Only 16 percent of Americans read for personal interest or pleasure

[2na fisherman]

74. Lack of Language skills nurtured by new media

Many high schools have student graduates who cannot read beyond a sixth grade level. But they are often more able to communicate among their peers using a truncated text language version of English and emojis when they communicate on smart phones: "R U @ home yet? W8 4 me. I'll C U L8R." All communication must be fast and geared for limited attention spans by years of conditioning via non-verbal advertising images designed for quick emotional responses. So it's no wonder that the younger generation, and elders, view literature as a dying art. In many ways, it's a foreign language to them. And trying to spend time to ponder things like subtext, nuance, allegory and irony presented using a large vocabulary is just too boring when compared to the cheap thills offered by video games. And who needs to write anything when there is a speech-to-text AI bot nearby?