So audiobooks are here to stay; what does that mean for reading culture? If you ask book enthusiasts, you’ll likely get two answers: that they’ve read more books than ever thanks to audiobooks, or that people who listen to books aren’t “actually” reading them. Is there any truth to this claim? How do audiobooks compare to reading physical media?
Can You “Read” an Audiobook?
Spend any time in reading circles and you will quickly encounter a very passionate debate: whether listening to an audiobook “counts” as reading. From the way the information is parsed to the total recall of the people encountering the narrative, different camps may argue how the audiobook experience compares to in-print media.
“Yes, You Definitely Can”
A growing number of people are joining the “yes” camp when it comes to deciding whether you can read an audiobook. These people argue that being able to comprehend and engage with a story is the most important facet of the experience. The story itself matters more than the medium, they claim, and so the method by which you absorb it makes little difference.
“No, Audiobooks Aren’t Reading”
Conversely, a staunch but shrinking cohort believes that people who use audiobooks are not actually readers. They allege that reading requires the visual act of decoding words; if you don’t do that, you are not reading.
While the semantics of what “reading” really is could be debated for years, it is true that significant research has been conducted to determine how the brain responds to reading in print media versus audiobooks. If you’re looking for the scientific answer, it’s best to start there.
So Who’s Right?
In the end, the concept of “reading” encapsulates how a person comprehends the information being presented to them and how well they retain it. Listening to information or gleaning it from a page are two methods of acquiring details, but what does the brain think of these differences?
As it turns out, the human brain really couldn’t care less.
Studies indicate that the same regions of the brain activate when encountering a story, whether the participant is listening or reading the information. Comprehension and narrative are similarly absorbed. However, the experience may be different across both media and the people engaging. Audiobooks place limits on narratives that physical books don’t.
Have you ever listened to a recording and wished the speaker spoke faster? Why did they put emphasis on that word when you wouldn’t have? Are they failing to pause in the same places you would? These small factors (which are one element of prosody, or rhythm) can influence a person’s ability to retain the information or fully engage with it. In this arena, some people are more successful than others, and this likely explains why some people dislike audiobooks.
However, the research does show that when it comes to active learning, physical media may still be king. The act of decoding—which we talked about previously—increases the brain’s engagement with the text. You might reread a section, remember the shape of the paragraph on the page, or flip back and forth to reference what you’ve found. These tangible actions can improve memory in a way that audiobooks struggle to replicate.
Conversely, and perhaps contrary to popular belief, those who read audiobooks often demonstrate higher levels of attention. Because they cannot go back and reread—at least not as easily as in a paper book—listeners maintain higher levels of active attention on average.
What Does All This Mean?
Maybe you like audiobooks, or maybe you’re dedicated to the physical page. No matter your preference, what we know for sure is that both options trigger the brain’s abilities to process and store information, albeit in slightly different ways.
However, reading is more than just functional; it is also cultural. Acceptance of audiobooks is higher in some regions of the world versus others as a result. Spend some time to consider: where you live, how do people respond to you reading a book? Do they treat you as smarter, educated, or even trustworthy? Or do they only care about whether you know the information? Being able to read, and doing so publicly, can have big consequences in some places in the world. If you don’t, you might even be considered illiterate!
In the end, the great debate about whether audiobooks are the “cheater’s” method to reading comes down to how we define reading itself. If fewer people are reading printed materials but more are listening to audiobooks, is society really reading less? Or are we just changing the format of how we consume stories? Our very existence began with the spoken word; perhaps modern formats simply give us unprecedented opportunities to return to that modality with which we spent so much of our history.
