Reading other minds

TLDR

The study examined whether reading literature can enhance empathy. A 100‑participant experiment measured lifelong fiction exposure, personality traits, and empathy, then had participants read either an essay or a short story before reassessing empathy with self‑report and a non‑self‑report measure. Reading a short story increased cognitive empathy among participants low in Openness, while no affective empathy changes were observed; frequent fiction readers scored higher on a non‑self‑report empathy measure, supporting fiction’s role in empathy development.

Abstract

The potential of literature to increase empathy was investigated in an experiment. Participants (N = 100, 69 women) completed a package of questionnaires that measured lifelong exposure to fiction and nonfiction, personality traits, and affective and cognitive empathy. They read either an essay or a short story that were equivalent in length and complexity, were tested again for cognitive and affective empathy, and were finally given a non-self-report measure of empathy. Participants who read a short story who were also low in Openness experienced significant increases in self-reported cognitive empathy (p .05). No increases in affective empathy were found. Participants who were frequent fiction-readers had higher scores on the non-self-report measure of empathy. Our results suggest a role for fictional literature in facilitating development of empathy.