Washington, December 29: Minneapolis has emerged as America’s most literate city of 2007 in an annual survey.

It was chosen as such on the basis of the cultural resources for reading in America’s largest cities.

Published in ‘USA Today’, the survey ranks cities based on six key indicators of literacy—newspaper circulation, number of bookstores, library resources, periodical publishing resources, educational attainment, and Internet resources.

The study named Seattle as the second most literate city in the US, while St. Paul came in third. Denver surfaced as the fourth most literate city.

Wrapping up the top five on the list was Washington, DC.

This was followed by St. Louis, San Francisco, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, and Boston in the same order.

Central Connecticut State University President Dr. Jack Miller, the author of the study, said that his research also substantiated recent studies that indicated that Americans were reading both lesser and less well.

Dr. Miller said that a review of five-year data showed that reading among Americans kept declining as they became more educated.

However, he admitted that though newspaper reading had declined over years, the trend of magazine reading and online reading had caught the pace.

For his study, Dr. Miller collected information from US Census data, audited newspaper circulation rates, and data on magazine publishing, educational attainment levels, library resources and booksellers.

America’s most literate cities of 2007 in order of ranking:

1. Minneapolis

2. Seattle

3. St. Paul

4. Denver

5. Washington, DC

6. St. Louis

7. San Francisco

8. Atlanta

9. Pittsburgh

10. Boston (ANI)