Extra Credit: The Neuroscience of Your Brain on Fiction

I really liked this article because I never knew how reading could really effect your brain in positive ways. For me, I was never big on reading, but after reading this article it intrigued me to read more so therefore I can more fully understand the complexities of my social life. In this article, it stated that reading can "produce a vivid simulation of reality" and "the opportunity to enter fully into other people's thoughts and feelings." Who knew that reading (even fiction) and engaging with characters in a book can help us relate to our real life. That is amazing to me. As stated in the article "individuals who frequently read fiction seem to be better able to understand other people, empathize with them and see the world from their perspective." Before reading this article I was already convinced that reading enhances a persons academic success and broadens their prior knowledge of many things, such as historical events and facts. But reading not only serves as entertaining purposes and teaches you things you never knew about before, it can also (as talked about in this article) produce more sensory details and feelings in your brain and aids you to learn more about yourself and about others that surround you in life to therefore better understand things going on in the world.