Reading books too challenging for Sweden's students
Professors at the prestigious Lund University in southern Sweden have voiced concern to the newspaper Sydsvenskan about how their students' reading skills are declining. Even top students are often unable to read longer texts and books, they say. The national press examines the causes.
Overprotected from childhood onwards
Expressen sees symptoms of overprotective families and failures in the school system:
“In his book 'The Anxious Generation', American psychologist Jonathan Haidt says that Gen Z is doubly afflicted - by screen terror and by an overprotective adult world that has clipped the children's wings. ... Having learnt nothing in primary school, they are dragged through secondary school and get top marks in all subjects. Then eventually they start studying law or dentistry without being able to read a book. ... Compulsory reading and writing tests should be standard at all universities. ... There must be no compromises here.”
Studying is a mental marathon
Students are too caught up in the digital world, Sydsvenskan suspects:
“The point of a university education is not to ask AIs to solve puzzles, but to train one's own skills. ... Quite apart from how good or bad the corresponding AI tools are, students have to read the course literature in order to practice how to analyse and reflect on texts independently. As the Enlightenment philosopher Voltaire wrote back in 1767, thinking, doubting and questioning one's own views is 'not a pleasant condition'. But there is no shortcut to enlightenment. The fact that good results take time and effort should be as self-evident at university as it is at the fitness studio.”