Let’s talk about the difference between listening to books and reading books

I like reading. I used to read paper books, but since my friend introduced WeChat Reading a year ago, I have been reading e-books on WeChat Reading. The advantage of e-books is that you can open your phone anytime, anywhere and read a few pages. You can also underline sentences or paragraphs that interest you and write your thoughts while reading. The disadvantage is that looking at the phone for too long will cause eye fatigue.

My eyes have been dry recently. In order to reduce the time I spend looking at my phone, I chose the "Listen" function in WeChat Reading. The electronically synthesized voice will read the book to you. At the beginning, I felt it was okay, but gradually I discovered that there is a really big difference between listening to books and reading by myself. Maybe I'm not an auditory learner, or maybe the electronic sound is segmented incorrectly, so when listening, I always feel like I don't understand what the book says at all, let alone understand it in depth.

Then I tried listening to some books read aloud by real people. Although the sentences and emotions were on point, it still felt wrong. What was the problem? Later, I finally discovered that although listening to books and reading books are both inputting a book into the brain, the two methods are completely different.

Listening to a book is passive acceptance. The reader has already expressed the emotions and hidden meanings in the book. When it reaches the brain through the ears, there is no room for thinking. Some philosophical sentences or paragraphs also pass by in a blink of an eye during the listening process. Before you can penetrate into the cerebral cortex to ponder and understand, the following words and sentences will flow into your ears again, so the book ends.

When you read a book, you actively take it in with your own eyes. When your eyes see these words, your brain will expand the space of imagination. The characters, actions, and emotions displayed through the words are all one by one. in your mind. Some sentences are not enough for you to read once, but you have to read them two or three times. You chew these words over and over again until they take root in your brain.

I don’t know if you like listening to books or reading books. Do you feel the same way as me?