Older Americans Adopt E-Books

Older Americans are strangely resistant to the allure of the Internet. They have been slow to go online and reluctant to buy smartphones. E-books may be different. Among book readers aged 65 or older, a substantial 20 percent read an e-book in the past year, according to a Pew survey. This is only 11 percentage points less than the 31 percent of 18-to-29-year-old book readers who read an e-book. The e-book generation gap is tiny compared with these technology gaps, all reported by Pew...

• 43 percentage point gap in using the Internet: 18-to-29 (95%); 65-plus (52%).
• 55 percentage point gap in smartphone ownership: 18-to-29 (66%); 65-plus (11%).
• 64 percentage point gap in accessing the Internet on a phone: 18-to-29 (77%); 65-plus (13%).

Source: Pew Research Center, E-Book Reading Jumps; Print Book Reading Declines