To Your Brain, Audiobooks Are Not 'Cheating'

Simplifying, two basic processes happen when you read: There is decoding, or translating the strings of letters into words with meaning. And then there is language processing, or comprehension.

Decoding is specific to reading but by about late elementary school, decoding becomes so second-nature that it isn’t any additional “work” for your brain. It happens automatically.

Reading regularly involves many regressions, where you reread parts of the text to ascertain a word or syntax.

Listening sometimes requires echoic memory which is a brain feature that allows us to remember something we heard without paying attention to it a few seconds after we heard if needed.

• The book might not have been intended to be consumed in such a way and doing so decreases the value obtained from reading it.
• An inertial reaction from our society, especially in schools, where reading a big number of books or certain famous ones was considered an achievement.