Week 4: ‘Treat ’em mean, keep ’em keen’: engagement with villains

Introduction

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A dictionary entry for ‘Jekyll and Hyde’.

So far in the course you have learned about relationships with fictional characters and started to get a sense that psychologists believe that such relationships can have significant impacts on the reader. This impact can be to our levels of loneliness and sense of belonging; but also in our behaviours and attitudes towards others. This week you will build on this knowledge and consider some views of both authors and academics about the implications for the self of reading about, or hanging out with, characters who are unlikely to be considered role models: in other words, villains. In real life people are generally repulsed by the idea that they might be similar to people who act immorally, or are negatively viewed (Wan and Wyer, 2019). Yet, as you will learn this week, the same is not always true if the character is fictional.

By the end of this week, you should be able to:

• understand a little about the views of both authors and academics about the risks and rewards of our relationships with fictional villains
• understand what is meant by self-expansion, and how this might relate to fictional characters
• consider how hanging out with fictional villains might have a relationship with your sense of self
• consider that greater empathy with fictional baddies might be a positive thing.