Paper & Digital

Paper is better than digital.

Recent research shows that reading a paper product, similar to one you are holding,  stimulates the deep-reading part of your brain. Digital reading does not. 

Neuroscience has revealed that humans use a different part of their brain when reading from a paper product versus a screen! The more time you spend reading on a screen, the more your mind skips around. The researchers call it non-linear reading. 

When reading digitally and not holding a paper product in your hands, your brain tends to focus on non-linear reading and encourage a bi-literate brain experience. You don't get as much and you cant' recall as much of what you just read.

When you read a paper product you read from the deep-reading part of your brain. And if you don't read often enough, thereby utilizing the deep-reading part of your brain, you lose the deep-reading part of your brain. If you don't use it, you lose it. 

What is deep-reading you may ask?  An example is what happens in our brain when we read a novel. When you spend most of your time reading from a screen, independent of the content, you compromise your deep-reading function. The things we really want to understand and learn by reading, we cannot accomplish by screen-reading. 

Deep-reading, by utilizing a paper product, encourages a slower read and that helps your brain to absorb, file and recall that which you just read.  Digital reading is literally and figuratively all over the board, according to the studies. 

This science is telling us, that you who rely on screens are not doing reading as well as you could, and are also may be the culprits encouraging children to grow up with a digital screen and compromised deep-reading capabilities. 

We, at The Constitution, recently began printing the Lawton School Newspaper. When we discovered that a digital edition was all the students had, we happily contributed our skills and printing capabilities to producing a paper newspaper for the students and teachers.  The response has been delightful. 

The power of paper!