Listening to audiobooks has a greater emotional impact than watching films

Listening to audiobooks of blockbusters or best-sellers has a greater emotional impact than watching films or reading the written word, a study has found.

Scenes from eight top films and books were tested on subjects, including A Game of Thrones, The Girl on the Train, Pride and Prejudice and The Silence of the Lambs.

Participants listening to a recording from an audiobook were found to be more physically and emotionally engaged than those who viewed the same scene in a visual format.

Working in collaboration with Audible, University College London researchers found listeners had a higher heart rate and body temperature, which suggests a more intense emotional response to the material.

Great Expectations, The Da Vinci Code, The Hound of the Baskervilles and Alien were also used in the experiment.

Dr Joseph Devlin, head of experimental psychology at UCL and lead researcher on the project, says: “Listening to a story on Audible produced greater emotional and physiological engagement than watching the scene on a screen, as measured by both heart rate and electro-dermal activity.”

“Though, when surveyed, participants assumed they were less engaged, the biometric sensors indicate otherwise. Having concluded the first phase of our multi-stage study, it seems as though the heart really does tell the story.”

Researchers tracked conscious responses to the audio and video clips through a variety of surveys, while measuring heart rate and electrodermal activity with Empatica E4 biometric sensors.

Participants’ average heart rate was higher when they were listening to audiobooks by about two beats a minute.

They also had a higher peak heart rate during the story by four beats per minute, and were roughly two degrees Celsius warmer than when viewing the same scene on a screen.

The statistical evidence was very strong (over 99 per cent certainty) that audiobooks produced a stronger emotional and physiological response than visual storytelling mediums.

This finding is consistent across different stories, and different participant ages and demographics.

UCL’s research team cross-referenced accelerometer data with participants’ heart-rate data to rule out increased movement or fidgeting as a possible explanation for higher heart rates whilst listening to audiobooks.

SWNS