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Fragmented Reading is Making You More and More Stupid

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Fragmented Reading is Making You More and More Stupid

Psychology Open Class,

5 min read
5 take-aways
Audio & text

What's inside?

All those products that say you can learn on the go are actually doing more harm than good.

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Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Innovative
  • Applicable
  • For Beginners

Recommendation

Many people in China and elsewhere try to take advantage of every little scrap of downtime. With the proliferation of the mobile Internet and social media, the number of wemedia channels and paid-content companies in China has exploded, and people subscribe to massive amounts of articles and podcasts to read or listen to when they have a moment of spare time. Feng Xu, a therapist and blogger on the wemedia channel Psychology Open Class, presents his case against “fragmented reading” and prescribes a way to break the habit. Ironically, he is making this appeal to the public using the same medium and writing style that he fervently attacks in his article. Nevertheless, his challenge of the “knowledge consumption trend” that has taken hold of China in the last two years makes his perspective interesting. getAbstract recommends this article to young professionals, procrastinators, people with cellphone addictions and people who want to make better use of their time.

Summary

The Internet – along with mobile smartphones – is changing the way people read. The practice of “fragmented reading” – the behavior of reading in spurts and on the go – is replacing old habits of “deep reading” in extended blocks of time. Fragmented reading allows readers to acquire a wider range of information from more diverse sources. However, the flip side of fragmented reading reveals five problems:

  1. Fragmented reading creates lazy readers who no longer proactively try to learn the material – The channels that offer content that people can read in short chunks of time have one goal: attract more users. Their goal isn’t to educate or provide in-depth analysis of an issue but to monetize a large user base. This business model produces “dumbed-down” material and simple articles with alluring titles that are easy to understand, provoke emotion...

About the Author

Feng Xu is a blogger and therapist who writes for the WeChat wemedia channel Psychology Open Class.

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