Examining Shared Storybook Reading in Childhood and Reading for Pleasure in Adolescence

The numerous benefits of print exposure are unquestionable as they have been widely studied among children and adults (Cunningham & Stanovich, 1990, 1991, 1997, 2001; Mol & Bus, 2011). However, despite these benefits, some individuals choose to engage in reading as a leisure activity and some do not. The social interactions of shared storybook reading have contributed to children’s favorable experiences with reading up to Grade 4 (Sénéchal, 2006), yet the role that shared storybook reading plays in print exposure during high school has not been examined. Therefore, the present study investigated shared storybook reading in childhood and current print exposure in English and in French with 45 adolescent-parent dyads from the greater Montréal area. Parents and adolescents completed a retrospective Title Recognition Test (TRT), where they identified storybook titles they recognized from a list of real titles and foils. Adolescents also completed an Activity Preference Questionnaire and an Author Recognition Test (ART), to assess their current print exposure, and literacy measures to assess their spelling, word-recognition, and word reading skills. The results of hierarchical multiple regressions demonstrated that adolescents’ TRT scores in English accounted for unique variance in their print exposure scores, as measured by the ART. Additional regressions demonstrated that the ART was an important contributor to literacy skills. The findings underline the importance of parents engaging in shared storybook reading with their children. These early social experiences relate to later reading preferences and skills in adolescence