Books

If you're reading this, you probably aren't an average young American. A report released Monday by the National Endowment for the Arts makes clear what they're doing a lot less of: reading.

•Only 30 percent of 13-year-olds read almost every day.

•The number of 17-year-olds who never read for pleasure increased from 9 percent in 1984 to 19 percent in 2004.

•Almost half of Americans between ages 18 and 24 never read books for pleasure.

•The average person between ages 15 and 24 spends 2 to 2 ½ hours a day watching TV and seven minutes reading.

The 99-page study, "To Read or Not to Read," is a follow-up to a 2004 NEA survey, "Reading at Risk," that found an increasing number of adults were not reading even one book a year. The findings were based on government, academic and foundation data.

The report found that the more books there are in a young person's home, the higher their average scores in science, civics and history. But the report notes that average household spending on books, adjusted for inflation, dropped 14 percent from 1985 to 2005.

According to the report, reading ability has fallen as well. While scores have improved for 9-year-olds, they dropped sharply for 17-year-olds. Only about a third of high school seniors read at a proficient level, a 13 percent decline since 1992. "And proficiency is not a high standard," NEA Chairman Dana Gioia said. "We're not asking them to be able to read Proust in the original. We're talking about reading the daily newspaper."

The report suggests that multitasking is a factor. It found that more than half of middle and high school students use other media most or some of the time while reading, and that 20 percent of the time they spend reading they are also watching TV, playing video games, sending messages or otherwise using a computer.