Preferring Print in a Digital World: An International Study of Students’ Academic Reading Behaviors

With today’s online technology and wireless connections, the average person is likely to engage in more electronic reading – emails, text messages, and social media – than print. It is easy to assume that college students, most of whom grew up in a ubiquitously digital environment, would prefer to read their academic texts electronically as well. It is well known that readers use different strategies – skimming, scanning, deep reading – for different contexts and purposes. But reading academic texts for learning and understanding purposes is different than scanning headlines and Facebook posts; it requires focused and intensive engagement. The Academic Reading Format International Study (ARFIS) collected data from students in over 30 countries from 2014-2017 to investigate their behaviors and attitudes towards print and electronic reading for their academic work.

DOI: 10.21125/inted.2018.0222