Why We Read and How Reading Transforms Us: The Psychology of Engagement With Text

Abstract

Reading is a microcosm of human life. The motives that steer our life in general influence whether we read and what we read. Much of the satisfaction we gain from reading mirrors the satisfaction we can gain from other life activities. As other life experiences do, reading has the potential to transform us in transitory as well as lasting ways, and to make more likely desirable as well as undesirable behaviours.However, reading also has unique properties. We may have biological predispositions that encourage us to engage with the abstract symbolic world presented in text. Such biological predispositions make it possible for us to decode text and engage with the symbolic world represented in text. Even though many of the needs that underlie motivation to read are needs that can be satisfied in a variety of ways, when these needs motivate a reader to engage with a text and this engagement helps satisfy the need, the interaction between text and needs creates a distinctive inner experience for the reader.Engagement with text can transform the reader. Some of the changes induced by reading are short-term and grounded in the changed consciousness that comes with engagement with text. Other changes are lasting, resulting in permanent alterations ranging from future ability to decode text to increased knowledge to changes in the reader's sense of self.