Let me start with this. I am personally a big consumer of content in many forms. I read. I watch. I listen. I spend money on content of multiple types I own and I get other content from a couple of different libraries. My intent here is not to discourage use of any of these resources or sources. What I struggle with are arguments that all formats are equally suited to all purposes. I am most interested in educational applications and decisions made by educators when it comes to assigning content. I am also not suggesting that it is not useful to have experiences learning from multiple formats.
Here is the type of message I think can be confusing. This news article is titled “Why we are ditching our kindles in favor of audiobooks“. While this may be true, this is not a claim about learning and perhaps more a comment on convenience. Here is an example of a more direct examination of the issue I am intending to address – Are audiobooks as good for you as reading?” This Time article both mentions the type of article that claims listening is just as good and articles that claim reading is to be preferred for learning. BTW – the article also gets into the screen vs paper reading issue which a different issue.
The Time article mentions a straightforward study by Willingham & Woody, 2010. The research considered the retention resulting from listening to a podcast vs. reading a transcript. I include this reference because the students reading the material learned much more as measured on a followup exam.
Willingham & Woody note that the students knew that listening resulted in less retention. I think those of us who use both formats on a regular basis do as well. We like listening for the convenience. We like listening because it allows us to do other things at the same time (driving, walking on a treadmill). We like listening because it is easier. Yes, we make students listen to lectures. However, we expect them to take notes and would rather they did nothing else at the same time. Is this what you and I do when we listen to an audiobook or a podcast. I doubt it. If I were going to just sit there listening and taking notes, I would prefer to read and highlight because I could be moving much faster.
Willingham notes that reading allows rereading which we do far more often than we realize. He is not describing the type of review that one might duplicate with an audiobook by scrubbing back a page or so and listening again, he is talking about the very efficient use of regressive eye movements we engage in when we read. Even if listeners relisten, what they are doing is not the equivalent of momentary pausing and internal sentence lookbacks that occur as we read.
The golfing expression – drive for show, putt for dough comes to mind. Reading and listening are kind of like that. Listen for fun, read to learn – if the efficiency and effectiveness of learning matters.
Daniel, David B. “They Hear, but Do Not Listen: Retention for Podcasted Material in a Classroom Context.” Teaching of Psychology 37.3 (2010):199. Web.
