Reading books is good for you--really
A study by researchers at Yale University School of Public Health appears to show that reading books can provide health benefits. They studied the records of over 5,000 participants in the ongoing Health and Retirement study who were over 50 and had provided information on their reading habits when the study began. People who read books regularly had a 20% lower risk of dying over the next 12 years compared with people who weren't readers or who read periodicals. The difference remained regardless of race, education, state of health, wealth, marital status, and depression.
It looks like the study was too small to try to guess at whether there's a difference between fiction and nonfiction. And I wonder why books were linked to longevity while periodicals weren't.
And does fanfiction count as a book?
Since the same periodical I read this in (Harvard Women's Health Watch) had an article on sitting which said that people who were sedentary, with less than 150 minutes of exercise a week, had an increased risk of heart disease, diabetes, and breast and colon cancer, I'm glad that I can read and exercise at the same time. Yes, it's possible to read on an exercise bike or a treadmill. I just hope that the "books" in the first study mentioned includes all formats. I read from a tablet or a Kindle. I'd hate to drag a paper book to the gym. I save those for my sedentary periods.
It looks like the study was too small to try to guess at whether there's a difference between fiction and nonfiction. And I wonder why books were linked to longevity while periodicals weren't.
And does fanfiction count as a book?
Since the same periodical I read this in (Harvard Women's Health Watch) had an article on sitting which said that people who were sedentary, with less than 150 minutes of exercise a week, had an increased risk of heart disease, diabetes, and breast and colon cancer, I'm glad that I can read and exercise at the same time. Yes, it's possible to read on an exercise bike or a treadmill. I just hope that the "books" in the first study mentioned includes all formats. I read from a tablet or a Kindle. I'd hate to drag a paper book to the gym. I save those for my sedentary periods.