The article in the url below, which focuses on declining reading rates (and the associated ability to concentrate) among Gen Z university students, contains a pretty alarming graphic – the "average words per sentence in popular books," measured over 100 years. As you might expect with the ubiquity of smartphone screens and popular apps, such as TikTok, the story is not encouraging:
The Economist suggests that, in addition to a heightened inability to concentrate, "decreasing litearry sophistication may lead to decreasing political sophistication," and has found plenty of support that this lack of sophistication is reflected in today's politicians:
"Our analysis of Britain's parliamentary speeches found that they have shrunk by a thirs in a decade. We also analyzed almost 250 years of inaugural presidential addresses. … George Washinton scored 28.7, denoting postgraduate level, while Donald Trump's came in at 9.4, the reading level of a high-schooler."
I wonder how bad things can get.
Take care
David
David Chandler
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The perils of book-spurning
September 6, 2025
The Economist
Late Edition – Final
71-72
https://www.economist.com/culture/2025/09/04/is-the-decline-of-reading-making-politics-dumber
