Audiobooks have become a popular alternative to traditional and even electronic books over the years because they can be consumed while a person is performing other tasks and their sales more than doubled from 2012 to 2016, according to Statista. On the whole, they can provide a similar experience to actual books in the areas of comprehension and emotional response while also providing a few extra benefits to the listener.
According to the personal blog of Daniel Willingham, psychologist at The University of Virginia, listening to an audiobook requires the brain to do much of the same work to interpret the information as reading does with one small caveat. Both forms force the mind to process the language of the story to discern its meaning, but reading requires the additional step of 'decoding' the text into language before it can be processed, making the brain work harder. After about the fifth grade, however, most people are such fluent decoders that there isn't much difference in activity. In fact, comprehension is very similar between the reading and listening groups of adults and the decoding element shows up when testing children.
Much of the difference between reading and listening to audiobooks is much more of a subjective response to the experience of reading or listening, according to Book Riot. Readers are hearing the story in their own voice, rely on themselves for pronunciation, and can stop and ponder about a particular passage or meaning. Those listening to audiobooks, meanwhile, have the benefit of hearing the story precisely as it is meant to through the emphasis, inflection, and tone of the narrator and don't have to worry about mispronouncing a characters name.
