psycheandproze

A book didn't just move you. It briefly turned you into someone else. 🕯️

Psychology calls it experience-taking: when a book absorbs you fully, you take on the character's identity their thoughts, emotions, goals as if they were your own.

And across six studies, it changed people's real behavior afterward to match the character they'd become.

So when you say a book "changed you," that's not exaggeration. You lived as someone else for a while. And carried a little of them home.

Which character did you fully become?

Part 14 of Your Brain on Books.
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Source: Kaufman & Libby (2012), JPSP.
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