General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that scientific and technological innovation and scientific popularization are the two wings of innovative development, and scientific popularization should be placed in the same important position as scientific and technological innovation. Data from the Chinese book market retail data monitoring agency open volume data show that in the past 5 years, the proportion of popular science books in the overall book market has remained rising, of which children's science encyclopedia books have become the main driving force, and in 2021, it will become the first major sub-classification of the children's plate, and the proportion of code oceans in the overall book market will exceed 6%. Why is the market performance of adult science books and children's science books differentiated? What factors are driving the development of the popular science book publishing market?
Children's science popularization has increased significantly
According to analysts related to the opening of the volume, adult popular science books are small and relatively stable in the market, and the scale of children's science popularization is relatively large, and in recent years, it has shown a significant growth trend. The main reason for this phenomenon is that parents pay more attention to their children's knowledge reserves and are willing to buy children's popular science books for their children, but the number of readers who are willing to read adult science is limited.
"Whether it is watching popular science or checking rumors, the mobile terminal is very convenient, and there are many platforms that focus on popular science content." "I didn't read much this year, so I just took care of listening to podcasts when I was idle." At present, Internet encyclopedias, WeChat public accounts, etc. to a certain extent to meet the public's popular science needs, coupled with the trend of adult reading fragmentation, the public readers have a low demand for popular science books, and are more inclined to read interesting books.
In comparison, children's science performance is very eye-catching. The reporter learned that the number of children's science encyclopedia books far exceeds that of adult science books, mainly focusing on humanities and natural sciences such as history, geography, physics, animals, etc., and the scale of code ocean continues to expand, especially since 2020, the proportion of children's science encyclopedia in the overall market is more than 6%.
"The advent of this wave of popular science book publishing 'spring' has both external factors and internal factors in the publishing industry." Yuan Yewei, an associate researcher at the China Press and Publication Research Institute, said that from an external point of view, the popularization of science has become the consensus of the whole society and the focus of the national development strategy. In particular, the "Development Plan for the 14th Five-Year Plan period of the publishing industry" issued by the State Press and Publication Administration clearly proposes to launch a number of popular science books that carry forward the spirit of science and popularize scientific knowledge. In the fight against the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the China Association for Science and Technology and its subordinate China Science and Technology Publishing House, provincial science and technology publishing houses and professional publishing houses have played their advantages to publicize the scientific fight against the epidemic, which has also become an important driving force for the development of popular science books.
On the other hand, from the perspective of internal factors, in recent years, the specialization of publishing has become a trend. "Many professional publishing institutions work intensively in this professional field, and cooperate with children's book planning agencies and illustrators, publishing institutions have rigorous scientific concepts, children's book planning agencies and illustrators have sensitive market insight and content production capabilities, resulting in a number of high-quality popular science publications." Yuan Yewei said.
Short videos drive the frequent appearance of explosive models
"One of the reasons for the significant increase in the proportion of children's science popularization codes is that the scope of children's science encyclopedias in the open-volume classification is wider, in addition to natural sciences such as astronomy, geography, and biology, but also includes books on social sciences such as history and economics." According to analysts related to the opening of the volume, the sales volume of children's popular science books is also higher than that of adult science in terms of average single variety sales, which is driven by short video e-commerce. In 2021, in short video e-commerce, the proportion of children's plate code ocean will reach 60.4%, of which the proportion of children's science encyclopedia code ocean is more than 30%, which is the highest proportion of sub-classification. In particular, some knowledge and enlightenment books are more prominent, and such books are easier to find selling points, hit the pain points of parents, and stand out in short videos and live broadcasts.
"With the 'post-80s' and 'post-90s' gradually becoming parents, the recognition of popular science books by the whole society has gradually increased." At present, the important buyers of children's books in the mainland are still parents, and under the influence of a generation of parents who value science and knowledge, the choice of high-quality popular science books has become an inevitable trend. Yuan Yewei said.
In this context, children's popular science books have frequently appeared. According to the open volume data, children's science encyclopedia books such as "Puppy Money Money", "Our Body (New Edition)", "DK Museum Encyclopedia", "Big Universe", "Play with Science: Science and Knowledge in Games" and so on are leading the sales. Yuan Yewei also observed that popular science books related to traditional Chinese culture are very popular in the market. For example, the twenty-four solar terms popular science knowledge publications, traditional Chinese medicine science publications, etc., account for a higher proportion of original popular science books.
"Although the child is less than 4 years old, I have always attached great importance to parent-child reading, in addition to the regular picture books, but also according to the WeChat public account recommended into a lot of popular science picture books, such as the classic "Our Body", "DK those important things", "Invisible Travel", "Magic School Bus", many children's science books will tell popular science stories according to the characteristics of children, so that we adults feel very interesting." Bao Ma Xiaoqi said.
The more diversified content and form is one of the important factors in the popular science of children. The new generation of parents pays great attention to children's reading and education, and they want their children to be exposed to the knowledge they need for the future from an early age. In this context, the content coverage of children's popular science books has become more and more extensive, and there have been contents such as "Giving Children Quantum Mechanics" and "Programming Enlightenment Book for Children". At the same time, the application of new printing technology makes the form of children's popular science books more interesting, such as the series of "Flashlight Look at the Popular Science Perspective Picture Book" that uses special light and shadow perspective effects, and integrates three-dimensional, turntable, push and pull, touch and other forms of "Our Body".
Popular science publishing also needs in-depth development
Looking back at the development trajectory of the children's book market, the children's book market has been growing rapidly for more than 20 years, and has always occupied the largest sector of the market after 2016. Open volume data show that after 2012, the proportion of children's literature code ocean continued to decline, the proportion of children's picture books and children's science encyclopedia gradually increased, after 2018, the proportion of children's science books increased significantly, becoming the first major sub-classification of children in 2021.
Yuan Yewei believes that the children's publishing market has experienced a golden period of rapid growth for decades, accumulating a large number of excellent illustrators, children's book planners and smooth distribution channels. In recent years, the proportion of refined publishing and original content has increased to become a major trend in the development of the publishing industry, raising the threshold requirements for children's book publishing. The average production threshold and knowledge level of popular science books are overall higher than that of fairy tale books, which also improves the overall level of children's book publishing.
While the market is improving, there are also development problems in the field of popular science publishing. Yuan Yewei believes that at present, the new popular science media that matches popular science books has not yet been popularized. The number of new science popularization media led by professional scientific and technological publishing institutions, represented by popular science In China and scientific rumor dispelling, is not large, and its influence is not enough. Uncle Kai's storytelling, KaDa stories and other emerging audio platforms and animation platforms specifically built for children have certain popular science products, but the number of fairy tales and historical stories is still small. The children's audio reading platform created by the publishing house lacks influential cases, and there are fewer popular science content. Overall, the new media for children's science popularization currently lacks an influential platform like adult science popularization. In the future, the transformation of publishing institutions into content service institutions is the trend of the times, and the new media promotion of children's popular science publications needs to be further improved.
(The pictures in the text are all original children's popular science books published by Le Fun)
February 24, 2022 China Culture Daily
The 7th edition features a special report
The proportion of yard oceans has continued to rise for five consecutive years
Behind the popularity of popular science books》
Editor-in-charge: Chen Xiaoyue