Building Young Readers, One Story at a Time

As a clinical psychologist who has studied children's mental health for over four decades, I am often asked the same question by parents: is it too late? Their child is seven, nine, twelve. They've seen screens since infancy. They reach for YouTube before they reach for a book. Is it too late to raise a reader?

It is not too late. It never is. But it does require deliberate effort.

The competition

Let's be honest about what we're up against. A smartphone app is designed by teams of PhDs to capture and hold attention. It uses infinite variability, dopamine triggers, social validation. A paperback book asks a child to sit still, focus, and imagine. The contest is wildly uneven.

But that doesn't mean books can't win. They just need help.

Four things that work

1. Read aloud, at every age. Even teenagers. Especially teenagers. Shared reading builds a kind of intimacy that no screen can replicate.

2. Let them choose. If your child wants to read the same book thirty times, or a book you find silly, or a book below their reading level — let them. Reading that brings pleasure builds readers.

3. Make books visible. Screens are hidden in pockets. Books should be everywhere — on tables, in cars, by the bed, in the bathroom. Physical presence matters.

4. Model it. If you want a child who reads, be a parent who reads. Children are remarkably observant. They notice when the adults around them are engaged with books.

The deeper point

My book From Freud to Zuckerberg and Back argues that we've outsourced too much of childhood to algorithms. Books are one of the simplest, most beautiful ways to pull some of it back. A story, shared between a parent and a child, is not a nostalgic relic. It is an act of resistance.