Have young people read less because of TikTok? (Spoiler: it's exactly the opposite)
It is often believed that the generation of twenty-year-olds has stopped reading: the reason for this is both gadgets, and in general the fact that young people are always a little different. We look at the statistics and find out that this stereotype is infinitely far from reality.
There are many things that have not changed over the centuries, and one of them is the belief that young people are becoming stupider, more and more obnoxious and, of course, hardly reading, unlike their parents' generation, which should actually be an example. And at the beginning of the XXI century, another factor was added to the problem - technology. Instead of reading, young people play video games at best, and spend hours on YouTube and TikTok at worst. The end times, as predicted.
There is only one small detail: everything is exactly the opposite.
Young people read more than adults
The reading statistics in Russia are not very good, but here are the data from the Eksmo-AST publishing group, which publishes most of the fiction books in Russian. According to the president of the group, Oleg Novikov, the most active groups of book buyers in 2023 are not middle-aged people, but from 16 to 24 years old and from 55 to 64 years old. An important nuance: with a general decrease in interest in reading among all groups among young people, it is steadily growing.
Studies in other countries show similar data. For example, a recent survey in the United States showed that the share of people who have not read a single book in the past year is highest among respondents aged 35-64.
It turns out that in different countries, the graph of the most reading people by age has the shape of the letter U: peak values among young and old people, sagging in the middle. Why is that? At least one reason is intuitively clear: older people have enough time to read, young people also read for study, and middle-aged people are not up to it – they would like to earn money, what kind of books are there.
This is indirectly confirmed by statistics: if you look at the studies of previous years, the picture will be very similar. A decade ago, Pew Research found that 88% of Americans under 30 read at least one book a year, compared to 79% of Americans over 30. At the same time, older adolescents (16-17 years old) read more than all other age groups.
Their other study compared the reading habits of people aged 16-29 and people over 30.
It turned out that young people are more likely than adults to read once a week or every day. The share of respondents who do not read at all among people over 30 was twice as high.
So it's not that zoomers suddenly turned to books: the pattern repeats itself in every generation. However, today's 20-year-olds have another trump card – technology.
Over the past decades, the word "book" has finally ceased to mean "paper book". The above-mentioned survey by the American website Testprepinsight.com shows that respondents aged 18-24 not only read more than almost all other age groups, but also more diverse: they are the ones who most often turn out to be consumers of e-books and audiobooks (and in second place in print after respondents 65+). Similar data for the Russian audience could not be found, but it can be assumed that the data will be similar here, especially given the fact that the prices for paper books are skyrocketing and one inexpensive volume costs the same as a monthly subscription to a service like Bookmate or Strok.
But the most important factor influencing young people's reading is the very TikTok that conservatives blame for all sins, including the fact that "teenagers don't read books anymore." More precisely, the segment of it that is literally dedicated to books and has become so popular that now it itself influences the book industry.
#BookTok
On TikTok, the hashtag #BookTok more than 29 million videos (for comparison: the hashtag #TaylorSwift 12 million). In these videos, users share their emotions from what they read, discuss their favorite characters, communicate, but above all, advise each other the books they like. According to Australian researcher Margaret Mergi, recommendations account for 40.5% of all bookstock videos. Most of the authors of these videos (at least those whose age is known) are young readers and readers aged 16-21.
It turns out that young people read a lot, share what they read with each other and listen to this advice. Ultimately, it is young TikTok users, often scorned by conservatives, who are beginning to actively influence the book industry. In any large English-language bookstore, there are several shelves with the most popular books on tiktok. Authors of average fame #BookTok make stars of the first magnitude. And last year, the first TikTok Book Awards ceremony took place - with nominations like "Bookstore of the Year", "Best Book I'd Like to Read for the First Time Again" and "Best Book Revived by BookTok". In the last nomination, by the way, Jane Austen won with the novel "Pride and Prejudice".
It turns out that young people do not just read, but read more than anyone else. Not only did technology not kill books, but it also increased their accessibility. And even TikTok, which was supposed to finally bury books under a mountain of cat videos, is reviving interest in classic literature and creating new stars. So there is no need to worry about the decline in the intellectual level of young people: everything is fine with them.
