Men read less fiction, and perhaps that's why they feel lonelier.
BarcelonaA few years ago, I had a creative writing professor who, on the first day of class, solemnly declared, "I won't accept romance or fantasy novels in my course. You can change your project if you come with these ideas." This statement, unbecoming of someone who should be guiding the development of new voices, goes beyond a mere literary preference and encapsulates an old legacy: the idea that there are serious and lesser literatures. It's no coincidence that this disdain tends to fall from the corner of genres traditionally considered feminine: romance, fantasy, and autofiction; while thought, culturally associated with the masculine sphere, has been considered the emblem of serious literature.
A 2017 study analyzed more than half a million reviews from Goodreads, the world's largest reading platform, and found that 76% of the reviews were written by women (although those posted by men received more likesWomen rated romance subgenres (contemporary romance and paranormal) higher, while men rated short stories, nonfiction, history, and biography higher. In terms of review content, women emphasized romance, relationships, and fantasy; men focused on structure and style. Regarding comics, women highlighted positivity and aesthetics, while men focused on superheroes and crime.
Various studies in several countries confirm that women read more than men. In Catalonia, according to the 2024 study of reading and purchasing habits, 79.5% of women and 68% of men read books; 29.5% and 23.5% read magazines, respectively; and 65.7% and 58.3% consume content on social media. No significant differences between the sexes were observed in other media (newspapers, comics, websites, blogs, and forums).
Two ways of understanding reading
Beyond the numbers, this data reveals two ways of understanding reading: for many women, fiction is a space of intimacy and empathy, where emotions, connections, and vulnerability are explored (studies in neuroscience and psychology show that fiction fosters theory of mind, that is, cognitive ability). For many men, on the other hand, reading means information, action, and analysis. This difference, the result of unequal emotional education, has profound emotional and social consequences. Men have been socialized to analyze and understand the world from the outside, but not so much to connect with it. At a historical moment when we speak of an epidemic of male loneliness, with greater isolation, fewer close friendships, and fewer emotional communication skills, the lack of space for the introspection that reading, especially fiction, offers is more relevant than it seems.
Associating sensitivity with weakness and turning emotional distance into a masculine attribute has been a double-edged sword: women grow up with greater freedom to express emotions; men, on the other hand, are deprived of spaces to represent them or of the language to understand themselves and their relationships. And, in the end, women end up shouldering the emotional burden of the men around them (what is known as mankeeping), and the result is dissatisfaction for everyone.
Perhaps the epidemic of loneliness affecting men is not just a lack of relationships, but a lack of the language to sustain them. Promoting reading, and especially fiction, is no longer just a cultural issue, but a public health necessity.