On The Mass Reading Style In The New Media Era

Reading is an important means of civilization development, which enables human to probe into the world. As a kind of social activity to understand the symbols, reading and its style change with the development of media, the carrier of language and symbol, and the object of reading activity. During the past decade the mass reading style has changed radically since the avalanche of the new media, including cellphone, E-book, and Internet media such as Blog and cyber-magazine.One of the representative transforms is the so-called Shallow Reading. The periods when mass reading showed different characteristics are Clumsy Media Era, Paper Media Era, Electronic Media Era and, New Media Era. In the last one came forth some new reading modes related to Internet, cellphone, TV and so on. Part of the presentation of the shallow reading tendency is the decrease of paper-medium reading opposite to the increase of reading through screens. It has deeply influenced people's reading habit.With theories of communication the author analyzes the phenomena of mass reading in the new medium environment and figure out what has been changed. The analysis comes down to the intrinsic changes in the text, the reading public's motivation and mentality, property of reading activity, etc. Based on a survey of the reading behavior of people in Guangzhou city, the author analyzes the trend as well as the actuality of modern mass reading style.Following the changes of communication modes caused by influence of new media, the mass reading style, as an essential part of human's life, has been changed so much and it is only a beginning. It brings forward a challenge to the media education and the communication study of China.