Theodore (TJ) Cooke

theodore.cooke@ocvts.org

Are you
Cheating?
Reading Comprehension vs.
Listening Comprehension
 Introduction
There is a stigma surrounding
audiobooks, and how they are viewed as
“cheating”

● Audiobooks
○ seen as leisurely and
This study compared the scores of participants in different
something that you can use
sections of a form in which they had to read and listen to short
while you are multitasking
pieces and answer questions about them to see if they
● Physical books
comprehended them. Participants were also asked to go to
○ take up most of a person’s
educationplanner.com to take a short assessment and report
attention
which learning type they were assigned (visual, auditory, or
○ preventing multitasking
tactile) to see if that affected the results.
Hypothesis
It was hypothesized that considering the fact
that there are several different types of learning
styles, there would be no clear-cut answer of
whether one method is better than the other,
rather that they will both remain equally reliable
for comprehension. This is because there are
too many variables for there to be a specific
learning style that’s better for comprehension.
Methods
● This experiment was conducted on a google form that was split into 3
sections
○ First section was to report level of education and learning style
○ Second section contained reading pieces and comprehension
questions
○ Third section included audio files and comprehension questions
● Readings and audio files were found to use on the form
○ 1 fiction and 1 nonfiction for both
● A Good Form was created and added my excerpts and follow up questions
● A form was advertised to friends, family, in school, and on social media
● 93 responses were collected
● Responses were recorded on a google sheet
● Data was analyzed
○ Wrote down which section each participant did better in (reading,
listening, or neither)
■ Counted the number of people who did best in each section
○ Found the average score in each section and overall
○ Separated the responses by learning style
■ Counted the number of people who did best in each section
 Results
● Out of 93 total participants,
47% of them showed better
comprehension when listening
● Out of the 44 people who did
better on listening, 19 were
auditory learners.
● Out of the 15 people who did
better on reading, 7 were
visual learners.
● Out of the 34 people who got
the same score on both parts,
16 were tactile learners.
● The average score was 88.23
Discussion
● The data revealed that my hypothesis was wrong
● Observation: Less than 50% of participants got the
right answer to one specific question in the listening
section
● Variable that could have possibly led to this
outcome: The people reading the audiobook used
different pitches in their voices for each character,
which could keep somebody’s attention
Audiobooks
● This conclusion could help to make teachers more
aware of the benefits of audiobooks and hopefully Vs
they could link them to their assignments more
Physical Books
often
 Conclusion
● the original hypothesis was not correct
● the majority of people performed better
when listening
● it was proven that there is an association
between learning types and
comprehension of materials
Sources
Beth A. Rogowsky, B. (2016, September 1). Does Modality Matter? The Effects of Reading, Listening, and Dual Modality on Comprehension - Beth A.
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Heid, M. (2018, September 6). Are Audiobooks As Good For You As Reading? Here's What Experts Say. Time.
https://time.com/5388681/audiobooks-reading-books/.

Lee, D. (2018, November 22). Audiobooks vs Reading: The Rules Are, There Are No Rules. BOOK RIOT. https://bookriot.com/audiobooks-vs-reading/.

Martin, J. (2021, April 19). Do Audiobooks Get in the Way of Learning to Read? Understood.
https://www.understood.org/en/school-learning/assistive-technology/assistive-technologies-basics/will-listening-to-audiobooks-make-it-harder-for-my-third-
grader-to-learn-to-read.

Reading vs Listening - YouTube. (2017, September 16). Retrieved October 27, 2020, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKGB3k6cPCU

Sea Turtles. National Wildlife Federation. (n.d.). https://www.nwf.org/Educational-Resources/Wildlife-Guide/Reptiles/Sea-Turtles.

What's Your Learning Style? 20 Questions. (n.d.). http://www.educationplanner.org/students/self-assessments/learning-styles-quiz.shtml.

Why AUDIOBOOKS Are NOT The Same As READING | Audiobooks VS ... (2019, October 12). Retrieved October 27, 2020, from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dr4FoRs4xIY

World Wildlife Fund. (n.d.). Sea Turtle. WWF. https://www.worldwildlife.org/species/sea-turtle.