Bibliotherapy for You
Adeline Loh May 2007
In a recent study published in the Journal of Research in Personality, psychology researchers at the University of Toronto discovered that frequent fiction readers possessed stronger social abilities than frequent non-fiction readers.
Readers more exposed to fiction performed better on tests measuring empathy and social cognition than readers of expository non-fiction.
As fictional narratives often correspond to our social environment, they give opportunities to relate to characters and situations in the stories. “By continually placing ourselves in these fictional social worlds and simulating social experiences, we can either hone the processes used for comprehending others, or come to learn concrete information about how interpersonal relations work,” says Raymond Mar, a PhD candidate in psychology at the University of Toronto.