Education
Writing
Research
February 28, 2025
Why include reading in your annual goals?
In addition to favoring neurological and psychological aspects, reading also strengthens critical thinking and broadens people’s worldview
Released in September 2024, the 6th edition of the survey “Portraits of Reading in Brazil”, conducted by the Pró Livro Institute (IPL) and the Ministry of Culture (MinC), indicated that, for the first time since the survey began to be conducted, people who do not read books are the majority in the country. According to the data, 53% of Brazilians had not read even part of a work in the months prior to the survey.
Considering only completed books, the percentage drops to just 27%. Furthermore, the percentage of non-readers is the highest ever recorded in the survey, which began in 2007, and represents a 5% increase compared to the previous edition, conducted in 2019 (figure 1).
Source: Pró Livro Institute (2024)
The main factors pointed out by non-readers as reasons for not having read were lack of time, not liking to read, and not having the patience to read (figure 2).
Source: Pró Livro Institute (2024)
Although lack of time was the main reason cited, survey data showed that internet use and social media during leisure time increased significantly. In 2015, 43% of respondents stated they enjoyed using social media in their free time, a number that rose to 62% in 2019 and 71% in 2024. According to the report “Digital 2024: 5 billion social media users” by We Are Social, Brazil is the third country where users spend the most time using social media, with an average of 3h37 daily.
Designed to be quick and easy to digest, the content produced for social media has come to dominate a large part of people’s choices and activities — determining everything from clothing style and consumption decisions to the so-called lifestyle. The consumption of this quick content greatly impacts people’s concentration ability and makes more complex activities highly challenging.
The expression brain rot(literally translated as “cerebral atrophy”) was coined by cyberculture to define both this type of content and the negative effects it supposedly generates for cognition. So popular was the term that it was elected by Oxford University as the “word” of the year for 2024 and began to appear in the Oxford Dictionary under the definition “the apparent deterioration of a person’s mental or intellectual state, especially seen as resulting from the excessive consumption of material (now particularly online material) considered trivial or not challenging.” The first record of the term, according to Oxford University, was made by Henry David Thoreau in his work “Walden,” in which the author criticizes society’s tendency to devalue complex ideas in favor of simple ones, which would indicate a decline in mental and intellectual effort by individuals (Oxford University Press, 2024).
The brain and synapses
The human brain is formed by a set of neurons that communicate with each other through synapses. Brain development is a process that does not cease, as the brain adapts and reconfigures itself as a new skill or information is learned. This process of adaptation of the brain’s architecture is due to neuroplasticity, which is the brain’s ability to adapt from internal and external stimuli, with neurons forming connections that did not exist before (Jornal da USP, 2023a).
According to Raphael Spera, a doctor at the Hospital das Clínicas of the University of São Paulo’s Medical School, learning is like physical activity for the brain, as it stimulates the organ’s plasticity. As the activity is performed, a large brain area is stimulated to find the most efficient way to carry out such a task, leading to an increase in gray matter volume in the areas stimulated by this activity (Jornal da USP, 2023a).
Regarding reading, the main activated areas are those responsible for processing visual stimuli, symbol recognition, and language processing, meaning it is an activity that stimulates the neuroplasticity of areas responsible for memory, interpretation, vision and concentration (CMSi, 2021). According to Eliane Comoli, a professor at the Ribeirão Preto School of Medicine at USP, the act of paying attention requires cognitive effort (Jornal da USP, 2023b), therefore, for an individual to have greater focus and concentration capacity, it is necessary for them to exercise this competence with activities that stimulate it — such as, for example, reading (Jornal da USP, 2020).
Relationship between reading and writing
Reading plays a significant role in the development of writing. Research reveals that when writing and reading are taught together, both skills are better developed by students. Reading can also function as a tool for improving writing skills because, when reading, the individual comes into contact with a diversity of textual genres, grammatical structures, and a plurality of vocabulary (Ahmed et al., 2023). But, despite these factors being known, it is not yet possible to establish the nature of the correlation between writing and reading skills.
Although many may think otherwise, written production is part of the daily lives of the vast majority of people — including in the context of social networks and everyday communication, with the exchange of messages that occurs in both personal and professional spheres. Writing is the process of transforming ideas into texts and involves interpretation, ordering and connection of words based on the linguistic and grammatical criteria of a language. A text that lacks clarity can generate confusion and the spread of incorrect information. In scientific and business contexts, the damage caused by confusions of this nature can generate significant impacts.
Every scientific discovery needs to be published in journals to be validated and disseminated. This makes writing part of researchers’ daily routine, regardless of the area they work in. Building a cohesive, organized, and objective text is essential to ensure clarity in transmitting the information contained therein, as well as to facilitate understanding for both other researchers and people seeking knowledge on the subject (read more about the topic by clicking on the column “Where is the clarity?”, of the E&S Magazine.
A survey conducted in 2019 by the National Association of Colleges and Employers, in the United States, indicated that 82% of the interviewed employers considered that written communication was the most valued skill, ahead of problem-solving skills or teamwork ability (Research Rockstar, 2020).
According to Jeff Bradford, former member of the Forbes Agency Board and president of Dalton Agency’s Nashville office, companies’ concern with the quality of employees’ writing is linked to the fact that they consider communication a key factor for success in any business, since persuasion is a fundamental part of negotiations (Forbes, 2019). And, although communication can occur in various ways — videos, conversations, calls, illustrations, advertisements, etc. —, all of them depend on writing skills, as, being a cognitively complex activity, it requires the coordination of a series of higher-order thoughts for it to be well executed.
It is important to remember that reading is a habit that, like others, can be acquired even by those who are not familiar with the activity. An essential tip for including reading in your routine is to set aside a daily time for it, which can start with 10 minutes and gradually increase. At this moment, it is important that distractions such as cell phones, computers, and televisions are eliminated, which increases concentration capacity. The habit of reading can also be an important ally in reducing the use of social media, the excess of which can cause problems such as anxiety, depression, poor sleep quality, low self-esteem, and even lead to a fictional elaboration of reality (Jornal da USP, 2021). Read more about social media and self-esteem by clicking on the column “Sem filtro: reflexões sobre autenticidade, autoestima e o impacto das redes sociais”, from Revista E&S.
Reading, whether it is a complex work or done as a hobby, is an activity that presents numerous benefits for human beings. In addition to neurological, psychological, and professional aspects, reading also allows for the strengthening of critical thinking and the broadening of people’s worldview. In a context like the current one, with the spread of fake news and social media algorithms that surround people with topics of interest to ensure they do not abandon the activity, broadening critical thinking takes people out of their comfort zone and gives them the necessary tools to discern between what is true and what is not.
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This content was produced by:
Jéssica Zambello
She holds a degree in Portuguese Language and Literatures of the Portuguese Language from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) and a master’s degree in Portuguese and African Literatures of the Portuguese Language from the same institution. Since 2024, she has worked as a proofreader and text preparer at Editora Pecege.
Who wrote this column
Editora Pecege
