A couple of weeks ago an article was published in the journal Science, detailing a study in which researchers determined that reading literary fiction can help improve “mind-reading abilities”. That is to say, people who read literature as opposed to popular fiction or non-fiction tend to be better and discerning social motivations and emotions.
Conducted by the New School for social research in New York City, the study gave samples of literary works (by Don DeLillo, Wendell Berry, and others) to one group of test subjects, and excerpts of supermarket dime novels to another group. In some cases, subjects were even given pieces of the driest non-fiction that the researchers could get their hands on, (How the Potato Changed the World and Bamboo Steps Up, among others), to compare against other two groups. After reading for 15-30 minutes, or sometimes not reading at all, the subjects were asked to take several tests that monitored their abilities to decode emotions and judge people’s conviction in certain statements or scenarios. These consisted of “eye” tests, in which subjects tried to guess the emotions being expressed by people solely by looking at pictures of their eyes, and other picture/audio-based tests.
Much to the researchers’ surprise, those who had been assigned literary fiction scored almost twice as high as the others. After some discussion and further investigation, the researchers decided that the results probably turned out as they did because of the way that literature forces readers to judge the motivations of deep, complex characters as well as foresee dynamic plot twists and developments. The key, they say, is empathy. Just as a sad movie draws viewers into the lives of its characters, literature draws readers into the lives of its characters, happy and sad, causing them to filter their own perceptions and adapt their modes of thinking to the patterns of others’ emotions. Reading literature, in a sense, can prime people to “walk in others’ shoes”.
The implications of this research are still being examined, but researchers say that it could potentially result in more non-fiction being assigned in educational curriculums. What is still unclear is whether habitual reading results in amplified empathetic effects, or if this phenomenon can only result in a short-term “primer”. Regardless- if you’re looking to read minds, you might want to try starting off with some Tolstoy.
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/03/i-know-how-youre-feeling-i-read-chekhov/?ref=science
