Why we get lost in a good book...

--amadeus--

Any avid reader knows the power of a book to transport you into another world, be it the wizard realm of "Harry Potter" or the legal intrigue of the latest John Grisham.

Part of the reason we get lost in these imaginary worlds might be because our brains effectively simulate the events of the book in the same way they process events in the real world, a new study suggests.

Ignore teh JK Rowling and John Grisham part of the intro

Top sportspeople have long used "visualisation" as part of thier preparation. This involves actively picturing themselves being successful in thier event - how they will feel when they score the winning goal, how the pitch will smell, the sound of the crowd, the direction the keeper will dive in a penalty shoot out and how they will breath to calm thier nerves and so on. The more detailed the imagined scenario the more effective it is. Recent research indicates that this visualisation micro triggers the same nerve pathways as actual performance of teh activity, helping create the all important "muscle memory".

But this article takes the idea a step further and suggests that reading a good book can literally take you there by triggering the same general neural activity as performing teh actions yourself.

Link

FoxInATreehouse

An interesting article. I have fallen under a good book's spell so often. I was one of those kids who loved reading time in school, I could get lost in thought for hours.

The article makes sense since the human body does create associations between physical and chemical stimuli and we can become conditioned. Such as when I'm watching a movie, a chase scene may make my heart rate and respirations increase even though I'm not actually running.

Everyone's responses range to varying degrees however. Which led me to consider: How does a person's learning style affect the degree to which he or she "gets lost" in a book? Perhaps those with a preference for a particular style will have increased brain activity in the corresponding area when reading text that matches it.

The article mentioned that not everyone visualizes a scene as it occurs. Personally, I'm a visual and kinesthetic learner, so I need to see and touch to fully understand. Whenever I read a book that has a lot of physical descriptions and actions I tend to fade out my surroundings and imagine the scene as I read it. Conversely, if I read a text that has mainly dialogue or few descriptions, I will rarely remember what happened. That might explain why I never really understood poetry in school. Anyway, those are my initial thoughts on the article. Sorry if they're a bit jumbled.

looksee

I mostly read fantasy, or historical novels (which usually comes to much the same thing ) and I prefer a book with a well-drawn 'world' - for example Feist's Magician and Empire series. These create very clear images in my mind, both of the environment and the characters. For this reason I rarely watch films of familiar books as I always find them either confusing or disappointing.

If I am deeply involved in a book I often find between readings I get a fleeting sense of being in the fantasy 'world' at odd moments. Its a bit hard to describe, does anyone identify with that feeling?