More people plan to escape into books than go to the cinema this summer, new polling from the Publishers Association has found.
The survey by the trade body showed that a third (33%) of people think that books offer them the best form of escapism when they’re having a bad day, coming second only to watching television (54%).
Streaming services, looking at social media, listening to the radio and going to the pub or cinema were all less popular methods of escapism than reading, found the survey of more than 2,200 adults across the UK.
People were also asked what they do with books they’ve read, and the results suggest that they “overwhelmingly” keep, reuse or recycle them. The poll, in which respondents were able to choose more than one answer, found that 41% of people keep books for themselves, while 34% pass them on to friends and family members.
A third said they give their used books to charity shops, while 12% sell them online. Only 7% of people said that they throw books out.
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Dan Conway, CEO of the Publishers Association, said the survey “not only shows the importance of books to people’s mental health and wellbeing, but is a testament to their longevity and value”.
“Books are a great way for us all to escape from our everyday routines, and if we are able to share that with our friends, families, and more widely, we could be making a huge difference to people’s lives without even realising it,” he continued, adding that the “UK publishing industry is booming”.
Last year was a record-breaking one for the publishing industry: total income in 2022 was £6.9bn, with sales up 4% from 2021; 669m physical books were sold in the UK in 2022, the highest overall level ever recorded.
The industry also saw an 8% increase in exports, taking the total sales to £4.1bn, with Alice Oseman’s Heartstopper series of graphic novels the biggest book export of 2022.
The poll coincides with the launch of the association’s Insights Dashboard for publishers, where they can look at trend data for the last six years.
