How We Learned to Read

Why do we actually read word-for-word or with small fixations?

Believing that we have to read each word individually, slowly, and thoroughly is a remnant from elementary school, where we learned to read. Here it made sense to concentrate on each individual word, as we first had to decode each one separately. Starting with letters or graphemes as symbols, to which a certain sound is assigned, several sounds formed a sound, which in turn has a specific meaning for us. Gradually, we were able to read the words ourselves by converting the sounds into word meaning. This is our inner voice that reads along, known as subvocalization.

This method is helpful for learning the basics, but the limitations that this technique entails need to be overcome. The small field of vision for individual words, the frequent reading fixations, and the inner speaking along prevent us from reading faster and more efficiently.

By now, we have had quite a bit of reading experience and know many words, so we no longer have to audibly decipher every word anew. We already know enough words and recognize their meaning purely visually. We have built up a kind of internal dictionary, a graphemic lexicon, over time that we can access. This way, words and phrases can be understood before we convert them into a sound.

However, we habitually cling to word-for-word fixation, as well as to subvocalization, the inner voice. It is a conditioning to phonetic text processing that we once needed because we didn't know any words yet.

These developmental stages of reading have conditioned us to "speaking-reading." However, since we can think much faster than we can speak, we limit ourselves.

There are thus two ways of reading. On the one hand, the auditory (phonological) way, where we have to pronounce words internally to ourselves. On the other hand, the visual (lexical) way, where we grasp the meaning of words purely visually by accessing words we already know. This allows more units of meaning to be grasped at once, which increases semantic understanding.

The trained reader uses both methods of text comprehension to absorb information more quickly. Through the visual path, our brain can process several words simultaneously, allowing us to make more efficient reading fixations or require fewer fixations per line of text. We merely need to increase the input from the eyes to the brain. It is worthwhile to learn to read anew.