I suspect people's internal mind abilities impact this a lot. I have little visual memory so icons are hard for me. Others I think struggle with quickly scanning words.
I think both are needed as we are varied people, and empathy for the need for both is important.
Finally... The UI that drives me mad for this is the Discord server list in its left bar. You can't turn on text! It slows me down and makes it hard for me to deal with - especially as I'm slow to learn the icons of new servers. The list changes and they have no coherent design! (And no, the hover tooltip doesn't solve the problem)
I think both are needed as we are varied people, and empathy for the need for both is important.
Finally... The UI that drives me mad for this is the Discord server list in its left bar. You can't turn on text! It slows me down and makes it hard for me to deal with - especially as I'm slow to learn the icons of new servers. The list changes and they have no coherent design! (And no, the hover tooltip doesn't solve the problem)