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Aims / Reasons for Reading
When people read a detective novel their motives are different from when they read a sign on the motorway. We can divide reasons for reading into two broad categories:
- INSTRUMENTAL: a large number of reading takes place because it helps readers to achieve some clear aim. Thus, someone reads a road sign so that he/ she knows where to go. We read the instructions on the ticket machine because we need to know how to operate it.
- PLEASURABLE: another kind of reading takes place largely for pleasure. Thus people read magazines, poetry readings or novels. Some people read illustrated cartoon or photo-stories.
Instrumental reading can be pleasurable, too; reading history textbooks for example may be done for fun as well as for some utilitarian purpose.
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