Google crawls and picks up more - querry strings for serps if article/contents are written on a page have less use of paragraphs(lessor the better) but from user/visitor point of view, nice multiple paragraphs in article/contents draws more attention.
I think it comes down to the more written on the page the more words compete. You could have so many words that are different that google can not pick one good topic to list site as.
I would suggest that you should try to make your pages themed. This means if Google for example has doubts about the topic of your page, then you will not get good SERPS. This is achieved now by using LSI methods. The days of using keyword density articles is over.