There is a study that “reading pure literature can develop the ability to read the psychology of others”.
This time I will introduce it.
Reading Literary Fiction Improves Theory of Mind
In this study, participants who read the following three types of books read the pure literature and scored the highest score in the “test to read others' feelings”.
- National Book Award Pure Literature
- Best selling entertainment novel
- Non-Fiction
It seems that pure literature, which draws more complex mind movements than entertainment works, helps train the ability to read others' minds.
However, there are various types of pure literature.
So what pure literature is recommended for this research is Lydia Davis' novel.
In Lydia Davis' novel, I have read the following novels:
Madame Bovary: (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)
This novel is a masterpiece that allows you to have a reading experience of “I don't know why but it's really interesting”.
So I recommend it even if it's not for the purpose of training the ability to read others' emotions.
Anyway, reading mysterious novels and working your brain seems to be important in order to train your ability to read others' emotions.