By Lilyana Canales | Arts & Life Writer
While almost half of U.S. adults read below a sixth grade level, Generation Z has picked up a few tricks to keep themselves off their phones and focused on reading, including “brain stacking” and building a personal curriculum.
According to Worldmetrics, 47% of U.S. adults read below the sixth-grade level, and 36 million U.S. adults are functionally illiterate.
Despite these statistics, Gen Z is reading at an increasing rate. In a recent article, Relevant magazine reported on a study published by the Cambridge University Press, titled “How Gen Z Discover and Consume Books,” by professors Kathi Inman Berens and Rachel Noorda. The study found that 66% of Gen Z identify as readers.
Gen Z has also contributed to certain trends that encourage reading. Brain stacking took TikTok by storm this past October. This trend is a replacement for “doomscrolling” and a rest from “brainrot” content online.
In a recent article, Mashable digital culture editor Crystal Bell wrote that brain stacking involves “assembling a stack of activities designed to engage your brain.”
“On TikTok and Instagram Reels, creators are showing off their collections of Sudoku books, crossword puzzles, novels, journals, and other analog activities.” Bell wrote. “The goal of the trend is to feed your brain with cognitively stimulating activities, instead of doomscrolling when you are bored.”
While reading novels is one of the possible analog activities, Dr. Jodie Maki, an adjunct English professor, said brain stacking can be helpful for doom scrolling but may not be the answer to the broader literacy crisis and obsession with screens.
“I don’t know that doom scrolling is the main culprit for the literacy crisis,” Maki said. “My experience would point to the problem stemming from the early years of reading experience, or the lack thereof. Before children have personal access to social media, they have access to screens … Those screens have replaced reading and in my opinion is the root cause of the literacy crisis, and it started before Gen Z.”
Similarly, Dr. Youngji Seo, an assistant professor in the journalism department, said that the literacy crisis is not just a Gen Z problem.
“I believe most people right now, across all generations, are experiencing the same thing,” Seo said. “With the popularity of social media, people are constantly exposed to short-form content … and short-form videos and algorithm-driven feeds encourage us to consume information quickly. This constant exposure makes it harder for us to process information carefully. As a result, people tend to understand information more superficially, and over time, this can weaken their critical thinking in general.”
Another pro-literacy trend still circulating the algorithm is the practice of building a personal curriculum.
According to a Newsweek article by life and trends reporter Lydia Patrick, this trend seeks to enjoy “learning for learning’s sake” and mirrors the back-to-school season, with its kickoff occurring during autumn.
There is no fixed outline for how one’s personal curriculum must look. The only guidelines are to find interesting topics and compile a syllabus, assignments and the like.
On the matter of these trends, Seo said what matters is why people are participating.
“People are recognizing the media literacy problem and trying to do something about it,” Seo said.
Though a U.S. literacy crisis has been recognized, Seo said there may be hope.
“There has been an increase in books checked out from the school library in the last year as well,” Seo said. “… Maybe there is hope for an improvement in this crisis, but it will need to be combatted in many ways.”
