Misc,
COST E-READ Stavanger Declaration Concerning the Future of Reading
(2019)
Abstract
We live in an era of ever more swift and pervasive digitisation. Digital technologies offer tremendous
opportunities with respect to the production, access, storage and transmission of information, at the
same time as they challenge a number of long-established reading practices. Over the last four years a
group of almost 200 scholars and scientists of reading, publishing, and literacy from across Europe,
have been researching the impact of digitisation on reading practices.
Paper and screens each afford their own types of processing. In today's hybrid reading environment of
paper and screens, we will need to find the best ways to utilize the advantages of both paper and digital
technologies across age groups and purposes.
Research shows that paper remains the preferred reading medium for longer single texts, especially
when reading for deeper comprehension and retention, and that paper best supports long-form reading
of informational texts. Reading long-form texts is invaluable for a number of cognitive achievements,
such as concentration, vocabulary building and memory. Thus, it is important that we preserve and
foster long-form reading as one of a number of reading modes. In addition, as screen use continues to
grow, it will be one of the urgent challenges to discover ways in which to facilitate deep reading of
long-form texts in a screen environment.
