The Hindu reports on a survey of book reading habits in north Tamil Nadu, conducted in mid 2006.
More than three-fourths of the 329 people surveyed by a group of journalism students from Softview Visual Communication were between the ages of 15 and 40. They rated education as the principal reason for buying books.The survey had several parameters, including reasons, material chosen, preferred time and preferred language for reading. It was conducted with the reading public in Chennai, Thiruvallur, Kanchipuram, Villupuram and Cuddalore as the target group.
A little more than half of those surveyed said they preferred to read English books though around 80 per cent marked their mother tongue as Tamil.
While English was associated with better employment opportunities, the upwardly mobile young adult group still seems almost evenly split between reading English and Tamil books.
More than a fourth of them said that books for leisure reading were important, while around a fifth of all respondents said they preferred reading personality development books.
More than 40 per cent said that they prefer to buy books from book fairs, though about the same proportion still frequent bookshops. Online book shopping seems to be picking up slowly with around 2 per cent choosing that mode of shopping.
Most readers also said that they prefer to read at home in the evenings or night. Around half the number surveyed said they had a personal collection of books at home.
The principal factors affecting the choice of books were reviews in magazines, the reputation a particular book gained by word of mouth, or the author's popularity.
Man u have done a lot fo research for this, kudos and keep it up, i will keep coming back
Posted by: Rajesh Chandran | April 01, 2007 at 07:30 PM
Great work done by Journalism students
Posted by: Dinamalar | September 23, 2009 at 05:15 PM
Dear Sir/Madam,
Thank you very much for providing such wide knowledge for publishing Industry.
I want to know about it more. I mean, How the books are published?, What are the channnels we can go for?, what are the rates to get book published?
if you can provide me such information then I would be greatful to you.
this is my mail: mahesh_buiz@yahoo.co.in
Posted by: Mahesh Patel | September 29, 2009 at 09:46 AM
Dear sir,
I am an M.Ed student at Calicut University, Kerala. This article was indeed useful for me as my dissertation topic is Reading Habit. Thank you so much.
Posted by: Razeena | January 05, 2010 at 10:28 PM
i am from chennai and i found this article helpful. i would like to see some graphs to support this.
Posted by: education | August 04, 2011 at 05:31 PM
I think more people needs to be able to read, while this would help them not only with readding but also with other issues, maybe with TV with subtitles...
Posted by: jadrnice | September 22, 2011 at 05:38 PM
I like way of writing and explaining. Great survey
Posted by: chandan singh | October 09, 2011 at 07:27 AM