Participants Needed! How fast do you read?

Salt · Jun 9, 2012

I've read that on average people read around 250-300 wpm. If you can please take the test here

http://www.staples.com/sbd/cre/mark...arch-centers/ereaders/speed-reader/index.html

and post your wpm, I would greatly appreciate it. Please be honest and read at your normal rate. If you're ashamed,

like I am, of your reading speed please private message me the answer instead.

Your participation will help me greatly!

Also, please specify what story you read.

Edited.
For those of you wanting to know more. I'm collecting this information for my own novel. I'm self publishing and calculating how long it would take for someone to finish my manuscript. All of this is to help me decide a good price.

Silence · Jun 9, 2012

Ok I tried it, I read 265 wpm. Not too good, but it's not that bad right?

Parametric · Jun 9, 2012

475 words per minute. All three questions answered correctly.

Salt · Jun 9, 2012

Thanks. I edited the OP but if you guys don't mind, could you also give the name of the book excerpt as well.

Scribhneoir · Jun 9, 2012

368 words per minute.

The examples they give of reading times for well-known books at that speed seems pretty reasonable based on how long it usually takes me to read a book for pleasure.

ETA: My excerpt was from The War of the Worlds

jclarkdawe · Jun 9, 2012

2 out of 3 correct, 644 wpm. And an ache to edit this into some decent writing. And I didn't pay any attention to the title.

This is a poorly designed test because information isn't being presented in a logical manner. Result is you really need to go back and forth in your reading to understand. Result was I just skimmed. So part of the issue is how are you reading this and for what purpose. Which vastly effects the speed of reading.

ETA: Went back and looked at it again. It was THE WAR OF THE WORLDS, and the purpose of the test seems to be slowing you down in your reading so you will go for their longer battery life. And this piece is not what I'd choose for testing reading speed. It would be much better to have chosen the beginning of a section, rather then jumping into the middle. It would help ground the reader, and would be an area where the writer is more naturally presenting testable information.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe

firedrake · Jun 9, 2012

559 words, and answered all three questions correctly.

BunnyMaz · Jun 9, 2012

432wpm. I got all 3 questions right, but it was Alice in Wonderland I got, so it's hardly surprising since I'm already familiar with the story. It does seem pretty true to my natural speed, at least according to the test estimate of how quickly I could read certain books. I have a habit of picking up a book to take to bed and finishing it before I fall asleep. Admittedly, when I do that, I generally fall asleep around 3am...

Yasaibatake · Jun 9, 2012

490 words per minute for me. I answered all 3 questions correctly but the excerpt was from Alice in Wonderland, which is one of my all-time favorites anyway

If it had been new to me, I would have read a little slower.

lorna_w · Jun 9, 2012

391. Alice

then I went back and tried again, different reading sample, and got 792. Er, it felt like I was reading the exact same speed both times.

NikkiSloan · Jun 9, 2012

351 wpm - ha! - 11th grade level.
Mom will be disappointed.

leahzero · Jun 9, 2012

391. Default The War of the Worlds snippet.

But this test is useless. When I read fiction, I read slowly to savor the language, visualize scenes, etc.

When I'm reading nonfiction, I skim for facts and read rapidly.

Since this is a combination of the two, it produces meaningless data.

jaksen · Jun 9, 2012

586

War of the Worlds

Parametric · Jun 9, 2012

Didn't catch the title of the excerpt. Something to do with two or three hundred people standing around a pit.

NikkiSloan · Jun 9, 2012

Yup - 550 wpm reading Alice. Not sure what that first one was. Had to scroll down to click the Finished button both times ... that's my excuse. That and the fact that I prefer reading at a leisurely pace.

Salt · Jun 9, 2012

The results are high, which is expected since this sample size is full of writers. I'll probably have to jump over to another forum to sample another group. Thanks for the responses and keep them coming.

JayMan · Jun 9, 2012

jclarkdawe said:
2 out of 3 correct, 644 wpm. And an ache to edit this into some decent writing. And I didn't pay any attention to the title.

This is a poorly designed test because information isn't being presented in a logical manner. Result is you really need to go back and forth in your reading to understand. Result was I just skimmed. So part of the issue is how are you reading this and for what purpose. Which vastly effects the speed of reading.

ETA: Went back and looked at it again. It was THE WAR OF THE WORLDS, and the purpose of the test seems to be slowing you down in your reading so you will go for their longer battery life. And this piece is not what I'd choose for testing reading speed. It would be much better to have chosen the beginning of a section, rather then jumping into the middle. It would help ground the reader, and would be an area where the writer is more naturally presenting testable information.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe

leahzero said:
391. Default The War of the Worlds snippet.

But this test is useless. When I read fiction, I read slowly to savor the language, visualize scenes, etc.

When I'm reading nonfiction, I skim for facts and read rapidly.

Since this is a combination of the two, it produces meaningless data.

Agree with both of these wholeheartedly. If I'm reading a dense biology textbook, for instance, I probably read 700-1000 wpm (which is probably what they meant by "high scoring college students" or "college professors," etc.). Absolutely not the same as reading fiction.

427, 3/3, Wizard of Oz, by the way.

But in reality, probably slower than that, because I was intentionally reading a little faster knowing the test was timed.

Salt · Jun 9, 2012

leahzero said:
391. Default The War of the Worlds snippet.

But this test is useless. When I read fiction, I read slowly to savor the language, visualize scenes, etc.

When I'm reading nonfiction, I skim for facts and read rapidly.

Since this is a combination of the two, it produces meaningless data.

It may seem meaningless, but its helping me. And thanks for the extra info on fiction vs nonfiction. I think a lot of people do that, at least I know I do. Feel free to give further explanation of your reading scores.

Ari Meermans · Jun 9, 2012

Well color me shocked. 732 and 3 out of 3 correct. War of the Worlds.

muse · Jun 9, 2012

507 words per minute. War of the Worlds. Answered all 3 questions correctly.

MacAllister · Jun 9, 2012

Salt, what is this for?

Generally I take a REALLY dim view of people who drop in here to exploit the community for the sake of their college research paper or statistics class, for example -- and doing research for something like that on a forum without properly informing and receiving informed consent from the participants is worth than useless, it's unethical, slimy, creepy, and wrong. But people still try to do that here on a regular basis.

On the other hand, for something like an informal survey to use in a blog post, it would be entirely different and much more acceptable.

Salt · Jun 9, 2012

Sorry MacAllister. This isn't for school. I was dividing wpm by the length of my manuscripts to get a rough estimate of how long it would take someone to finish my novel. I did a post earlier on how long people like their books. This is to help me decide how much to charge when self-publishing. I was planning on posting my results on the self-publishing board.
Please don't ban the thread, it's helping a lot.

mscelina · Jun 9, 2012

I'd take this test, but I strongly dislike links that take me to a retail site without my prior knowledge and/or permission. I don't need anything at Staples, thanks--and particularly not a link that takes me off AW.

SLF · Jun 9, 2012

327. war of the worlds. 2/3 correct but I ended up skimming about 1/3 the way through.

Nick Rolynd · Jun 9, 2012

289 (all three questions correct for War of the Worlds) at my normal fiction reading pace.

434 (all three questions right for Alice in Wonderland) and 489 (all three questions right for The Wizard of Oz) at the pace I would read a textbook or something I wasn't particularly interested in.

How fast I read depends on the pacing of the story, the level of writing, and my general interest in it. The harder something is to read, the slower I read. The more interested I am in the story, the slower I read. If I'm not particularly invested and it's an easy read, I blow through it pretty fast.

Participants Needed! How fast do you read?

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