Australasian Science — May-June 2017

Every Day I Hear the Book

Some readers “hear” characters speaking to
them, even when the book is finished.

Those who love literature often describe one of the joys of
reading as the experience of being fully absorbed in the words
and actions of a particular character, who seems to express the
reader’s own thoughts, feelings or views of the world. A recent
study by a team of British researchers found that some readers
even experience the voices of fictional characters
as a quasi-hallucinatory phenomenon, claiming to
“hear” the words of fictional characters even when
not reading.
Prior investigations have demonstrated that
both individual and textual variables affect the
experience of reading. Readers are known to adjust
the pace of their reading to accommodate more
difficult text or prose rich in imagery. Some of
these processes are detectable by examining scans
of brain activity: when a character is “speaking”
in a text, specific regions of the auditory cortex are
more active than when the character’s actions are
described in prose. These and other findings have
suggested that the enjoyment of reading in part
reflects our ability to use visual and auditory mech-
anisms to more fully imagine the setting of the
novel, as well as the activities and personality of
its characters.
In the recent study published in Cognition and
Consciousness, the researchers sought to learn more
about the nature and frequency of occasions in which readers
are engrossed in characters’ lives and voices. They surveyed
more than 1500 readers, many of whom were attendees at a
large book festival in Scotland.
The researchers found that most survey respondents reported
hearing characters’ voices when reading at least part of the time,
with more than half noting this occurring all or almost all of the
time. Many stated that they “heard” the accent or dialect of
the character, or a specific pitch, tone or rate of speech they
associated with the character as he or she was imagined to speak.
Visual imagery was common for around 14% of participants,
with some describing reading as a kind of cinematic experi-
ence. A few reported tactile experiences, such as a character’s
whisper being “felt” on their neck.
As many as one-fifth of respondents reported that at times
they “heard” characters’ voices outside of the immediate reading
experience. One of these described their experience in this way:
“Whenever I’m reading a novel I always hear the characters
talking even while not reading. They continue a life between
bouts of reading.”

One theory proposed to explain these findings is that the

experience of reading about the words and actions of well-

described characters produces an overlay on the reader’s thoughts

and feelings. That is, if a reader becomes engrossed in a char-

acter’s life, or is emotionally affected by their speech or behaviour,

the reader may adopt their words, phrases and styles of speech

as a pattern when responding to others. This could occur only

for a brief time while reading the book, or persist for a longer

period on occasions where the reader is deeply moved.

As one respondent to the survey put it: “If I read a book

written in the first person, my everyday thoughts are often

influenced by the style, tone and vocabulary of the written

work. It’s as if the character has started to narrate my world”.

The researchers termed this “experiential crossing”: the thought

and speech patterns of the character have crossed over from

the text to influence the behaviour and speech of the reader.

The researchers also noted that the vividness of the reading

experience was associated with responses to a questionnaire

measuring proneness to auditory hallucinations. They noted

that this is not to imply that readers are hallucinating while imag-

ining characters’ voices, but simply that some people are more

disposed than others to immersing themselves in a fictional world.

Experiential crossing has also been noted by readers of non-

fiction books, though it’s most commonly reported when

reading fictional works in which the author has created vividly

detailed characters whose words and actions resonate with the

personal histories and experiences of the reader.

MAY/JUNE 2017 | | 41

NEUrOpSy Tim Hannan

A/Prof Tim Hannan is Head of the School of Psychology at Charles Sturt University, and the

Past President of the Australian Psychological Society.

“Visual imagery was

common for around

14% of participants,

with some describing

reading as a kind of

cinematic experience.”

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