New shows that people who read a lot live longer. The study was carried out by from Yale University in the USA. The researchers said reading keeps the active, helps reduce stress and makes us take better of our health. The researchers said that help the brain more than newspapers and magazines, but any kind of will help us to live longer. Even reading for an hour a day could help us to live longer. In the study, researchers looked at the of 3,500 men and women over a 12-year period. They looked at their reading , health, lifestyle and their education. All of the people were at least 50 years old at the of the research.
The study is in the 'Social Science and Medicine'. It found that people who read for up to 3.5 hours a week were 17 per cent likely to die during the study’s 12-year research than those who read no books. Those who read for more than 3.5 hours a week were 23 per cent less likely to die. Researcher Becca Levy said: "Older individuals, of gender, health, or education, showed the survival of reading books." She suggested people swap TV for reading to live longer. She said: "Individuals over the of 65 spend an of 4.4 hours per day watching television. Efforts to redirect time into reading books could prove to be beneficial."
