Article published In:
Scientific Study of LiteratureVol. 3:1 (2013) ► pp.28–47
Reading other minds
Effects of literature on empathy
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.
Keywords: literature, theory of mind, perspective taking, empathy, art
Cited by
Cited by 102 other publications
Alderson-Day, Ben, Marco Bernini & Charles Fernyhough
2017. Uncharted features and dynamics of reading: Voices, characters, and crossing of experiences. Consciousness and Cognition 49 ► pp. 98 ff. 
ALKAN, Yağmur & Salim DURUKOĞLU
2024. Ortaokul Öğrencilerinin Kitap Okumaya Yönelik İlgi ve Tercihlerinin İncelenmesi. Ana Dili Eğitimi Dergisi 12:1 ► pp. 137 ff.
Ayu, Antonia
2017. The Effect of Reading Fiction on Empathy. SSRN Electronic Journal
Bavishi, Avni, Martin D. Slade & Becca R. Levy
2016. A chapter a day: Association of book reading with longevity. Social Science & Medicine 164 ► pp. 44 ff.
Bell, Sarah L. & Tanvir N. Bush
2021. ‘Never mind the bullocks’: animating the go-along interview through creative nonfiction. Mobilities 16:3 ► pp. 306 ff.
Black, Jessica E.
2019. An IRT Analysis of the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test. Journal of Personality Assessment 101:4 ► pp. 425 ff.
Black, Jessica E. & Jennifer L. Barnes
2015. The effects of reading material on social and non-social cognition. Poetics 52 ► pp. 32 ff.
Boerma, Inouk E., Suzanne E. Mol & Jelle Jolles
2017. The Role of Home Literacy Environment, Mentalizing, Expressive Verbal Ability, and Print Exposure in Third and Fourth Graders’ Reading Comprehension. Scientific Studies of Reading 21:3 ► pp. 179 ff.
Borkfelt, Sune
2022. Literary Narratives and the Empathics of Slaughter. In Reading Slaughter [Palgrave Studies in Animals and Literature, ], ► pp. 33 ff.
Bracher, Mark, Deborah Barnbaum, Michael Byron, Tammy Clewell, Nancy Docherty, Françoise Massardier-Kenney, David Pereplyotchik, Susan Roxburgh & Elizabeth Smith-Pryor
Bulfin, Ailise
2021. ‘I'll touch whatever I want’: Representing Child Sexual Abuse in Contemporary Children's and Young Adult Gothic. Gothic Studies 23:1 ► pp. 21 ff.
Burke, Michael, Anezka Kuzmicova, Anne Mangen & Theresa Schilhab
2016. Empathy at the confluence of neuroscience and empirical literary studies. Scientific Study of Literature 6:1 ► pp. 6 ff.
Calarco, Navona, Katrina Fong, Marina Rain & Raymond Mar
2017. Chapter 14. Absorption in narrative fiction and its possible impact on social abilities. In Narrative Absorption [Linguistic Approaches to Literature, 27], ► pp. 293 ff.
Chiavaroli, Neville, Chien‐Da Huang & Lynn Monrouxe
2018. Learning Medicine With, From, and Through the Humanities. In Understanding Medical Education, ► pp. 223 ff.
Chlebuch, Natasha, Thalia R. Goldstein & Deena Skolnick Weisberg
Costabile, Kristi A., Randi Shedlosky-Shoemaker & Adrienne B. Austin
2018. Universal stories: How narratives satisfy core motives. Self and Identity 17:4 ► pp. 418 ff.
Crowe, Taylor & Tracey S. Hodges
2022. Elementary Education and Perspective-Taking. In Creativity as Progressive Pedagogy [Advances in Educational Technologies and Instructional Design, ], ► pp. 351 ff.
Dahy, Faten Abdelaziz & Khaled Mostafa Karam
2021. Potentials of Empathetic Stimuli in Creative Nonfiction: Zimbardo’sThe Lucifer Effectand Danner’sTorture and Truth. English Studies 102:4 ► pp. 468 ff.
David, Amy, Amanda S. Mayes & Elizabeth C. Coppola
2020. The Effect of Live Theatre on Business Ethics. Humanistic Management Journal 5:2 ► pp. 215 ff.
Davis, Jenny L. & Tony P. Love
2017. Self-in-Self, Mind-in-Mind, Heart-in-Heart: The Future of Role-Taking, Perspective Taking, and Empathy. In Advances in Group Processes [Advances in Group Processes, 34], ► pp. 151 ff.
De Mulder, Hannah N. M., Frank Hakemulder, Rianne van den Berghe, Fayette Klaassen & Jos J. A. van Berkum
2017. Effects of exposure to literary narrative fiction. Scientific Study of Literature 7:1 ► pp. 129 ff.
De Smedt, Johan & Helen De Cruz
2015. The Epistemic Value of Speculative Fiction. Midwest Studies In Philosophy 39:1 ► pp. 58 ff.
Deane, Paul, Swapna Somasundaran, René R. Lawless, Hilary Persky & Colleen Appel
2019. The Key Practice, Building and Sharing Stories and Social Understandings: The Intrinsic Value of Narrative. ETS Research Report Series 2019:1 ► pp. 1 ff.
Denham, A. E.
2024. Empathy & Literature. Emotion Review 16:2 ► pp. 84 ff.
Duncan, Charles, Georgene Bess-Montgomery & Viktor Osinubi
2017. Why Martha Nussbaum is Right: The Empirical Case for the Value of Reading and Teaching Fiction. Interdisciplinary Literary Studies 19:2 ► pp. 242 ff.
D’Adamo, Amedeo
2018. Welcome to Dantean Space!: Empathy and Space in Singin’ in the Rain, Legally Blonde, the Pursuit of Happyness and Aliens. In Empathetic Space on Screen, ► pp. 3 ff.
Eekhof, Lynn S., Kobie van Krieken, José Sanders & Roel M. Willems
2021. Reading Minds, Reading Stories: Social-Cognitive Abilities Affect the Linguistic Processing of Narrative Viewpoint. Frontiers in Psychology 12
Eekhof, Lynn S., Kobie van Krieken & Roel M. Willems
2022. Reading about minds: The social-cognitive potential of narratives. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 29:5 ► pp. 1703 ff.
Fekete, Judit, Zsuzsanna Pótó, Eszter Varga, Dóra Hebling, Márton Herold, Noémi Albert, Borbála Pethő, Tamás Tényi & Róbert Herold
2023. The effect of reading literary fiction on the theory of mind skills among persons with schizophrenia and normal controls. Frontiers in Psychiatry 14
Franks, A. Dean, Audra I. Classen & Tracey S. Hodges
2021. Recognizing, Embracing, and Advocating for Diversity to Develop Young Children's Social-Emotional Skills. In Handbook of Research on Supporting Social and Emotional Development Through Literacy Education [Advances in Educational Technologies and Instructional Design, ], ► pp. 134 ff.
Franks, A. Dean, Audra I. Classen & Tracey S. Hodges
2022. Recognizing, Embracing, and Advocating for Diversity to Develop Young Children's Social-Emotional Skills. In Research Anthology on Early Childhood Development and School Transition in the Digital Era, ► pp. 760 ff.
Fåhraeus, Anna W. E.
2020. Fiction as a Means to Understanding the Dynamics of Empathy. Educare :3 ► pp. 46 ff.
García Ochoa, Gabriel & Sarah McDonald
2020. Cultural Literacy and the Case for Empathy. In Cultural Literacy and Empathy in Education Practice, ► pp. 21 ff.
Gavaler, Chris & Dan Johnson
Gavaler, Chris & Dan Johnson
Gittel, Benjamin, Robert Deutschländer & Martin Hecht
2016. Conveying moods and knowledge-what-it-is-like through lyric poetry. Scientific Study of Literature 6:1 ► pp. 131 ff.
Grenier, Robin S, Jamie L Callahan, Kristi Kaeppel & Carole Elliott
2022. Advancing book clubs as non-formal learning to facilitate critical public pedagogy in organizations. Management Learning 53:3 ► pp. 483 ff.
Gross, Daniel M. & Stephanie D. Preston
2020. Darwin and the Situation of Emotion Research. Emotion Review 12:3 ► pp. 179 ff.
Gustafsson, Anna W, Per Johnsson, Kajsa Järvholm, Katarina Bernhardsson, Torbjörn Forslid & Anders Ohlsson
Hahn, Erin R. & Marybeth K. Garrett
2017. Preschoolers' moral judgments of environmental harm and the influence of perspective taking. Journal of Environmental Psychology 53 ► pp. 11 ff.
Junker, Christine R. & Stephen J. Jacquemin
2017. How Does Literature Affect Empathy in Students?. College Teaching 65:2 ► pp. 79 ff.
Kaakinen, Johanna K., Orsolya Papp-Zipernovszky, Egon Werlen, Nuria Castells, Per Bergamin, Thierry Baccino & Arthur M. Jacobs
2018. Chapter 6. Emotional and motivational aspects of digital reading. In Learning to Read in a Digital World [Studies in Written Language and Literacy, 17], ► pp. 141 ff.
Kampourelli, Vassiliki
2022. Historical empathy and medicine: Pathography and empathy in Sophocles’ Philoctetes. Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 25:3 ► pp. 561 ff.
Kann-Rasmussen, Nanna & Gitte Balling
2015. Ikke-læsning som «problem» i dansk kulturpolitik - En analyse af læsekampagnen Danmark Læser. Nordisk kulturpolitisk tidsskrift 18:2 ► pp. 250 ff.
Kelly, Cavenaugh
2024. Healthcare Education: Can Literary Narratives Address Occupational Therapy’s ‘Incongruence’ in Values?. Occupational Therapy In Health Care 38:2 ► pp. 439 ff.
Kidd, David Comer & Emanuele Castano
2013. Reading Literary Fiction Improves Theory of Mind. Science 342:6156 ► pp. 377 ff.
Kolaiti, Patricia
2020. Perceptual relevance and art: Some tentative suggestions. Journal of Literary Semantics 49:2 ► pp. 99 ff.
Koopman, Eva Maria (Emy)
2018. Does Originality Evoke Understanding? The Relation between Literary Reading and Empathy. Review of General Psychology 22:2 ► pp. 169 ff.
Kotrla Topić, Marina
2021. EMOTIONAL ENGAGEMENT, BUT NOT TRANSPORTATION LEADS TO HIGHER EMPATHY AFTER READING A FICTIONAL STORY, IN MORE AGREEABLE PARTICIPANTS. Primenjena psihologija 14:2 ► pp. 211 ff.
Kuzmičová, Anežka & Katalin Bálint
2019. Personal Relevance in Story Reading. Poetics Today 40:3 ► pp. 429 ff.
Kuzmičová, Anežka & Teresa Cremin
2022. Different fiction genres take children’s memories to different places. Cambridge Journal of Education 52:1 ► pp. 37 ff.
Kuzmičová, Anežka, Anne Mangen, Hildegunn Støle & Anne Charlotte Begnum
2017. Literature and readers’ empathy: A qualitative text manipulation study. Language and Literature: International Journal of Stylistics 26:2 ► pp. 137 ff.
Kuzmičová, Anežka, Theresa Schilhab & Michael Burke
2020. m-Reading: Fiction reading from mobile phones. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies 26:2 ► pp. 333 ff.
König, Sannah & Saskia Schabio
2022. 6th FabLearn Europe / MakeEd Conference 2022, ► pp. 1 ff.
Laermans, Jorien, Hans Scheers, Philippe Vandekerckhove & Emmy De Buck
2020. PROTOCOL: Recreational book reading for promoting cognitive functioning and emotional well‐being in older adults: A systematic review. Campbell Systematic Reviews 16:4
Lathrop, Ben
2021. From Engagement to Empathy: Performance in the ELA Classroom.
English Journal
110:3 ► pp. 56 ff.
Lecce, Serena, Federica Bianco & Claire Hughes
2021. Reading minds and reading texts: Evidence for independent and specific associations. Cognitive Development 57 ► pp. 101010 ff.
Lieto, Antonio, Manuel Striani, Cristina Gena, Enrico Dolza, Anna Maria Marras, Gian Luca Pozzato & Rossana Damiano
2024. A sensemaking system for grouping and suggesting stories from multiple affective viewpoints in museums. Human–Computer Interaction 39:1-2 ► pp. 109 ff.
Lin, Xi
2020. The Engaged Spectator: Reading BL Novels in Contemporary China. Fudan Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences 13:2 ► pp. 233 ff.
Mahmoudi, Masoumeh, Mehdi Pourasghar & Kamaledin Alaedini
2020. Literature and Medicine: Clinical Symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in Contemporary Iranian Fictions. Iranian Journal of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences 14:3
Mangen, Anne, Anne Charlotte Begnum, Anežka Kuzmičová, Kersti Nilsson, Mette Steenberg & Hildegunn Støle
2018. Empathy and literary style. Orbis Litterarum 73:6 ► pp. 471 ff.
Mar, Raymond A.
2018. Stories and the Promotion of Social Cognition. Current Directions in Psychological Science 27:4 ► pp. 257 ff.
Mason, Jessica
2022. Teachers’ Intertextual Identities and English Education. In Pedagogical Stylistics in the 21st Century, ► pp. 263 ff.
McIntyre, Dan
2014. The year’s work in stylistics 2013. Language and Literature: International Journal of Stylistics 23:4 ► pp. 389 ff.
McTigue, Erin, April Douglass, Katherine L. Wright, Tracey S. Hodges & Amanda D. Franks
2015. Beyond the Story Map. The Reading Teacher 69:1 ► pp. 91 ff.
Mellor, Rebecca Louise & Elia Psouni
2021. The Study of Security Priming on Avoidant Attentional Biases: Combining Microsaccadic Eye-Movement Measurement With a Dot-Probe Task. Frontiers in Psychology 12
Miller, Henry “Cody”, Shelby Boehm, Kathleen Colantonio-Yurko & Brittany Adams
2022. Himpathy, Herasure, and Down Girl Moves: A Critical Content Analysis of Sexual Assault in Young Adult Literature. Journal of Literacy Research 54:3 ► pp. 298 ff.
Mol, Suzanne E., Jelle Jolles, Tamara Van Batenburg‐Eddes & Maureen K. Bult
2016. Early adolescents' and their parents' mental imagery in relation to perceived reading competence. Journal of Research in Reading 39:3 ► pp. 253 ff.
Mumper, Micah L. & Richard J. Gerrig
2019. How Does Leisure Reading Affect Social Cognitive Abilities?. Poetics Today 40:3 ► pp. 453 ff.
Mínguez-López, Xavier
2023. La educación literaria en educación infantil: leer antes de leer. Enunciación 28 ► pp. 185 ff.
Namba, Shushi, Russell Sarwar Kabir, Kiyoaki Matsuda, Yuka Noguchi, Kohei Kambara, Ryota Kobayashi, Jun Shigematsu, Makoto Miyatani & Takashi Nakao
2021. Fantasy Component of Interpersonal Reactivity is Associated with Empathic Accuracy: Findings from Behavioral Experiments with Implications for Applied Settings. Reading Psychology 42:7 ► pp. 788 ff.
Nikolajeva, Maria
2019. What is it Like to be a Child? Childness in the Age of Neuroscience. Children's Literature in Education 50:1 ► pp. 23 ff.
Oatley, Keith
Oatley, Keith & Maja Djikic
2018. Psychology of Narrative Art. Review of General Psychology 22:2 ► pp. 161 ff.
Pino, Maria Chiara, Monica Mazza & Garet P. Lahvis
2016. The Use of “Literary Fiction” to Promote Mentalizing Ability. PLOS ONE 11:8 ► pp. e0160254 ff.
Pinotti, Andrea & Massimo Salgaro
2019. Empathy or Empathies? Uncertainties in the Interdisciplinary Discussion. Gestalt Theory 41:2 ► pp. 141 ff.
Poerio, Giulia & Peter Totterdell
2020. The Effect of Fiction on the Well-Being of Older Adults: A Longitudinal RCT Intervention Study Using Audiobooks. Psychosocial Intervention 29:1 ► pp. 29 ff.
Riese, Katrin, Mareike Bayer, Gerhard Lauer & Annekathrin Schacht
Rohm, S., F. R. Hopp & E. G. Smit
2022. Exposure to serial audiovisual narratives increases empathy via vicarious interactions. Media Psychology 25:1 ► pp. 106 ff.
Rokotnitz, Naomi
2021. Fantasy, Fiction, and the Foundations of “Relational Authenticity”: J. M. Barrie'sPeter and Wendyand Søren Kierkegaard'sFear and TremblingRevisited. Interdisciplinary Literary Studies 23:2 ► pp. 204 ff.
Salgaro, Massimo & Benjamin Van Tourhout
2018. Why Does Frank Underwood Look at Us? Contemporary Heroes Suggest the Need of a Turn in the Conceptualization of Fictional Empathy. Journal of Literary Theory 12:2 ► pp. 345 ff.
Samur, Dalya, Olivier Luminet & Sander L. Koole
2017. Alexithymia predicts lower reading frequency: The mediating roles of mentalising ability and reading attitude. Poetics 65 ► pp. 1 ff.
Samur, Dalya, Mattie Tops & Sander L. Koole
2018. Does a single session of reading literary fiction prime enhanced mentalising performance? Four replication experiments of Kidd and Castano (2013). Cognition and Emotion 32:1 ► pp. 130 ff.
Sanz-Valdivieso, Lucía
Satchwell, Candice
2019. Collaborative writing with young people with disabilities: raising new questions of authorship and agency. Literacy 53:2 ► pp. 77 ff.
Schwering, Steven C., Natalie M. Ghaffari-Nikou, Fangyun Zhao, Paula M. Niedenthal & Maryellen C. MacDonald
2021. Exploring the Relationship Between Fiction Reading and Emotion Recognition. Affective Science 2:2 ► pp. 178 ff.
Silva, Paulo Henrique Dias & Sara Del Prete Panciera
2023. Teoria da Mente e Empatia em Adultos Típicos: Uma Revisão de Escopo. Psico-USF 28:3 ► pp. 533 ff.
Smit, Julie
2016. The role of empathy in the knowledge building of eighth grade girls as they reflect on their experiences with literature. Scientific Study of Literature 6:1 ► pp. 59 ff.
Smith, Ann Kowal, Capria Jaussen & Karen R. Nestor
2020. The seminar goes to work: Towards a theory of collaborative literacy. Industry and Higher Education 34:4 ► pp. 263 ff.
Tamir, Diana I., Andrew B. Bricker, David Dodell-Feder & Jason P. Mitchell
2016. Reading fiction and reading minds: the role of simulation in the default network. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience 11:2 ► pp. 215 ff.
Troxler, Reba, Thalia Goldstein, Steven Holochwost, Charles Beekman, Stephanie McKeel & Muna Shami
2023. Deeper engagement with live theater increases middle school students’ empathy and social perspective taking. Applied Developmental Science 27:4 ► pp. 352 ff.
Tsang, Art & Daniel Fung
2024. Compulsory versus voluntary extensive reading: Investigating English learners' perceptions, proficiency and school banding. The Curriculum Journal 35:2 ► pp. 168 ff.
van Duijn, Max J, Ineke Sluiter & Arie Verhagen
2015. When narrative takes over: The representation of embedded mindstates in Shakespeare’sOthello. Language and Literature: International Journal of Stylistics 24:2 ► pp. 148 ff.
Vaziri, H., L. Tay, M. G. Keith & J. O. Pawelski
2019. History, literature, and philosophy: A systematic review of positive functioning. The Journal of Positive Psychology 14:6 ► pp. 695 ff.
Walkington, Zoë, Stefanie Ashton Wigman & David Bowles
2020. The impact of narratives and transportation on empathic responding. Poetics 80 ► pp. 101425 ff.
Wimmer, Lena, Gregory Currie, Stacie Friend & Heather J. Ferguson
2021. The effects of reading narrative fiction on social and moral cognition. Scientific Study of Literature 11:2 ► pp. 223 ff.
Wimmer, Lena & Heather J Ferguson
2022. Testing the validity of a self-report scale, author recognition test, and book counting as measures of lifetime exposure to print fiction. Behavior Research Methods 55:1 ► pp. 103 ff.
Wimmer, Lena, Stacie Friend, Gregory Currie & Heather J. Ferguson
2021. Reading Fictional Narratives to Improve Social and Moral Cognition: The Influence of Narrative Perspective, Transportation, and Identification. Frontiers in Communication 5
Yama, Hiroshi
2024. Are Humans Moral Creatures? A Dual-Process Approach for Natural Experiments of History. In Human and Artificial Rationalities [Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 14522], ► pp. 210 ff.
YAZICI, Nermin & Günçe GÜNDUĞDU
2023. TÜRKÇE DERS KİTAPLARINDA YER ALAN ANLATISAL METİNLERDE OKUR EMPATİSİNİ YÖNLENDİREN DİLSEL GÖRÜNÜMLER. Hacettepe Üniversitesi Türkiyat Araştırmaları Dergisi (HÜTAD) :38/Özel Sayı ► pp. 199 ff.
Zambaldi, Carla Fonseca
2020. A literatura e medicina: a literatura como fonte de escuta, empatía e autorreflexão. MEDICA REVIEW. International Medical Humanities Review / Revista Internacional de Humanidades Médicas 8:1 ► pp. 29 ff.
Zeng, Ruoyan & Ellen Winner
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 14 april 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.