LRQ Items and Their Primary Factor Loadings
Insight
Reading literature makes me sensitive to aspects of my life that I usually ignore (786, personal).
In literature I sometimes recognize feelings that I have overlooked during my daily life (.775, personal).
I often find my shortcomings explored through characters in literary texts (.734, personal).
I find that literature helps me to understand the lives of people that differ from myself (.732, non-personal).
Reading literature often gives me insights into the nature of people and events in my world (.728, non-personal).
I often see similarities between events in literature and events in my own life (.723, personal).
I often find my own motives being explored through characters in literary texts (.715, personal).
I find that certain literary works help me to understand my more negative feelings (.711, personal).
Literature enables you to understand people that you'd probably disregard in normal life (.700, non-personal).
I sometimes find that reading a literary text makes me feel like changing the way I live (.625, personal).
In my reading, I learn to recognize more readily certain types of people or events, i.e., I can see these types more clearly after reading about a particular example in a literary text (.619, non-personal).
When I begin to understand a literary text, it's because I've been able to relate it to my own concerns about life (.602, personal).
Literature often gives special emphasis to those things that make a moral point (.513, non-personal).
Sometimes while reading literature my feelings draw me toward a distinctly unsettling view of life (.512, personal).
Empathy
Sometimes I feel like I've almost "become" a character I've read about in fiction (.856).
I sometimes have imaginary dialogues with people in fiction (786).
When I read fiction I often think about myself as one of the people in the story (.737).
I sometimes wonder whether I have really experienced something or whether I have read about it in a book (677).
1 actively try to project myself into the role of fictional characters, almost as if I were preparing to act in a play (.652).
Sometimes characters in novels almost become like real people in my life (.647).
After reading a novel or story that I enjoyed, I continue to wonder about the characters almost as though they were real people (.509).
Imagery Vividness
I often see the places in stories I read as clearly as if I were looking at a picture (.800).
I can readily visualize the persons and places described in a novel or short story (.723).
I sometimes think I could draw a map of the places I have read about in a work of fiction (.660).
Sometimes a scene from a story or poem is so clear that I know its smell, its touch, its "feel" (.638).
I often hear dialogue in a novel as though I were listening to an actual conversation (560).
When I read a literary text, a scene that is only partly described often becomes a whole, vividly present place in my mind (.545).
When reading a story, sometimes I can almost feel what it would be like to be there (.515).
I usually hear the tone of speech in a dialogue from a story or novel (498).
Often when I read literary texts, descriptions of smells suggest colors, descriptions of colors suggest feelings, and so on (.468).
Leisure Escape
Sometimes I like to curl up with a good book just to enjoy myself (840). When I have spare time my favorite activity is reading a novel (.817).
Very often I cannot put down a story until I have finished reading it (.796).
Reading literature is a pleasurable way to spend time when I have nothing else to do (.774).
Reading a story is a wonderful way to relax. (.763).
While reading I completely forget what time it is (.740).
I find that reading literature is a great help in taking my mind off my own problems (666).
I like to become so absorbed in the world of the literary text that I forget my everyday concerns (.608).
Once I've discovered one work by an author I like, I usually try to read all the other works by that author (.579).
I am often so involved in what I am reading that I am no longer aware of myself (.578).
I often wish I had more time for reading literature (.509).
Concern With Author
One of my primary interests in reading literature is to learn about the themes and concerns of a given author (.755).
In reading I like to focus on what is distinctive about the author's style (.742).
One of my primary interests in reading is to learn about the different genres of literature (.727).
I like to see how a particular author's work relates to other literature of the author's period (.726).
When reading I usually try to identify an author's distinctive themes (.701).
One of my primary interests in reading literature is to appreciate the author's understanding of society and culture (.686).
I think literature is especially interesting when it illuminates facts about the author's life (.610).
When I find a work of literature I like, I usually try to find out something about the author (.608).
The challenge of literature is to comprehend the author's unique view of life (.605).
I am often intrigued by an author's literary technique (.508).
Story-Driven Reading
I like to see tension building up in the plot of a story (659).
The type of literature I like best tells an interesting story (.635).
I think the most important part of fiction or drama is plot (.619).
When reading a novel, what I most want to know is how the story turns out (.609).
I like it best when a story has an unexpected ending (.600).
I prefer to read fiction in which there is plenty of action (.599).
When reading a novel my main interest is seeing what happens to the characters (.576).
1 find it difficult to read a novel in which nothing much seems to happen (.540).
Rejection of Literary Values
I think people should spend less time talking or writing about literature (.755).
Even if literature were well taught, I think high schools should not devote so much time to it (.738).
For me a work of literature is destroyed by trying to analyze it (.711).
One of the things I dislike most about being a student of literature is the teacher who tells you what a literary text means (.703).
Reading literary texts from past centuries should be left to literary scholars and historians (.623).
1 don't believe that literature is socially relevant (.616).
1 disliked English in high school because most of the texts I was asked to read I would not have chosen myself (.579).
Works of literature often seem to make the issues of life more complicated than they actually are (.491).
If I want to spend time reading, I don't choose "literary" texts (.392).