
The average person’s reading speed is slower than commonly thought - EndXA
https://digest.bps.org.uk/2019/06/13/most-comprehensive-review-to-date-suggests-the-average-persons-reading-speed-is-slower-than-commonly-thought/
======
EndXA
The original article is available at:
[https://psyarxiv.com/xynwg/](https://psyarxiv.com/xynwg/) (note that it's a
preprint, and hasn't yet been subjected to peer review)

Abstract:

> Based on the analysis of 190 studies (17,887 participants), we estimate that
> the average silent reading rate for adults in English is 238 word per minute
> (wpm) for non-fiction and 260 wpm for fiction. The difference can be
> predicted by the length of the words, with longer words in non-fiction than
> in fiction. The estimates are lower than the numbers often cited in
> scientific and popular writings. The reasons for the overestimates are
> reviewed. Reading rates are lower for children, old adults, and readers with
> English as second language. The reading rates are in line with maximum
> listening speed and do not require the assumption of reading-specific
> language processing. The average oral reading rate (based on 77 studies and
> 5,965 participants) is 183 wpm. Within each group/task there are reliable
> individual differences, which are not yet fully understood. For silent
> reading of English fiction most adults fall in the range of 175 to 300 wpm;
> for fiction the range is 200 to 320 wpm. Reading rates in other languages
> can be predicted reasonably well be taking into account the number of words
> these languages require to convey the same message as in English.

~~~
no_identd
I think words per minutes seems like a highly problematic metric, for a
variety of statistical logics reasons.

Instead, I think we should try to measure multi-word expressions (MWEs) per
second, and consider special characters (including spaces!) as words.

Why? Well, to start with, due to us already knowing about the Auerbach-Estoup-
Yule-Zipf-Pareto-Mandelbrot-Simon-Price Law(s) only holding for multi-word
expressions, not for phonemes, words, characters or syllables. Can't dig up
the papers on that right now, tho.

(Personally however, I suspect that MWEs per second ain't the be all, end all,
of reading speed, either. It ignores concepts like Paronomasia & Polysemy, as
well as even more obscure things, like Polyphonemes. I just so far lack
sufficient knowing of any possibly plausible hyperparameterizations which'd
generally let one compile some metric for further complexity reductions.)

I'd elaborate on /how/ that (partially) answers the "why", but I lack the time
to do so at the moment.

------
egypturnash
"You should take just under two-and-a-half minutes to finish reading this blog
post."

Does that include the time taken up by dismissing the "subscribe!" pop-up, and
figuring out where you were when you got distracted by that?

~~~
kazinator
Didn't see that at all (I'm a user of the NoScript browser extension that
allows JS only from explicitly whitelisted sites).

I went through the content in about 30 seconds. What I remember:

1\. "People read at closer to 240 wpm rather than 300 as was previously
thought."

2\. This was from a meta-study gathered over various studies spanning the
twentieth century, in various languages based on the Roman alphabet.

3\. There appears to be some variation in reading speed dependent on language.

~~~
adverbly
I was just under two minutes and I'd have added the following by memory:

\- Spanish readers are faster than English

\- A key reason for the discrepancy between previously measured reading speeds
and the new results is recreational vs test-style assessment. Basically it
sounds like people read faster when they are being assessed on their reading.

\- It should take about 2 minutes and 30 seconds to finish reading the
article.

And then doing a 30 second skim a second time I would have added the
following:

\- Reading speed depends on if the text is long or short. Shorter text can be
much slower.

\- Reading speed declines with age.

A third skim and I'd add:

\- this is important for assessors, who shouldn't expect everyone to read at
300wpm.

Looking back and comparing my notes across the three reads I actually remember
recognizing each one of those points the first time through, but I didn't
reliably remember them all after each run. I almost think this might have more
to do with the way that memory works than the way reading works.

------
soulofmischief
I _can_ read blazingly fast. I used to read sometimes two books in a day, and
I destroyed the fiction section in the library of every school I went to.

But now I mostly read non-fiction, and in light of the fact that I remember
maybe 8% in detail of the thousands of books I've read, I like to take things
very slowly. I'll read a paragraph, stop, think about what I just read, and
sometimes read it again just to help things stick.

I break up long articles into multiple sessions, and after each session I try
to recall in detail what I just read, and try to form insights and draw
connections which help to cement the data into my brain.

If I'm skimming for information, sure, I'll just churn over the text as fast
as possible-- But these days I'm reading for knowledge's sake and not
escapism. And even when I read fiction, I like to exercise my visual memory
and try to imagine every last detail while I read at a leisurely pace.

I see nothing wrong with this approach and thusly I think WPM outside of a
desk job is meaningless and not some number corresponding to intelligence that
we should be trying to maximize.

~~~
Mirioron
> _And even when I read fiction, I like to exercise my visual memory and try
> to imagine every last detail while I read at a leisurely pace._

You just made me realize that people can and do read fiction without
visualizing the majority of things that happen in a story. That suddenly
explains so much as to how some people read fiction so quickly.

~~~
soulofmischief
I used to visualize basic whisps of the scenes, what each character looked and
sounded like, I guess I've always liked to visualize while reading... in fact
I can still very lucidly recall tons of visualizations from more than a decade
and a half ago as if they were scenes in a movie, a real testament to the
storytelling ability of those authors.

But now I try to spend more time than before. I try to really soak in every
paragraph. Whereas in school I took pride in being the most prolific reader
around, there isn't much room in my adult life for such competitive, external
motivations. Now the stimulation I receive from art and literature stems from
my appreciation of the artist's prowess.

------
noir_lord
I read quickly and have the same retention rate (or better) than most people
I've interacted with.

I don't do any of the tricky stuff that 'speed readers' do.

The only thing I'm aware is different is I don't hear the words in my head
when I read as I'm often 'reading' a chunk of 3-4 words at once.

I thought this was completely normal til I spoke to an ex about it when she
commented I demolished books.

~~~
saberience
I often hear people boasting about their "speed reading" skills and then I ask
them what sort of books they read, turns out speed reading and having "good
retention rate" is easy if you're reading crap. I could also speed read Clive
Cussler, Stephen King, and JK Rowling.

I love Philosophy and classic literature and I've yet to meet anyone that's
managed to speed read Proust's "In Search of Lost Time", and then tell give me
a detailed description of the plot, themes, artistic merit, and so on.
Similarly with books like Ulysses. There's no possible way to speed read that
book because it's so rich with allusions, references to religion, art,
mythology, and philosophy. If you tried to "speed read" it, you would be
missing half the point of reading it in the first place.

Reading great books isn't about numbers, you don't get rewarded for how many
classics you read in a year. Reading great books is about slowly absorbing all
the riches inside, something that just cannot happen if you're rushing. I've
read The Brothers Karamazov and The Magic Mountain 4 or 5 times and each time
I learn something new and gain a deeper understanding of psychology and life.
I find it more rewarding to read and re-read the classics slowly, writing
notes, using a critical guide (or book of companion essays), than smashing
through as many crappy novels or modern popular non-fiction books (The Power
of Now of any of Malcom Gladwells books are typical fodder for todays
readers).

~~~
qwsxyh
This is legitimately the most pretentious HN comment I've ever read, and
that's a very high bar.

I too dismiss things that people enjoy as "crap" because I have such a
gigantic brain from reading philosophy and looking down everyone else, and
belittle them for believing that they read and understand fast in the wrong
type of book.

~~~
saberience
I actually read and enjoy Stephen King and JK Rowling, but I don't tell myself
it's fine art and I'm super "smart" for speed reading it. I don't try and
speed read anything because I don't think it's useful or meaningful.

I'm trying to rally against the crowd you always find in any thread on speed-
reading who love to talk about how great they are for reading 10 books a day
and gaining nothing from it.

------
BlackCases
I never took a speed reading class, but I do know how to recognize when a
author -- of any book -- starts blathering on or tries to motivate. I can read
whole pages in an instant in those circumstances.

~~~
friedman23
In fiction when an author has an entire page of technobabble I just
subconsciously skip the entire thing and only go back to read if the rest
doesn't make sense.

~~~
LifeLiverTransp
There worst scifi books are the post famous price ones.

The author has a contract, all competition has been eternally removed from his
mindset. He made it. Finally he can, drone on and on about some obscure
infodump he found.

Or even worser, show it to those upper class snobs & critic, who claimed that
writing good characters and prose is as far out of the league for sciFi, as if
it where burried at a rainbows end.

------
osrec
I have always been a slow reader. My younger siblings would often finish books
or articles a lot faster than me. Turns out, I'm a more careful reader than
them - I would spot spelling mistakes in text where they would miss them.
They'd also misinterpret texts due to speed, where I wouldn't. Not sure what's
better, but I do personally prefer the slow and considered approach to
reading.

------
le3dh4x0r
Reading speed is highly correlated with the difficulty of the material. And
even this factor varies from person to person because of different backgrounds
and interests. For me reading speed and a quiz on the material afterwards are
useless indicators of someone's overall speed. Every person should read as
fast or as slow to full grasp the material.

------
carapace
Kind of a tangent, but I've had fun experimenting with Rapid Serial Visual
Presentation (RSVP), a technique where words are displayed one-at-a-time at
the same location and you don't move your eyes.

With a little practice I got to the point where the reading material was
entering my brain _faster_ than I can normally think.

Apologies for the link, wikipedia article on RSVP is garbage (rare, but it
happens.)

[https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/these-apps-
could-t...](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/these-apps-could-triple-
your-reading-speed-180949945/)

------
3131s
> _Although the number of studies involving non-English languages was too
> small to draw any firm conclusions, there seemed to be a hint of differences
> between languages. For example, reading rate in the five Spanish studies was
> considerably faster than the average, at 278 wpm, while the average rate for
> the 144 English-only studies was 236 wpm._

It really doesn't make sense to compare wpm across languages.

------
hellllllllooo
My issue is concentration. Once an article looses my interest I find it very
difficult to keep reading without skipping chunks. Do others find it easy to
read things that they aren't interested in but have to read for work etc.? As
someone who used to have to read a lot of academic papers for my PhD I found
my mind wandering a lot and often impossible to make it through some content.

~~~
strikelaserclaw
I think everyone experiences this to some degree, especially when reading
technical stuff, you kinda take in what you are interested in/ think will be
useful and skim over the rest.

------
eagsalazar2
I wonder if reading rates have simply been declining in recent years because
of phones, computers, TV, etc.

~~~
CydeWeys
Alternatively, they could be increasing it. Computers have been exposing
people to a lot more text in the modern technological era than they would've
seen prior to it.

~~~
strikelaserclaw
yes but how many people read whole articles rather than short bursts of text
like comments, tweets, statuses, emails etc...

------
strikelaserclaw
I kinda read slowly but once i've read something i'll remember the important
parts for a long time. When i read, my mind converts the words into a sort of
movie, maybe this process isn't conducive to speed reading.

------
withdavidli
article: normal was thought to be 300wpm, meta analysis of new study says it's
238wpm, also speed varies between languages.

Never got tested for reading speed in school like the article says some
schools do. That's good for me as I would have failed the 300wpm mark.

Tried speed reading software in high school and college, my normal speed is
around 150-200wpm. Even with faster skimming sessions it never got over 450wpm
and reverts back to my normal range when not using software. Learned to be
okay with it as it seems my comprehension / memory were optimal at my normal
range.

------
OscarTheGrinch
It's not a race.

------
LarryL
Most people read VERY slowly, because they were taught to do so (at school)!

That's something that makes me angry, because reading fast is a HUGE advantage
in every setting (even taking into account the speed variability, depending on
the topic).

I'm a very fast reader. To give you an example, I can (easily) read the Hobbit
and the Lord of the Rings in english during during the weekend (2 days), and
english is not my first language. In comparison, my brother, who has a LOT in
common with me (including education level, and going to the same school as a
child), reads pretty slowly and would never be able to do that. My dad and
others members of the family are also very fast. BUT, we all learnt by
ourselves: basically, we -somehow- managed to NOT learn the WRONG way that the
teachers were teaching us (mostly: by "talking in our head when reading"). My
mom told me that as soon as I started reading I was very fast.

To me, french lessons (middle-school, early 80s) were _torture_ because of
that: the teacher assumed that we read slowly, and we would spend hours while
a student was reading out loud; myself I was already 3 chapters later (because
I was reading silent during his/her loud reading, I simply COULD NOT read that
slow!). When we were assigned a new book (usually a couple hundred of pages),
I read it in an hour. But the teacher did NOT understand that there were such
huge differences between students. It was painful! In the end, my conclusion
is that (because of stupidity) reading fast was de facto discouraged. :-((

I forgot to mention that I'm NOT talking about skimming (reading in diagonal
with a severe -and acceptable- loss of understanding), when I skim I'm up to
10 times faster. I'm talking reading with almost total comprehension (barring
remembering unimportant details like "the color of the cape of Frodo when he
left the Shire", or whatnot).

Of course, it must be said that reading speed is a _meaningless_ concept by
itself.

Your speed will (obviously) vary A LOT depending on the _context_: are your
studying? Trying to memorize? Reading for leisure? Reading in a foreign
language? Tired? What is the text's complexity/level? What is your education
level? Etc.

Average speed does NOT exist without context. And most articles on the subject
fail to put that context into account, it's even worse in the comments...

=> Of course, this article (and the study) detail the importance of that
context.

So, every time I read an article about "reading speed", I know that it's going
to be painful in the comments, because people who comment -almost- NEVER take
the context into account.

BTW, one of the most infuriating things EVER is that in comments, you ALWAYS
have a few people with an elitist attitude who raise the "but you are not
appreciating the text if you read too fast", they fail to understand that I
don't read poetry like a technical book like a children book, etc. Then you
have the "you CANNOT understand if you read fast" crowd, because they don't
know what is possible, they assume that their speed is "normal", when it's
NOT, they cannot understand that they have been taught to read slowly...

Yep, that topic is one of my pet peeves ^^

~~~
cheerlessbog
Assuming the LotR audio book is 45 hours you must be reading twice as fast to
finish it in two long days at the weekend. Sure, I could read it that fast -
meaning that mechanically I could probably decode the text as if the tape was
double speed - but it would be a miserable experience because I would have no
time to contemplate what was going on, to visualize events, to think back to
previous passages, and so forth. It would be like watching a movie at double
speed - we can all do it, and legitimately say we "watched" the movie, but it
wouldn't give most of us pleasure.

~~~
ksdale
I think this is exactly the point of people having different reading speeds,
though. What is uncomfortably fast for one person is normal speed for someone
else, including considering all of the implications of each sentence they're
reading. I don't know that I could read the LoTR in two days, but I do know
that the pace of audio books is painfully slow for me. My natural speed would
be substantially faster than the audio book and I wouldn't be racing through
at an unpleasant pace.

And I believe what the parent was trying to say was that we've been
conditioned to believe that a certain speed is normal, when perhaps most of us
are capable of reading (and fully comprehending) at a much higher speed,
though I don't know enough to have an opinion on that.

~~~
cheerlessbog
As an independent data point, consider the pace that someone might tell you a
story that they know by heart (ie, which they aren't reading from text).
Perhaps a storyteller or a actors monologue. In my experience that speed would
be much the same speed as if they were reading the book to you, or reading it
to themselves. That suggests to me that there is a natural speed to fully
absorb a narrative.

Non fiction may be different. Most times I read that to absorb the content
rather then for pleasure, and often it doesn't require deep introspection
during the process. It is limited only by the physical process and the
intellectual decoding speed. In those cases I read very fast. I typically am
continually and quickly scrolling a newspaper story on my phone, reading at
least twice as fast as fiction.

~~~
ksdale
Yeah I can definitely see that. I may just be weird. A lot of people in the
comments here are talking about not subvocalizing to read faster, and I have
never really worked on doing that, but according to the couple possibly
unreliable reading speed tests I’ve taken, I read really fast, despite
subvocalizing. So perhaps as long as I subvocalize, I can fully absorb the
narrative? I also know that I can read slightly faster when I try not to
subvocalize, but I’m not very good at it and I would never try to read a novel
that way because I feel like THAT would destroy the narrative, at least for
me.

