Read a novel: it’s just what the doctor ordered
IT’S WELL-ESTABLISHED SCIENCE THAT READING boosts vocabulary, sharpens reason and expands intellectual horizons. But the latest round of research on the benefits of literature focuses on how it improves not our IQ, but our EQ.
Book lovers profess a deep emotional bond with books, and scientists are increasingly looking to explain just what it is about fiction that improves our mental health. Three years ago, researchers at the New School for Social Research found a link between what psychologists call “theory of mind”—basically, the ability to know what another person is thinking or feeling—and reading a passage of literary fiction (distinguished from popular fiction). Participants who read passages from short stories were found to score better on the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET), an assessment that asks participants to look at photos of subjects’
