Too exciting! I was reading my Sunday paper yesterday morning and came across an article about some research being done at University of Toronto. It is being led by Dr. Keith Oatley, a psychologist at the U of Toronto – one of the schools that accepted me into their MA program, but not, of course, the one I accepted.
That’s is not the exciting part – that’s rather a drag - I have no doubt that Trent is the right place for me … but had I run across Dr. Oatley’s work sooner…
Anyway …. the article in the paper was about reading fiction & social intelligence; i.e. that “reading fiction appears to stimulate parts of the brain that govern empathy” so, as the headline says Read Fiction, Be Smarter. Since then, I’ve been through a whole bunch of online journals and found a whole lot of Oatley’s articles…I can’t wait to read them all more thoroughly – but certainly what I’ve skimmed so far is fascinating stuff that relates closely with my research interests.
I am going to get kid to print out the articles for me today while I’m at the college (teaching) … easier to read them on paper than on screen … Hopefully find a clear topic to explore further for MY psychology paper (want to get it done this week) …and also, once I’ve read it all, will email him… hopefully make a connection there. Part of what I need to do in gearing up to apply for PhD programs is to further gel my directions – and to make connections with people with similar interests… can’t hurt to try, right?
