Spanish Reading Influences in Goodreads: Participation, Experience and Canon Proposed

Abstract

Nobody doubts the importance of digital influencers when it comes to the selection and acquisition of new products and services. In the specific field of literary reading, literary blogs, booktubers and specialized websites that act as prescribers of reading stand out. This study presents a descriptive research model in which a multivariate analysis of the main sociodemographic characteristics, assessments, readings and activities developed by the 100 most important reading influencers in Spain was carried out. For this purpose, data were taken from the most widely used reading cataloguing platform, i.e. Goodreads. It was found to be mainly about women with a developed reading habit and with an effervescent and extensive experience in literary blogs, thematic social networks, etc. In addition, the results show that the more influencers evolve as readers the more demanding they become more in their assessments, which in turn translates into greater influence. Influencers’ recognition in the platform, therefore, is subject to their reading experience, critical capacity and personal criteria. Finally, it was learned that the canon of authors and works best valued by these relevant users is heterogeneous, although works and authors related to Young Adult Literature and bestsellers predominate to a certain extent.

Online procedure to encourage reading in children with school difficulties and their guardians, during the COVID-19 pandemic

“…All dyads completed the stage in two sessions of 30 minutes each. The answers to the "Reader Profile Questionnaire" (9) and personal data are summarized in Table 1. For P1 and P4, who were not literate, the books available had no texts.…”

“…With technological and new digital platforms progress, the possibilities for sharing stories read are not restricted to informal conversations or reading circles, there are also online book clubs (8) , thematic social networks and literary blogs (9) .…”

BookTubers as Multimodal Reading Influencers: An Analysis of Subscriber Interactions

“…In addition, future research could center on other types of videos within the classification presented above to uncover literary consumption trends. The inclusion of these audio-visual dynamics in social reading networks such as Goodreads also allows us to examine other types of comments [52,58,59]. It would likewise be interesting to delve deeper into the gender factor not only of Booktubers but also of subscribers and to analyze that aspect trying to identify potential differences.…”

Social network sites for book readers: The example of 1000Kitap, a Turkish social network

“…Such networks allow readers to interact with each other, establish social relations and create a social environment (Nakamura, 2013). In these networks, people communicate with each other, share their experiences, and thus can be influenced by each other (García-Roca, 2020). With these networks, readers can obtain information about the quality and content of the books (Wang et al, 2019).…”

“…When the literature is examined, it is seen that there are many studies on Goodreads in the last 5 years (e.g. Alghamdi and Ihshaish, 2021; García-Roca, 2020; Thelwall, 2019; Thelwall and Kousha, 2017; Wang et al, 2019). Similarly, reader networks such as librarything (e.g.…”