Comment by nxc18 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by nxc18 | Hacker News Reader

There is a good point in this article about the perception of effort and how that affects comprehension, rather than the medium.

I've met and worked with many people who think that just because it is being read through a computer that they don't have to read it carefully.

As a so-called 'digital native' with an unapologetic love for text, I find it extremely frustrating that people don't take online text seriously. Some people even like to speed-read, racing through text faster than they can recall the pronunciation of the words.

You might think you can speed read and still understand the content - most of the speedreaders I know hold that belief quite dear - but you aren't getting the whole story. A single missed word can profoundly alter the meaning of a sentence. I've seen many conflicts and miscommunications caused by lazy reading and misinterpreted messages.

If I took my time to write a clear, concise, meaningful message/email/post/document/etc, please pay me the courtesy of truly reading it.

/rant

> Some people even like to speed-read, racing through text faster than they can recall the pronunciation of the words.

That's totally normal! I don't think I know anybody who doesn't read faster than they can talk.

I agree with you about the problems involved speed reading, but... what you're describing here isn't speed reading --- it's just reading quickly. Speed reading's an entirely different discipline (and which is known not to work well).

> and which is known not to work well

This is commonly said about speed reading, but it seems to me like a bit of a misunderstanding about what speed reading even is. Speed reading isn't about trying to retain the same level of comprehension on a single pass through a text as a normal speed pass through it. It's nothing more than an optimized skimming technique if you only take one or two passes through a text. But the idea is to leverage the time saved through 'speed reading', by putting that extra time into additional passes later on, thus making it more of an efficient spaced repetition[0] system than a reading technique. The idea being that you build your comprehension up with each pass, until you surpass the comprehension you would've had of it if you only took one normal speed pass through it, and in the end still use up about the same amount of time or less as a normal reading.

Continuing with the spaced repetition idea, speed reading also helps that along more than normal reading by making the things you've read more difficult to recall, which is good if you plan to review them again later to strengthen the memories. The book "Make It Stick"[1] has a pretty good overview of different scientifically proven learning techniques that are pretty interesting, and a lot of them overlap with the effects of speed reading + multiple passes.

Personally, since I'm dyslexic, I prefer applying this approach to audiobooks and listening to them at 3-4x speed, then re-listening to ones I liked later, all while taking notes as I go. And I have to say, that works out for me pretty well. My biggest issue is keeping track of which book I learned what from.

[0] https://www.gwern.net/Spaced%20repetition

[1] http://makeitstick.net

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