{"id":6675461,"date":"2026-06-14T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-14T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/?p=6675461"},"modified":"2026-05-17T09:16:23","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T14:16:23","slug":"do-captions-turn-screen-time-into-reading-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/do-captions-turn-screen-time-into-reading-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Do Captions Turn Screen Time Into Reading Time?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A year ago, I found myself drawn to an intriguing question: when showing educational videos, should we turn captions on <\/strong>to help students learn or focus<\/em>? In my experience, most video services provide caption capabilities, and many turn them on by default. For this reason, I assumed that we have good reason to use captions. But, do we?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The best known research summary answers with an emphatic YES; the title says it all: “\u201cVideo Captions Benefit Everyone.\u201d Its first two sentences:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

More than 100 empirical studies document that captioning a video improves comprehension of, attention to, and memory for the video.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Video captions, also known as same-language subtitles, benefit everyone who watches videos (children, adolescents, college students, and adults).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

I quickly learned that this summary’s confidence lacks much justification. The 100 empirical studies it reviews rely on self-report data, focus on college-age students, and\/or look at data for language learners: that is, for example, English speakers learning Spanish by watching captioned videos. (While this last category is certainly interesting, it’s a very specific use of captions; it doesn’t obviously generalize to answer the broader question.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In my search<\/a>, I found exactly one study using objective <\/em>measures to look at neurotypical K-12 <\/em>students learning from same-language captions<\/em>. That study suggests — but does not conclude — that non-struggling readers learn FEWER words when they watch videos with captions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Given the alarming dearth of evidence, I concluded:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  1. We just don’t have enough evidence to make strong claims one way or another, and<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. I really hope that someone starts reseaching this topic.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Dreams Realized<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    Even as I wrote that blog post, my hopes were being met by a research team in England. This team, led by Dr. Anastasiya Lopukhina, worked with 127 six- to eight-year-olds in England. All the children spoke English at home; none had diagnoses for special needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    In some ways, this study was quite straightforward. For six weeks, half of the children watched TV with captions on <\/strong>while at home. The other half watched with captions off<\/strong>. The researchers gathered pre- and post-data on oral fluency: specifically, timed reading of words and non-words, and timed reading of a passage. In an especially thoughtful move, they also used eye-tracking software to test how much time the children spent focusing on captions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    So: did the caption-on children become more (or less) fluent after six weeks? Did they spend more (or less) time focusing on the captions?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    In a word: nope. Both groups read more words after six weeks, and read them faster. On both fluency tests, they made roughly the same amount of progress. To be statistically precise: the differences between these groups did not achieve statistical significance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    The eye-tracking data yielded interesting results as well. Here again, both groups spent a bit more time reading the captions…but the changes were roughly the same in both groups. This result strikes me as especially surprising; the captions-on group had been practicing <\/em>reading captions, while the captions-off group hadn’t. And yet: both groups developed in the same direction at the same rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Intriguingly, more than half the time the children didn’t engage with the captions<\/em>. They fixated on roughly 40% of the captioned words, which means they overlooked roughly 60%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    In brief, I think we can safely say: if the goal is reading fluency, this one study gives us no reason to think that captions help or harm young readers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Pushing Back<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    People who champion the use of captions might offer several rejoinders to these conclusions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

      \n
    • One study is just one study. We need more research to draw strong conclusions.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

      I absolutely agree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

        \n
      • This study measured reading fluency, not learning. Captions could help fluent readers learn!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

        Very true. We don’t have research to support (or contradict) that claim, but it could be true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

          \n
        • Six weeks isn’t long enough. The benefits won’t show up until more time has passed.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

          This critique, while possible, strikes me as less plausible. During this time, the children watched — on average — sixty-six hours of TV. If a teaching strategy doesn’t help after 66 hours…well, it’s hard to feel lots of confidence that 120 hours will be different.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

          In this field, I’m often the guy saying “let’s slow down — that study doesn’t say what people claim it does.” In this case, I’m the guy saying “this study asks an important question, gathers appropriate data, and comes up with a clear and unhyped conclusion. We should take that conclusion seriously.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

          At this point, the burden of proof lies squarely on those who claim that captions help children develop reading fluency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

          \n\n\n\n

          Lopukhina, A., Cooper, H., Hsieh, C. Y., van Heuven, W. J., & Rastle, K. (2026). No evidence that same\u2010language subtitles improve children’s reading fluency. British Journal of Psychology<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

          A year ago, I found myself drawn to an intriguing question: when showing educational videos, should we turn captions on to help students learn or focus? In my experience, most video services provide caption capabilities, and many turn them on by default. For this reason, I assumed that we have good reason to use captions. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":6675512,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[275,47],"class_list":["post-6675461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lb-blog","tag-captions","tag-reading"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6675461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6675461"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6675461\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6675515,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6675461\/revisions\/6675515"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6675512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6675461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6675461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6675461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}