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A short and sweet starting place to getting to learn about captions! Great website to branch out and explore more of than just this short summary.

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Ai-Media creating accessibility, one word at a time.

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Closed Captioning vs Subtitles

Some people refer to closed captions and subtitles interchangeably, but there's an important distinction.

Both closed captions and subtitles are the text version of the spoken audio in a video. However, while subtitles involve translating the video's language into an alternate language, closed captions are in the same language as the audio.

Closed captions are created to allow deaf and hard-of-hearing people to experience the video, so they includes background sounds and speaker changes. Subtitles assume the viewer hears the audio and as a result do not contain the background sounds or notifications for speaker changes.

Subtitles and captions have different goals

Subtitles allow people to watch videos even when they themsleves don't speak the language. With the growth of global video platforms, many video owners see the value of adding subtitles making their content available in multiple languages.

The growth of closed captions has coincided with the growth of mobile video consumption as more people watch videos in public places with the sound muted.

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What is the difference between captions and subtitles? - Ai-Media creating accessibility, one word at a time.

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Closed Captioning vs Subtitles Some people refer to closed captions and subtitles interchangeably, but there's an important distinction. Both closed captions and subtitles are the text version of the spoken audio in a video. However, while subtitles involve translating the video's language into an alternate language, closed captions are in the...

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A great article with some really awesome statistical information as to how Closed Captions are not only beneficial to the target crowd, hard-of-hearing and deaf population, but how they can actually be tremendously beneficial to all people

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Key Takeaways

Regardless of whether they have a disability of any kind, a majority of students use closed captions at least some of the time.

Roughly 90 percent of all students who use closed captions find them at least moderately helpful for learning.

Specific ways in which closed captions can aid learning include comprehension, accuracy, engagement, and retention.

When we think of closed captions in higher education, the focus is often on students with disabilities, particularly those who are deaf or hard of hearing. In fall 2015, the Oregon State University Ecampus Research Unit conducted a national survey with 3Play Media to learn more about how all students - those with disabilities and those without - use and perceive closed captions in relation to their learning experiences in the college classroom. This article reports on results of the survey (a full version of the report can be found on the 3Play Media website).

For the recruitment of the student participants, a comprehensive list of U.S. institutions was compiled from membership lists of the Association of American Colleges and Universities, the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities, EDUCAUSE, the Association on Higher Education and Disability, and WCET, using publicly available information. We notified institutional representatives (provosts, student affairs representatives, and/or directors of disability services offices) by e-mail about the study, and we also used social media and word-of-mouth communication to spread the word. This effort resulted in 15 university partners.

More than 2,000 students at those 15 institutions across the United States responded to our online survey. Of those reporting, the average age was 24.5, with a range of 18-72. The majority of the respondents were female (62.8 percent). The largest percentage were seniors (24.2 percent); graduate students made up 12.8 percent.

The racial and ethnic mix of respondents was as follows:

White: 68.3 percent

Two or more races: 9.3 percent

Asian: 7.2 percent

Black/African American: 2.6 percent

American Indian or Alaska Native: 1.3 percent

Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander: 1 percent

Just over 10 percent did not respond to this item; on a separate item, 11.2 percent self-identified as Hispanic.

Results

For the purpose of analysis, student responses to four questions were used to create groups based on reported disabilities. Students were asked whether they:

Were diagnosed with a disability (and what type of disability)

Had a disability other than the types listed

Were registered with an office of disability services at their institution

Required academic accommodations

Students who responded "yes" to any of these questions, regardless of their type of disability, comprised the students reporting disabilities group. Those who responded "no" to all of these items comprised the students not reporting disabilities group. The results showed that 412 students (19.4 percent) reported a disability, 1,547 (72.9 percent) did not report a disability, and 163 (7.7 percent) did not respond to any of the four questions.

Use of Closed Captions

Participants were asked how often they use closed captions when they are available on course videos. Among all respondents, 35 percent said they often or always use closed captioning when available, and an additional 19 percent said sometimes. Thus, more than half (54 percent) of the respondents use closed captions at least some of the time.

Do students who report disabilities differ from students who do not report disabilities in their use of closed captions?

Table 1 shows how participants responded to this item. As this table shows, a larger percentage of students reporting disabilities (26.2 percent) indicated they always use closed captions when available, compared to students not reporting disabilities (15.6 percent). However, the percentages for often and sometimes were similar for the two groups.

Table 1. Frequency of closed caption use

The results of combining the percentages for the responses of sometimes, often, and always are shown in Figure 1. This figure reveals that 61.1 percent of students reporting disabilities use captions at least sometimes. Among students not reporting disabilities, more than 50 percent said they use closed captions at least sometimes. By a gap of about 10 percentage points, more students not reporting disabilities indicated that they use closed captions seldom or never than students reporting disabilities (48.3 percent vs. 37.9 percent).

Figure 1. Student use of closed captioning when available

Helpfulness of Closed Captions

Students from both groups (those who reported having a disability and those who did not) who indicated that they use closed captions ( n = 1,532) were asked how helpful they found the closed captions. Among those students, 59.1 percent reported that the closed captions in course videos are very or extremely helpful, and an additional 29 percent said they were moderately helpful. Thus, more than 88 percent of student respondents who use closed captions said they are at least moderately helpful.

Do students with disabilities differ from students without disabilities in their ratings of the helpfulness of closed captions?

Table 2 shows respondents who reported using closed captions in course videos, broken out by the two groups. Among students reporting disabilities, the largest percentage (33.2 percent) indicated that captions are extremely helpful, compared to 21.1 percent of the students not reporting disabilities. Similar percentages of students in both groups indicated that captions are very helpful.

Table 2. Helpfulness of closed captions

Combining the categories of moderately, very, and extremely helpful shows that a very large percentage of both groups indicated that closed captions are at least moderately helpful (see figure 2).

Figure 2. Helpfulness of closed captions

Closed Captions as a Learning Aid

Students from both groups who indicated that they use closed captions were asked to indicate whether any of the following are reasons why they use closed captions. Figure 3 shows that almost two-thirds of respondents indicated that closed captions help them focus, retain information, and overcome poor audio. In addition, more than 40 percent indicated that they use closed captions for reasons related to sensitive environments (i.e., public places or libraries in which they cannot use sound).

Figure 3. Reasons for using closed captions

All students were asked to describe in their own words why closed captions are helpful. A total of 1,210 open-ended responses were coded into six main themes, which were similar to the results of the closed-ended question about helpfulness shown in figure 3. Table 3 shows the percentage of responses within each of the themes. Three-quarters of respondents indicated that closed captions are helpful because they are learning aids. A large percentage also indicated that captions are helpful because they help with poor audio quality. Six percent stated that they use captions for the accommodation of a learning or physical disability. Just over 5 percent indicated that with captions on, it is easier for students to read along or take notes.

Table 3. Themes of why closed captions are helpful

Due to the large number of responses (913) under the theme of captions as a learning aid, these responses were coded into four subthemes:

Comprehension: 51.9 percent of the responses were related to how captions help students understand, organize, and learn the information in videos.

Accuracy: 33.4 percent were related to how captions help with details, terminology, and spelling in videos.

Engagement: 20.3 percent were related to how captions help students focus on the content of videos.

Retention: 14.6 percent were related to how captions help students retain information in the videos through reading and studying.

Difficulty with Hearing

All respondents were asked a specific question about difficulty with hearing; 374 (17.6 percent) indicated they did have difficulty hearing, while 1,584 (74.6 percent)indicated they did not. Another 164 (7.7 percent) did not respond to this item.

How does the frequency of use of closed captions differ for students who have no difficulty hearing compared to students who have difficulty hearing?

Table 4 shows the frequency of use of closed captions for students with and without difficulty hearing. Although one would expect that students who experience difficulty hearing will use closed captions at a higher frequency, our research found that respondents who do not have difficulty hearing also use closed captions with some frequency. Only a little less than 30 percent of student respondents who do not have difficulty hearing said that they never use closed captions.

Table 4. Frequency of closed caption use

Figure 4 shows the combined results of the sometimes, often, and always categories of frequency of use. Students who reported having no difficulty hearing indicated they use captions at a fairly high rate, with almost 50 percent using captions at least sometimes. As expected, student respondents with difficulty hearing reported using closed captions more frequently, with more than 68 percent indicating using captions at least sometimes.

Figure 4. Frequency of closed caption use

Frequent Users of Captions

To further explore perceptions of the helpfulness of captions, we conducted a subgroup analysis for the 678 students who indicated that they often or always use closed captions when they are available and who answered the disability questions. The responses of frequent caption users were analyzed by their reported disability status, and table 5 shows the results. Not surprisingly, the two groups show similar response patterns. Combining the moderately, very, and extremely helpful response choices, 98.8 percent of respondents reporting disabilities indicated that captions are at least moderately helpful, which is very close to the 97.4 percent of responses of students not reporting disabilities.

Table 5. Helpfulness of closed captions among frequent caption users

Conclusions

The results of this study show that more than half of students are using closed captions in their educational videos at least sometimes. Although one might expect students with disabilities to report using captions at much higher rates, this study shows that students not reporting disabilities use captions almost as frequently, with more than 50 percent using them sometimes or more often; this is only about 10 percentage points less than those reporting disabilities.

Among those who reported using closed captions, the vast majority find the captions to be at least moderately helpful. This rating varied somewhat by ability status - the proportion of students reporting disabilities who indicated that captions are extremely helpful was more than 10 percentage points higher than the proportion of students not reporting disabilities who said the same. Overall, ratings of the helpfulness of closed captions were similar for all students, regardless of whether they reported having a disability.

When asked why captions are helpful, respondents overall expressed strong agreement that captions help students focus, retain information, and overcome poor audio. Open-ended responses further illustrate that students find captions to be helpful learning aids. Captions help students with comprehension, accuracy, engagement, and the retention of information transmitted in course videos.

A closer look reveals that almost half of the students who reported having no difficulty hearing use closed captions sometimes or more often, compared to two-thirds of students reporting difficulty with hearing. Further, the majority of frequent caption users find closed captions to be considerably helpful, regardless of their ability status.

In this study we found that closed captions are being used by a wide range of students, perhaps wider than one might guess. The results suggest that we need to look further into how and why students of all ability statuses are using accommodations such as closed captions to help them learn. In the meantime, this research demonstrates that providing closed captions for video content not only benefits students with various disabilities but also has the potential to improve learning for students who report having no disability.

Mary Ellen Dello Stritto is assistant director of research, Ecampus, at Oregon State University.

Kathryn Linder is director of research, Ecampus, at Oregon State University.

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a rising tide: how closed captions can benefit all students

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A Rising Tide: How Closed Captions Can Benefit All Students

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Regardless of whether they have a disability of any kind, a majority of students use closed captions at least some of the time. Roughly 90 percent of all students who use closed captions find them at least moderately helpful for learning. Specific ways in which closed captions can aid learning include comprehension, accuracy, engagement, and retention.

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This article is a bit more complex, referring to captions as a whole, why they are used, and how the are beneficial to all populations for a number of reasons

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Abstract

Video captions, also known as same-language subtitles, benefit everyone who watches videos (children, adolescents, college students, and adults). More than 100 empirical studies document that captioning a video improves comprehension of, attention to, and memory for the video. Captions are particularly beneficial for persons watching videos in their non-native language, for children and adults learning to read, and for persons who are D/deaf or hard of hearing. However, despite U.S. laws, which require captioning in most workplace and educational contexts, many video audiences and video creators are naïve about the legal mandate to caption, much less the empirical benefit of captions.

Keywords: captions, video, second language, D/deaf, reading, literacy

Introduction

Imagine a technique that can improve children's reading skills ( Linebarger, Piotrowski, & Greenwood, 2010), boost adolescents' written and spoken vocabulary ( Davey & Parkhill, 2012), increase college students' attention to lectures ( Steinfeld, 1998), enhance second-language learners' pronunciation ( Mitterer & McQueen, 2009), and raise literacy rates in developing countries ( Kothari, Takeda, Joshi, & Pandey, 2002). The technique is simple: Display captions on videos.

Captions are like foreign-language subtitles; they translate a spoken language into a written language ( Garza, 1991). Like foreign-language subtitles, captions appear at the bottom of the screen. Unlike foreign-language subtitles, captions translate into writing the same language that is heard in speaking, which is why captions are also called same-language subtitles. Captions also translate sound effects ("raindrops falling," "footsteps approaching," "horses galloping"); captions transcribe song lyrics, and captions offer other helpful clues, such as identifying conversational partners by their name and indicating off-screen voices with italics.

More than 100 empirical studies, listed in the appendix, document the benefits of captions. These studies report benefits to a wide swath of participants as measured by a wide swath of criteria: summarizing main ideas ( Markham, 2000-2001), recalling facts ( Brasel & Gips, 2014), drawing inferences ( Linebarger et al., 2010), defining words ( Griffin & Dumestre, 1992-1993), identifying emotions ( Murphy-Berman & Whobrey, 1983), and of course, answering multiple-choice comprehension questions ( Hinkin, Harris, & Miranda, 2014; Markham & Peter, 2002-2003; Murphy-Berman & Jorgensen, 1980).

Eye-movement studies document that captions are read easily ( d'Ydewalle & de Bruycker, 2007), attended to effortlessly ( d'Ydewalle, Praet, Verfaillie, & van Rensbergen, 1991), and integrated smoothly with the soundtrack of the video ( d'Ydewalle & Gielen, 1992). Standard verbatim captions are as effective as more detailed or elaborated captions ( Anderson-Inman, Terrazas-Arellanes, & Slabin, 2009; Murphy-Berman & Jorgensen, 1980).

The numerous empirical studies referenced in the appendix demonstrate that captions benefit everyone who watches videos, from younger children to older adults. Captions are particularly beneficial to persons watching videos in their non-native language, children and adults learning to read, and persons who are D/deaf or hard of hearing, as illustrated below.

Captions Benefit Persons Who Are D/deaf or Hard of Hearing

The early 20th century's golden age of cinema had created a level playing field for D/deaf and hard of hearing viewers. Silent films, with their interwoven screens of captions (called intertitles), created "the one brief time that deaf and hard of hearing citizens had comparatively equal access to motion pictures" ( Schuchman, 2004, p. 231). But in the late 1920s, as talkies (films with synchronized speech) pushed out silent films, the D/deaf community was shut out.

In response, the D/deaf community created captions ( Downey, 2010), first by recapitulating the intertitles of the silent film era and then by reconfiguring the bottom-of-the-screen foreign-language subtitles that carried U.S. films across the world. In the late 1950s, U.S. President Eisenhower authorized a federal Captioned Films for the Deaf agency (as "part of the post-Sputnik, cold war education boom," Downey, 2008, p. 193).

Captions began appearing on television shows in the 1970s (with their earliest appearances on ABC's Mod Squad and PBS's The French Chef; Withrow, 1994). In the 1980s, a handful of television shows began displaying captions in real time (e.g., the launch of the space shuttle Columbia and the acceptance speeches at the Academy Awards; Block & Okrand, 1983). By the 1990s, captions on TV shows were mandated by the U.S. law ( Erath & Larkin, 2004). The Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010 requires that captioned TV shows also be captioned when displayed on the Internet.

It is unsurprising that captions benefit persons who are D/deaf or hard of hearing. But early experiments demonstrating that captions benefit D/deaf persons demonstrated something further: Captions also benefit hearing persons. For example, displays the results of a study by Nugent (1983). More than 30 D/deaf children and nearly 100 hearing children (9-14 years old) were randomly assigned to one of four conditions: watch a video with audio but without captions; read only the captions; watch the video with audio and with captions; or read and watch nothing, thereby serving as a control group.

The children's scores on a 23-item comprehension test are illustrated in . Statistical analyses identified two main effects: a main effect of hearing status (hearing children scored higher on the comprehension test than D/deaf children) and a second, even more powerful, main effect of captioning. A lack of a statistical interaction between hearing status and captioning indicated that captions were as beneficial to the hearing children as they were to the D/deaf children.

Several other studies demonstrate the same effect: Video with audio and with captions leads to the highest levels of comprehension, both for D/deaf children and for hearing children ( Anderson-Inman et al., 2009; Boyd & Vader, 1972; Cambra, Leal, & Silvestre, 2010; Fischer, 1971; Gulliver & Ghinea, 2003; Hertzog, Stinson, & Keiffer, 1989; Murphy-Berman & Jorgensen, 1980; Murphy-Berman & Whobrey, 1983; Nugent, 1983; Steinfeld, 1998; Yoon & Choi, 2010).

Captions Benefit Hearing Children Learning to Read

Even for hearing children, learning to read is a complex process, which requires learning to map sound and meaning onto text ( Linebarger, 2001). Soon after captions began appearing on TV shows for D/deaf audiences, educators of hearing children made a striking discovery: Because captions explicitly illustrate the mapping among sound, meaning, and text, captions could also benefit hearing children learning to read ( Adler, 1985; Kirkland, Byrom, MacDougall, & Corcoran, 1995; Koskinen, Wilson, & Jensema, 1986; Parkhill, Johnson, & Bates, 2011).

For example, displays the results of a study of 70 hearing children learning to read ( Linebarger et al., 2010). Second and third graders were randomly assigned either to watch videos with audio but without captions or to watch videos with audio and with captions. The children watched six ½-hr videos, which were episodes of PBS children's shows (e.g., Arthur & Friends, Magic School Bus, Zoom).

As illustrates, watching videos with audio and captions leads to significantly better reading skills. Children who watch captioned videos are better able to define content words that were heard in the videos, pronounce novel words, recognize vocabulary items (which may or may not have been heard in the videos), and draw inferences about what happened in the videos. Other studies demonstrate cumulative benefits from watching videos with captions, for example, cumulative growth in vocabulary both for hearing children ( Koskinen et al., 1986) and for hearing adults ( Griffin & Dumestre, 1992-1993).

Captions Benefit Hearing Adults

After discovering that captions benefit hearing children learning to read, researchers investigated whether captions also benefit hearing adults learning to read. They do ( Koskinen, Knable, Markham, Jensema, & Kane, 1995-1996; Kothari, Pandey, & Chudgar, 2004; Kruger, Kruger, & Verhoef, 2007).

For example, in the late 1990s, researchers encouraged India's national television network to begin captioning popular Bollywood music videos, which were sung and captioned in Hindi. The literacy of thousands of adults was assessed before the captioned music videos began airing and several years later. The literacy of adults who frequently watched the captioned videos increased at a much greater pace than the literacy of adults who rarely or never watched the captioned videos ( Kothari & Bandyopadhyay, 2014).

Even highly literate adults benefit from captions. For example, when highly literate adults watch television commercials that are captioned, they remember brand names better ( Brasel & Gips, 2014), and when highly literate college students watch course lectures that are captioned, they remember course content better ( Steinfeld, 1998). Captions benefit hearing adults, just as captions benefit hearing children.

Captions Benefit Hearing Persons Learning a Second Language

Captions for D/deaf persons were co-opted from foreign- language subtitles for hearing persons. In the early 1980s, as captions for D/deaf persons became more prominent, second-language instructors began re-co-opting captions for hearing persons, to improve second-language literacy ( Price, 1983; Vanderplank, 2013). Scores of studies demonstrate that captions in a second language benefit hearing persons learning that second language; indeed, captions in a second language benefit hearing persons learning that second language even more than captions in the persons' native language.

For example, displays the results from nearly 150 Japanese junior college and university students learning English as a second language ( Yoshino, Kano, & Akahori, 2000). The students watched three types of videos: videos with English audio but without any captions, videos with English audio and Japanese captions, videos with English audio and English captions. In a fourth condition, the students listened to only the English audio.

After watching each type of video (or listening to only the audio) twice, in counter-balanced order, the students recalled as much content as they could using either Japanese and English. The students recalled substantially more content after they watched the videos with English captions than after they watched the same videos with Japanese captions. In fact, after watching the videos with Japanese captions, the students recalled as little as they recalled after not even watching the videos (the audio only condition).

Captions (same-language subtitles) also improve second-language learners' listening comprehension. displays data from University of Southern California students learning English as a second language ( Huang & Eskey, 1999-2000). The students were randomly assigned to watch videos with English audio and English captions or with English audio but without captions. Watching videos with English captions not only improved the students' performance when tested with a written comprehension test, but also improved the students' performance when tested with an auditory, listening, comprehension test.

Captions benefit hearing persons learning a second language, regardless of genre. displays data from 70 college students learning English as a second language, and displays data from 40 English-speaking college students learning Russian as a second language ( Garza, 1991). The students learning English as a second language were randomly assigned to watch videos with English audio and with or without English captions. The students learning Russian as a second language were randomly assignment to watch videos with Russian audio and with or without Russian captions.

As both Figures 5a and 5b illustrate, watching videos with same-language captions leads to significantly better comprehension. Captions benefit comprehension, regardless of the language being learned (Russian or English) and regardless of the genre being watched, from documentaries (The Sharks) to dramas (Hoosiers) to animations (An American Tail) to comedies (The Secret of My Success) to music videos (The Authority Song).

What Are the Policy Implications?

The empirical evidence is clear: Captions, also known as same-language subtitles, benefit everyone who watches videos. More than 100 studies document that captioning a video improves comprehension of, memory for, and attention to videos, for children, adolescents, college students, and adults. Although captions particularly benefit persons watching videos in their non-native language, children and adults learning to read, and persons who are D/deaf or hard of hearing, captions also benefit highly literate, hearing adults.

With so many studies documenting the benefits of captions, why does everyone not always turn on the captions every time they watch a video? Regrettably, the benefits of captions are not widely known. Some researchers are unaware of the wide-ranging benefits of captions because the empirical evidence is published across separate literatures (deaf education, second-language learning, adult literacy, and reading acquisition). Bringing together these separate literatures is the primary purpose of this article.

Reaping the benefits of captions is also impeded by erroneous attitudes (e.g., Weasenforth, 1994). Many people think captions are intended for, and therefore only beneficial to, persons who are D/deaf. For example, in a survey of several hundred K-12 educators across 45 U.S. states, almost all of whom were experienced teachers who frequently showed videos in their classroom, the majority had never turned on the captions on those videos. The minority who had, reported their students having reaped benefits from the captions ( Bowe & Kaufman, 2001).

Similarly, faculty and administrators in higher education are unlikely to be aware of the benefits of captions for university students, despite the fact that captions perfectly illustrate the fundamental principle of Universal Design. Like curb cuts and elevators, captions were initially developed for persons with disabilities, and, like curb cuts and elevators, captions benefit persons with and without disabilities. Indeed, the overwhelmingly vast majority of persons who benefit from curb cuts and elevators are not persons with disabilities, and the same could be true for captions.

The Institute of International Education reports that international students are enrolling in U.S. colleges and universities at an all-time high, a whopping 72% increase in only the past decade. Nearly a third of the international students studying in the United States are from China ( Redden, 2014). Given the increasing number of students in U.S. institutions of higher education who are not native English speakers and given the powerful benefits of captions to non-native speakers, it would behoove professors to turn on captions.

Unfortunately, a primary reason that everyone who watches videos is not benefitting from captions is that not all videos are captioned. Despite U.S. laws, which cover many workplace and educational contexts, many video audiences and video creators are naïve about the legal mandate to caption, much less the empirical benefit of captions. Some organizations rely solely on automatically generated captions (e.g., the auto- generated captions found on many YouTube videos).

However, as recent litigation ( Orzeck, 2015) as well as empirical data ( Pan, Jiang, Yao, Picheny, & Qin, 2010) demonstrate, captions generated via automated speech recognition are not yet without interfering error. When auto-generated captions reach parity with human-transcribed captions, further technologies, including real-time captioning of lectures for all students ( Bain, Basson, Faisman, & Kanevsky, 2005), will be able to harness the power of captions for the broadest population ever.

​

Acknowledgments
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This study was supported by Vilas Research Trust.

Appendix

Studies cited in the article are in boldface.

Benefits of Captions: D/Deaf and Hard of Hearing Children, Adolescents, and Adults

Benefits of Captions: Hearing Children and Adolescents

Benefits of Captions: Hearing Adults

Benefits of Second-Language Captions: Hearing College Students

Benefits of Second-Language Captions: Hearing Children and Adults

History and Theory of Captions

Footnotes
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Everyone should turn on video captions; captions improve comprehension, memory, and attention, for everyone.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

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Video captions, also known as same-language subtitles, benefit everyone who watches videos (children, adolescents, college students, and adults). More than 100 empirical studies document that captioning a video improves comprehension of, attention to, and memory for the video.

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Why you should be captioning your YouTube videos

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Why you should be captioning your YouTube videos

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This is a short, easy-to-follow blog that explains the benefits of captioning your content, both in benefit of you and all of your viewers

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3 Reasons Why Closed Captions Increase YouTube Views | 3Play Media

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Get more views on YouTube by adding captions to videos. Closed captions increase views by boosting SEO, UX, and accessibility.

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A blog that talks about how you don’t have to be within the deaf or hard-of-hearing population to be able to use captions as instructional or personal aids or resources

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The Office of Communications (Ofcom), the regulatory body for UK television broadcasting, conducted a 2006 study on how many people use subtitles and subtitle usage by people who are d/Deaf or hard of hearing.

In the UK, "subtitles" are equivalent to what we refer to in the United States as "closed captions" or "subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing (SDH)." That is, the timed-text displayed on videos that includes both speech and essential non-speech sounds. In this post, we will use the terms "closed captions" and "subtitles" interchangeably.

The Ofcom research study was prompted by the passage of the Communications Act of 2003, which set forth subtitling quotas for UK broadcast television and required data to prove how such accommodations are helpful to viewers with disabilities.

The pleasant surprise? Many television viewers benefit from subtitles even if they are not d/Deaf or hard of hearing.

Want to learn more? Read about the benefits of captioning ✅

How Many People Use Subtitles According to the Ofcom Study Results

The Ofcom study aimed to model user benefits, usage, and preferences for access services, collecting stats about user awareness of closed captioning and the number of people in the UK who are d/Deaf or hard of hearing.

Ofcom found that 7.5 million people in the UK (18% of the population) used closed captions. Of that 7.5 million, only 1.5 million were d/Deaf or hard of hearing.

This suggests that 80% of television viewers used closed captions for reasons other than hearing loss, and that closed captions benefit many more than just those who require them for accessibility.

In an effort to determine how many people use subtitles and why, Ofcom asked participants what motivates them to use subtitles. Ofcom found that "subtitles were regarded as generally very effective in making programmes understood."

In 2006, the BBC even referenced the Ofcom study and suggested that the average TV viewer could benefit from closed captions, particularly as the nature of video changes.

With the dominance of reality TV, the dialogue is becoming less articulate and more unscripted. In addition, more and more shows feature heavy accents that can be hard to understand. For these reasons and more, closed captions could improve comprehension for all viewers.

Why should you transcribe and caption your videos? Download our ebook to learn more ➡️

What Have We Learned Since the Ofcom Study?

In the years since Ofcom's 2006 study, many other studies and papers have corroborated Ofcom's suggestion that captions can improve understanding and benefit all viewers. For example, in a 2015 study conducted by 3Play Media and Oregon State University Ecampus Research Group on student use and perception of closed captions, we found that students not reporting disabilities use captions almost as frequently as students reporting disabilities. When asked why captions are helpful, respondents expressed strong agreement that captions help students focus, retain information, and comprehend academic material.

Another by Morton Ann Gernsbacher also found corroborating evidence, citing over 100 empirical studies. paper published in 2015 in Policy Insights from the Behavioral and Brain Sciences

"The empirical evidence is clear: Captions, also known as same-language subtitles, benefit everyone who watches videos," Gernsbacher writes. "More than 100 studies document that captioning a video improves comprehension of, memory for, and attention to videos, for children, adolescents, college students, and adults. "

In addition to research studies, many movie-goers have anecdotally praised captions, even if they're not d/Deaf or hard of hearing. For example, in a 2020 Washington Post article by Lauren Michele Jackson , the writer discusses using captions to better understand strong accents, such as those featured in Games of Thrones.

"Struggling to track its multiplying medley of tones and inflections, I found I was missing minor details about places and names, along with the all-too-rare moments of wit," Jackson writes. "Once I turned [captions] on, though, they stayed on, for any and everything on television. My hearing ability, I soon realized, had made me lazy. I took for granted a breadth of comprehension I never possessed."

Jackson's observations, while anecdotal, express strong agreement with the evidence-backed finding that captions are beneficial for everyone.

Discover 8 benefits of captioning and transcribing online video ➡️

Why Viewers Who Are Not Hard of Hearing Use Closed Captions

The Ofcom study clearly indicates that once a user is aware of closed captions, their usefulness is universal. Here are just a few examples of the benefits of subtitles:

Viewers who know English as a second language benefit from closed captions , because they make it easier to follow along with the speech.

Closed captions help with comprehension of dialogue that is spoken very quickly, with accents, mumbling, or background noise.

Closed captions provide viewers clarity on mentions of full names, brand names, or technical terminology.

Closed captions help maintain concentration and engagement, which can provide a better experience for viewers with learning disabilities, attention deficit disorder, or autism.

Closed captions allow viewers to watch videos in sound-sensitive environments, like offices and libraries.

Not convinced that your videos need closed captions? Check out this free guide 👇
This post was originally published on May 27, 2014, by Lily Bond, as "Ofcom Study: 80% of People Who Use Closed Captions Are Not Hard of Hearing" and has been updated.

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Who Uses Closed Captions? Not Just the Deaf or Hard of Hearing

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The Office of Communications (Ofcom), the regulatory body for UK television broadcasting, conducted a 2006 study on how many people use subtitles and subtitle usage by people who are d/Deaf or hard of hearing. In the UK, "subtitles" are equivalent to what we refer to in the United States as "closed captions" or "subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing (SDH)."

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The Difference Between Open and Closed Captions

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The Difference Between Open and Closed Captions

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A quick 101 rundown YouTube video as to what the difference is between open and closed captions and the importance of both

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OPEN vs CLOSED Captions - Why & How to Add Them to Videos Online

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Why you should use subtitles for your content

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Why you should use subtitles for your content

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This list of a couple reasons as to why using captioning, subtitles specifically, on your videos and other content is a great display of some key points that make captions so beneficial

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In today's digital world, online video content plays a key role within company advertising and video has become an extremely powerful marketing tool.

But have you ever stopped to think if your video is fully reaching your target audience? Have you ever wondered why you're not getting the views you were hoping for?

While great video content is always the first step, there's another one you may have missed- adding subtitles. Captioning your videos (training content, social media videos, TV shows or movies) proves to have a huge impact on how successful they are.

Some Meaningful Facts about Subtitles:

· They are written transcriptions that are synchronized to media files so that they play at the same time as the spoken world;

· They are designed for hearing users, as they only cover spoken text;

· They translate or transcribe the dialogue or narrative;

· Subtitles for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (SDH) are the subtitles designed for those who are deaf, Deaf, or hard of hearing. They have additional information, such as speaker tags, sound effects and other elements outside of speech;

· If you choose the subtitle option on a traditional TV, you would find Close captions, required by law on all public broadcasts, as per FCC regulations. Although geared toward the same audience as SDH, they are not as common in streaming internet videos and they don't usually come with the option to turn the subtitles on or off.

6 Reasons why Subtitles are so Important:

Subtitles improve comprehension of, attention to, and memory for the video. In fact, a quick research reveals that many people turn on captions on when they're watching TV shows, movies or other videos even if they're native speakers of the original language. They just understand it better.

Subtitle translation can really open up your global potential and is extremely useful if you have videos that you intend to distribute to foreign audiences. Taking your target audience's language into account is key if you're hoping to make the next leap to international clients.

It is widely understood that over 80% of Facebook videos are viewed without the sound on. By adding subtitles to your videos, you can increase engagement by as much as 15%. After all, what good is it if all your hard work producing the video is lost to the viewers because they are watching it without sound?

It was recently found that videos without subtitles were watched, on average, 66% to completion compared to 91% with subtitles. Besides, higher video engagement online can be well recognized by search engines. The more clicks your videos get, the longer users browse your site, the more brownie points for your SEO.

Adding subtitles and/or subtitle translation to online videos means that Google and other search engines can pick up on both English and foreign subtitles and utilize your key words for international audiences and global SEO, which should enhance your rankings and boost SEO for the source language site.

The biggest benefit to including subtitles lies in increasing accessibility to multimedia content. Subtitling allows viewers who cannot access the auditory component of a media file to still enjoy video in the fullest way possible without missing out the supplementary sounds. Reaching new audiences is a cornerstone of business success!

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THE IMPORTANCE OF SUBTITLES: 6 REASONS WHY YOU SHOULD BE SUBTITLING YOUR VIDEOS

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In today's digital world, online video content plays a key role within company advertising and video has become an extremely powerful marketing tool. But have you ever stopped to think if your video is fully reaching your target audience? Have you ever wondered why you're not getting the views you were hoping for?

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Netflix speaking on their standards for captions

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Netflix speaking on their standards for captions

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A great display of information from a media source that essentially everyone knows, and loves, expressing to the public their view on captions and why they are so important to the platform

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Why are Netflix's standards for Subtitles and Closed Captions so high?
Subtitles and Closed Captions are Primary Assets.
Subtitles and closed captions have historically been deemed a secondary asset. Even our own technical specification lists subtitles and closed captions (timed text) among several types of secondary assets that NETFLIX requires. The reality is that for millions of our members around the world, timed text files are primary assets.

Timed text files are needed not only to translate foreign language dialogue, and provide the deaf and hard of hearing access to content, but also to allow one to watch content in a noisy environment. With the rapid growth of mobile devices, living rooms are no longer needed to enjoy your favorite film or television show. NETFLIX affords its members the ability to watch content on their own schedule, and subtitles allow members to enjoy content without the need for silence or headphones. Timed text files are paramount not only to the NETFLIX service, but also for the consumption of media in a world without the living room as the primary center of entertainment.

Accurate and natural translations are a critical element as Netflix continues to expand its global reach. What was once considered a box ticked in a long list of deliverables is now being held to a higher standard. We currently reject more files for poor translations than any other type of error. We often hear that the files delivered to NETFLIX should be accepted since they were the same used for broadcast or home video. Older standards often need to be updated as we continue to improve the film and television experience on multiple fronts. Translations that may have been deemed acceptable in the past may not measure up to the quality expected today.

Our members simply want an effortless experience, and this means that they will be able to read subtitles or closed captions without being reminded that they are reading. Awkward language pulls you out of the viewing experience instead of supporting the experience. Often, these errors are not egregious, but quite subtle in nature. We may reject a file for containing translations that are grammatically correct, but are simply phrases and colloquialisms that are not natural to the viewer. For example, if a character is saying the equivalent of, "let me refresh your memory" in a language other than English, the English translation should not be, "let me refresh your mind." This may have been a passable translation for other platforms and we can infer the intended meaning here, but it simply does not read naturally. People do not say, "let me refresh your mind" when reminding someone of a past memory. An error like this is rarely an isolated event, but rather an indication that the translation was not performed by someone with a native fluency in the translated language.

To provide a bit of insight into our process, when we QC an English subtitle for a Spanish language film, for example, we have a native English speaker with no Spanish knowledge watch a few minutes of the content. If they find examples that do not read naturally, the file is rejected. We expect this type of language check to be performed before an asset is delivered.

Another important aspect of the quality of the language is the ability to read the entire subtitle. In the past, little attention was paid to ensuring the reading speed was actually readable. We have put a considerable amount of thought and research into defining a natural reading speed in each of our language specific style guides. The translation quality is moot if the sentence flies by too fast to read.

Ultimately, we need to change the way we think about subtitles and closed captions. They are no longer secondary assets in a world where content knows no physical borders.

Was this article helpful? 635 out of 758 found this helpful

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Why are Netflix's standards for Subtitles and Closed Captions so high?

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Why are Netflix's standards for Subtitles and Closed Captions so high? Subtitles and Closed Captions are Primary Assets. Subtitles and closed captions have historically been deemed a secondary asset. Even our own technical specification lists subtitles and closed captions (timed text) among several types of secondary assets that NETFLIX requires.

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How to turn on captions for different platforms

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How to turn on captions for different platforms

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If you are unfamiliar with using captions (subtitles or CC) this is a great resource to implement such in your day to day streaming, from Netflix to Hulu to Disney plus

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When you watch movies and TV shows on OTT streaming services, you might want to enable closed captions or foreign subtitles for your native language. While you generally can look for a 'CC' button, subtitles icon, or find the on/off switch under the settings menu, it can vary by platform.

In this guide, we will show you how to turn on subtitles and captions for the following streaming service platforms:

Turn On Subtitles in Netflix

Here's how to turn on subtitles during playback on Netflix.

Turn On Captions in Hulu

Here's how to turn on subtitles during playback on Hulu.

1. Launch the Hulu app.

2. Select a movie or TV Show.

3. Go to the Settings button in the bottom right.

4. Click on the Subtitles tab.

5. Turn on subtitles.

Turn On Captions in Disney+

Turn On Captions in Amazon Prime Video

Turn On Captions in HBOmax

Turn On Captions in Apple TV+

Turn On Captions in YouTube Premium

Turn On Captions in Peacock

Turn On Captions in CBS All Access

If you are a content creator for any of these OTT streaming service platforms, consider using Rev to create fast, accurate captions for your TV shows and movies.

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How to Turn On Captions and Subtitles for Streaming Service Platforms

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When you watch movies and TV shows on OTT streaming services, you might want to enable closed captions or foreign subtitles for your native language. While you generally can look for a 'CC' button, subtitles icon, or find the on/off switch under the settings menu, it can vary by platform.

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A risen social media platform, TikTok, has become a big advocate for captioning, as there has been a big movement of adding captions to your TikTok videos to allow all populations to have access to all videos, regardless of their hearing capabilities

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By Stephanie Hind, Manager, Creator Management and Operations, TikTok US Inclusivity is important because when people feel included, they're more comfortable expressing themselves and engaging with th