides, specs and digest words will put you ahead of your contemporaries.
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just get good at reading
just become good at reading
Fixed that for your nephew.
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Lol no he's a gamer and a millennial, "get good" is PROPER English my dood.
Department Of Education (Score:2, Funny)
A former wrestling CEO is going to be leading the department of education. https://www.npr.org/2024/11/19... [npr.org]
I'm sure everything will be fine.
Less to do with literacy, than lack of attention (Score:4, Insightful)
In a world where almost all information consumed is digital, I refuse to believe that adults are losing ability to read. Rather, I suspect that if you dive into this, it has more to do with how reading comprehension tests work - you can't pass them just by reading bite-size snippits of text, you need to read long passages and then answer questions on them.
As such, what adults are losing is not "the ability to read" - they are losing the ability to focus enough to consume longer pieces of information. They would have no problem reading text messages or short news stories and tweets, but they would never be able to comprehend a multi-page magazine article, let alone a book.
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A distinction without a difference.
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"digital" info sharing is more in the from of listening to podcasts or watching videos... Little reading necessary for either.
Assistant fundamental fail (Score:2)
It is not just reading. Writing skills have degraded also. I don't think this is necessarily due to the individual though. The environment of today promotes this.
As an example, look at handwriting skills. Everything today is typed - keyboards on computers, touchscreens on phones. People learn how to type efficiently but if you hand them a pencil and paper and ask them to handwrite something you get Homer Simpson chicken scratch out.
Another seemingly benign one is spell and grammar checkers. When th
Flip (Score:2)
I see what you guys are trying to do here (Score:2)
You want us to start reading the articles, no?
This isn't my first rodeo, nosirreebob. Nice try, though.
GUIs, videos and pod casts are easier (Score:2)
And cause a dumbing down of learning and content
Keep in mind, Xerox PARC, when they introduced pointing devices and GUIs, was attempting to make computing to developmentally challenged children.
Their widespread use has turned the world into exactly that.
Wanna know why we have dumb voters? Now ya know.
Which brings up the question (Score:2)
Reading recreationally is a choice and reflects (in some small part) education and emotional/intellectual development. Did you grow up eager to learn new things?
I wonder what the level of recreational reading is (relative to the general population) with the slashdot community... We tend to be educated and intellectually 'busy'.
I can't speak for anyone else, but I always have a stack of books waiting for me to read. I even installed a wall-light to make reading in bed easier.