The question is always there at every seminar and workshop: Does reading on a screen affect the way we retain information?
It's also a question we tried to get answered during the past few Poynter EyeTrack studies. We wonder how important the question will be 10 years from now. Until then, we have to go with the data we have. Now a new study has surfaced about our retention levels when reading in digital versus print.
The new Kindle study
A new study has found that readers using a Kindle were "significantly" worse than paperback readers at recalling when events occurred in a mystery story. The Europeans, and especially the Scandinavians, seem to be getting ahead on their studies of print versus digital and reading retention.
The latest study
Here is a highlight of that study , presented in Italy at a conference last month and set to be published as a paper. Anne Mangen, of Norway's Stavanger University, whose name has been associated with provious such studies,is associated with this study. Her team gave 50 readers the same short story by Elizabeth George to read. Half read the 28-page story on a Kindle, and half in a paperback, with readers then tested on aspects of the story including objects, characters and settings.
Here is what she said:
"When it came to the timing of events in the story. "The Kindle readers performed significantly worse on the plot reconstruction measure, ie, when they were asked to place 14 events in the correct order."
"The researchers suggest that "the haptic and tactile feedback of a Kindle does not provide the same support for mental reconstruction of a story as a print pocket book does".
The scientific approach
The subject of how we retain information when reading in digital platforms versus print has been the subject of a Scientific American piece as well.
According to Scientific American, before 1992 most studies concluded that people read slower, less accurately and less comprehensively on screens than on paper. Studies published since the early 1990s, however, have confirmed earlier conclusions, but almost as many have found few significant differences in reading speed or comprehension between paper and screens. And recent surveys suggest that although most people still prefer paper—especially when reading intensively—attitudes are changing as tablets and e-reading technology improve and reading digital books for facts and fun becomes more common.
I also wonder if, as more young readers whose reading takes place 90% on screens become adults, their retention levels on digital platforms will grow as well.
Laboratory experiments, polls and consumer reports indicates that modern screens and e-readers fail to adequately recreate certain tactile experiences of reading on paper that many people miss and, more importantly, prevent people from navigating long texts in an intuitive and satisfying way. Compared with paper, screens may also drain more of our mental resources while we are reading and make it a little harder to remember what we read when we are done, according to Scientific American.
And in newspapers
How do these studies apply to reading a newspaper?
Not too many studies have been conducted specifically to deal with newspapers and information retainer of print versus digital, and definitely more are needed.
One that comes to mind is an academic paper, "Medium Matters: Newsreaders' Recall and Engagement With Online and Print Newspapers" (pdf), by Arthur D. Santana, Randall Livingstone, and Yoon Cho of the University of Oregon. The researchers pit a group of readers of the print edition of the New York Times against Web-Times readers. Each group was given 20 minutes reading time and asked to complete a short survey.
The researchers found that the print folks "remember significantly more news stories than online news readers"; that print readers "remembered significantly more topics than online news readers"; and that print readers remembered "more main points of news stories." When it came to recalling headlines, print and online readers finished in a draw.
The call to action
Based on these findings, what can we do to stimulate higher retention levels for those reading on mobile devices, for example.
I admit that we do not have enough information about the consumption and retention of news, which could be quite different from how we retain facts and events from a fictional story. Normally we do not know much of the plot of a piece of fiction we are reading. We, however, do have a greater sense of what is happening in a news story, especially a recurring one.
I believe that we need to emphasize more labeling of information, for example. Use labels that, by their mere presence, bring us to the event: "The shooting of Michael Brown," "The Downing Of Malaysia Airlines 070". That label connects us to an event. Then learn to work with segments that may be easier to remember than stories in a long narrative without breaks or subheads.
This is still experimental and we must learn by doing, testing reader reactions and retention as we try various approaches to telling the story.
If we go with the studies we have, then it is unquestionable that print wins when it comes to retention of what we read. In the era of the "journalism of interruptions and everywhereness", it becomes more difficult to retain information, regardless of the platform.
Editors, writers and designers must try harder.
Comic Sans on that front page?
It was not a regular day for the Sydney Morning Herald of Australia (one of our projects). Executive Editor Matt Martel sends us a message:
This is awesome. A TV channel in Florida has done a piece on our use of Comic Sans. As has The Independent, Mashable, The New Statesman, The Huffington Post, Mashable, Stuff.co.nz and all of our competitors. It has been a very amusing day and a half. People have been really divided on whether we should have done it.
Don't remember the last time the use of a font on Page One caused such a a fuss or a Buzz. Take a look!
