A Candian Heritage study has “found a discrepancy between the self-declared preferred leisure activities of Canadians and the actual hours spent in pursuit of them.” As Caroline Alphonso reports in a Globe & Mail story, while “reading shares first place with television as a favoured leisure activity, Canadians spend only 4.6 hours a week reading for pleasure, but as many as 23 hours watching television or listening to music.” What could explain the discrepancy? “Robert Thompson, a professor of popular culture and director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University, said the inconsistency could be linked to the fact people have a tendency to choose reading as a favourite pastime because television is ‘considered a lower pursuit.'”