Have ebooks changed your reading habits?

[arjaybe]

reading: n 1: the cognitive process of understanding a written linguistic message;

However, there are a lot of definitions. eg, my computer reads the hard drive. Nevertheless, I agree that listening to someone else read something isn't the same as reading the words oneself. One is listening while the other is reading.

Quibbles, though, eh?

[spindlegirl]

Originally Posted by Geralt

Nobody claimed MP3 player is an ereader. We just corrected you in assuming that people only "read" audiobooks through tablets and phones. Aside from them even some ereaders have the ability to play audiobooks.

I'm gonna repeat myself again because I don't think you get it. Audiobooks are books. They have the SAME content. Same words, same sentences. So in that sense when you read a book and "read" an audiobook you absorbed the same content in different manner. Same thing with ebook and paper book. Same content, different medium and way of reading it.

Semi-related:

I volunteered for a long time at CNIB, a Canadian organization which assists blind or partially sighted individuals to adjust to the various details of their life/skills/interests around their vision loss. (I do not have vision loss myself).

In a counseling group, the facilitator (who has had vision loss for years) encouraged folks who had started using audio books to call it "reading". There were some who said it didn't feel like reading because they didn't have a book in their hand, so they were encouraged to grab a book, hold it, and when it sounded like long enough, turn the page over. Many of the people who used the services bought or borrowed a player that was called a "reader". The counselor who facilitated the group would sometimes talk with me about books he has read.

But I can see why most people would be uncomfortable with calling it "reading" if it took eight weeks of counseling for a group of blind folks to get comfortable with it

I also did teach myself grade one braille (I was able to braille greeting cards for people who asked), but that's a different issue.

I taught people with partial to total vision loss to knit, or to retain their pre-existing knitting skills, and I was taught to not shy away from using the word "see", or "read". ("See that needle with the bead on the end of it? That means you start a purl row")

[patrickt]

Originally Posted by Geralt

Nobody claimed MP3 player is an ereader. We just corrected you in assuming that people only "read" audiobooks through tablets and phones. Aside from them even some ereaders have the ability to play audiobooks.

I'm gonna repeat myself again because I don't think you get it. Audiobooks are books. They have the SAME content. Same words, same sentences. So in that sense when you read a book and "read" an audiobook you absorbed the same content in different manner. Same thing with ebook and paper book. Same content, different medium and way of reading it.

Unfortunately, you don't understand the concept of reading. A reader and a listener are not doing the same thing. One reads a book and the other listens to someone who can read, read the book to them. I suppose getting up, going to work, and getting a paycheck is the same as sitting in front of the television and getting a check from the government. Same money, same thing. No, it isn't the same thing and reading and being read to by someone who can read isn't the same thing.

I am certainly not opposed to being read to. My mother used to read "Henny Penny: The Little Red Hen" to me. I thoroughly enjoyed it and my mother read it to me enough I memorized it. But, then I learned to read.

I grew up listening to radio dramas and they could engage me for the necessary half-hour but I really preferred reading. And, no, they were not the same thing. I've tried to listen to audioboioks as I drive on trips but I end up switching to music. Oh, and playing a flute is not the same as listening to someone else play a flute. Same instrument. Same music. Not the same thing.

I wonder if there's a forum where people can record messages so those who prefer to be read to can listen to dramatic renditions.

[HarryT]

In musical terms, it's the difference between playing a piece of music, and listening to someone else play it. Yes, the notes are the same, but they are very different experiences. One is active, the other passive.

[spindlegirl]

My blind friend says he "watches hockey" (as does my brother who is blind), They also use the program "jaws" to read their email etc. Helen Keller (profoundly deaf and blind) used to go to the theatre with Annie Sullivan and described the experience as "listening to a play". Now, technically, they aren't visually absorbing the content, but they are valid terms to describe what is being accomplished.

When I use audiobooks I usually say, "listened to", but I've hung out with folks with vision conditions enough that it doesn't phase me when they say "reading". I get the point they are trying to make.

[DiapDealer]

I suspect the semantical differences are less important than some want to make it out to be. If a perfectly literate person enjoys Jack Reacher stories, is the distinction between "reading" and being "read to" all that relevant to either activity?

I can't use audiobooks either (not for lack of desire or a lack of trying), but that doesn't mean I consider that someone who can is engaged in an entirely different activity than I am. After all, a reader and a listener could sit down and have a discussion about the story they just "experienced," with little or no difficulty. They could retain or forget the same details.

The disinction is relevant... just not for the "this way is way more different than the other" reasons some seem to be espousing. I would suggest that those who feel bothered by the use of the word "reading" in conjunction with audiobooks might want to keep their noses buried in their own books a little more deeply. Because the people (who can and do "read") who also enjoy audiobooks already know there's semantic and cognitive differences between the two. They're just very not relevant to what they're looking to accomplish.

If the word "book" is in the product name, it's perfectly acceptable to say one "read" it. No need to reinvent the wheel. Conversations like:

"Read any good books lately?"
"No, but I did let Mary Robinette Kowal and Will Damron read Neal Stephenson's Seveneves to me this weekend. It was an excellent performance."

would be quite pointless (not to mention detrimental to any further potential conversation about the story).

[crich70]

I.don't know about the actual reading, but it has changed my buying habits. I bought my 1st paper book in quite a while yesterday. The collected short stories of Ernest Hemingway.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I suspect the semantical differences are less important than some want to make it out to be. If a perfectly literate person enjoys Jack Reacher stories, is the distinction between "reading" and being "read to" all that relevant to either activity?

For me personally, the mental imagery I get when I read a book myself (which is such an important part of reading - at least for me) just isn't there when I listen to someone else read the book to me. It's just a "blander" experience. I don't know if it's different for other people?

[JSWolf]

What do you say about reading and listening at the same time? The last audio book I borrowed from Hoopla I listened to while reading the eBook at the same time.

[spindlegirl]

Originally Posted by HarryT

For me personally, the mental imagery I get when I read a book myself (which is such an important part of reading - at least for me) just isn't there when I listen to someone else read the book to me. It's just a "blander" experience. I don't know if it's different for other people?

I have had a difficult time not allowing my mind to wander when listening to an audio book. Which is weird, I can listen to radio programs and podcasts just fine. I can listen to my husband read to me just fine (he enjoys reading aloud to me while I am knitting or something), but somehow pressing play on an audio book and I have trouble sustaining alertness. I don't think I've ever read/listened to an entire audio book end to end. Most of the time I've "returned it" (on Overdrive) before the loan period is up.

And I'm not a difficult person to entertain, I guess it's just a weird mental block I have to get over.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It's just a "blander" experience. I don't know if it's different for other people?

Unless you believe those other people are consistently (and knowingly) choosing the blander (blander in their opinion--having enjoyed both) of the two experiences for their enjoyment/enrichment, I suspect that it's most definitely different for other people.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

What do you say about reading and listening at the same time? The last audio book I borrowed from Hoopla I listened to while reading the eBook at the same time.

I've never tried doing that, but I don't like the idea of it. I think that listening would interfere with my mental enjoyment of reading, although I know it's something that Amazon push by offering very steep discounts on Audible audiobooks when you buy an ebook. It's just not for me.

[jhowell]

There a lots of times when I am reading that I stop and think over what I just read and sometimes I go back and re-read something earlier in the book in the light of new information (like Sixth Sense reveals). I would find those much more difficult to do in audio.

However I do listen to podcasts while walking my dog and while those are mostly news-related I like to mix in audio short stories from time to time.

[crich70]

One thing that is different is that books link up with the Goodreads app which helps in keeping an accurate count of how many books towards my reading challenge I have read. I like that.

[patrickt]

When I read, I make notes, I look up words, I might pause and consider a passage just read.I might read the sentence a second or a third time to make sure I'm getting the sense of it. When I listen to a book being read, and I'll admit I've never been able to listen to a whole book,I tend to do other things. I'm driving the car or fixing dinner or wondering what I'll do tomorrow morning as the reader reads.

I prefer reading and like most here,when someone is reading to me, I use the word listening. When I was in school, I learned more reading than I did having a teacher read to me. I remember telling an English teacher in high school that she didn't need to read the poems to me, I could read them on my own. Her response was, "I wish everyone could and would."