Dr. Seuss & Kindness: How Reading Develops Empathy

taylorkateoakley
Jul 15
2 min read

Did you know that reading a book as easy as Oh, The Places You'll Go! or as hard as Anna Karenina is actually a crucial part of being a kind and empathetic person?

It sounds kind of crazy that something as simple as reading a children's book could be the key to people of all ages developing a sense of empathy, but research and experiments have repeatedly proven that reading fictional book helps people develop empathy.

How Does It Work?

Okay. It might sound like nonsense right now, but let me explain.

When you read a book you are exposed to many different perspectives. You see how the characters think, you see how they act, you see how they feel, and you see how they are affected by their surroundings. These seemingly small things transport you into the minds of the characters and let you see the world how they would. This is called the Transportation Theory, and it is a big part of developing empathy.

When you experience other perspectives through the Transportation Theory, you learn to understand people. If you can understand other people, then you can understand how they feel and even understand how they would act. That is exactly what empathy is, understanding and feeling the way others feel in a situation.

Why Fiction?

Literary Fiction has been proven to be better than other genres such as romance, action, or mystery books. Many of these genres have predictable plots and characters that have many of the same common beliefs and feelings. Books that show uncommon beliefs are more common in fiction which makes these books better for building empathy.

A study was done where different groups of Dutch college students took a baseline "Theory of Mind" test. One group was told not to read and the other groups were all given a genre of book to read. The group that read fiction increased the most on the "Theory of Mind" test and the group that didn't read had a decrease in their score.