If I’m in a coffeeshop and there’s a hum of noise I want to drown I’ll listen to some music. AFAIK I have no problems focusing or collating the text while doing this.

But if I’m at home, where there’s no noise other than occasional traffic, and try to listen to music, I tend to lose focus and seek to multitask with something else. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I’m thinking it’s because my mind is looking for a mellow state to get into while reading a book. The music in the coffeeshop example ends up just being whitenoise but becomes more of a conscious burden when I’m already in a quiet environment. This behaviour is also very different if I program, where listenin to music always seems to put me in a the right state.