Reading's Impact on Democratic Citizenship in America

Polls conducted for the Times Mirror/Pew Research Center for The People & The Press enable us to explore reading's impact on democratic citizenship in the United States. After exploring literacy's meaning and significance, we assess how much Americans read and how reading affects key facets of democratic citizenship: attention to, knowledge of, and participation in public affairs and tolerance for unpopular groups. A measure of time spent reading the day before being interviewed is a significant predictor of democratic citizenship, even when other key factors' effects are taken into account. Reading remains essential to the quality of citizenship in modern democracy.