New Study: Americans’ Reading Habits Stable Since 2011

Most American adults read a book (or part of one) in the last year, according to a new survey from the Pew Research Center.

Print books maintain a wide lead. 64% of respondents reported reading a print book, compared to 31% reading ebooks and 26% reading audiobooks. More women than men read a book last year, but the split—78% of women, 71% of men—hardly supports the recurring panic about men’s reading habits. Adults under 50 were more likely than older adults to report reading a book in the last year. Book clubs are rare. Just 7% of American adults (10% of women, 5% of men) have participated in the last year. Power readers unite: only 14% of Americans read 20+ books in the last 12 months.

What to make of the fact that this data stands in sharp contrast to last year’s widely-reported finding that only 16% of Americans reported reading for pleasure?

Differences in survey design could be a factor.

Pew asks yes/no questions, whereas the data reported last year were combined from several studies that asked participants to record how they actually spent their time in a designated period. Pew’s wording casts a wider net. Adults ages 18-29 reported the highest rate of reading in the last year (78%), some of which could be attributable to assigned reading for school. Contrast this with the specificity of “reading for pleasure” in last year’s report. Pew sets a low bar. You get to answer “yes” if you’ve read a book “either all or part of the way through,” (emphasis mine), so even minimal engagement gets counted.

The key takeaway seems to be that the numbers are pretty stable. Pew has been asking this question since 2011, and the percentage of Americans who report reading some or all of a book in the last 12 months has been steady in that time.

You can see more of the data here.