I must provide a counter-point in the argument. Whilst only 1-in-5 Young Adult readers are male, the actual reading rate for males is only ~10% lower than femal

I must provide a counter-point in the argument. Whilst only 1-in-5 Young Adult readers are male, the actual reading rate for males is only ~10% lower than females. So with such a small margin of difference, what are the males reading if not Young Adult? I know when I was 12 years old, I wasn't reading young adult. I was reading LotR and Discworld novels. I think I had a brief period of reading YA before I was reading adult fiction. There weren't many good YA fiction when I grew up, most was targeted towards girls and I stopped reading YA before good books like Cirque Du Freak (which I narrowly missed) and Inkheart (which I missed by a few years) appeared. I personally read Terry Pratchetts YA books, but quickly progressed into his adult fiction with the Discworld (there was no Tiffany Aching YA discworlds until the same time of release as Inkheart and I was already well into Discworld by then). Does it not say that if boys are only reading slightly less than girls, but not reading YA, that those boys who do read books are more advanced readers?