Reading books can help you live longer—here's how
“When you get lost in a book, you often enter a trance-like state similar to meditation and that state is deeply protective.”
Every January, many of us resolve to finally read more. A new book appears on the nightstand, an audiobook gets downloaded, or we dust off an old library card. We keep finding our way back to it because reading feels like a wholesome promise of more calm, curiosity, and escape.
But research increasingly suggests that reading may be more powerful than we realize. In fact, doing so regularly has been linked to lower stress, stronger memory, protection against cognitive decline and dementia, and even a longer life.
“When you get lost in a book, you often enter a trance-like state similar to meditation and that state is deeply protective,” says Zoe Shaw, a Los Angeles–based psychotherapist who studies reading and longevity.
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So if your New Year’s resolution is to read more, you may be doing far more than enriching your bookshelf. You may be investing in the architecture of your brain, your emotional resilience, and your own longevity.
Here’s what to know about what happens to your brain when you become a regular reader.
The longevity effect: Why book readers live longer
The idea that reading could help you live longer sounds almost too good to be true, but scientists have given it real weight in a landmark study from Yale School of Public Health.
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The researchers followed 3,635 adults aged 50 and older over 12 years and examined how reading habits related to survival. They found that people who regularly read books lived an average of 23 months longer than those who didn’t read at all—even after controlling for factors like education, income, baseline health, depression, and cognitive ability. In other words, reading itself was associated with greater longevity, not just the advantages that often come with being a reader.
Elizabeth A. L. Stine-Morrow, a research professor of educational psychology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, who was not involved in the Yale study, praises the research and cites it “every chance I get.”
The mechanism she points to from the study that best explains why reading helps you live longer are its social-emotional effects—a factor echoed by Raymond Mar, a professor of psychology from York University in Canada and the co-author of many studies on the health benefits of reading.
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“Social connection is incredibly important for healthy aging,” he says. “And reading fiction can provide us with a proxy for social experience." He explains that, when we read, "we mentally practice relationships, emotions, and perspective-taking—even when we are physically alone.”
Loneliness is now considered a serious risk factor for early mortality, even comparable to smoking or obesity. Books help counter loneliness by offering companionship without pressure and intimacy without vulnerability—and readers who participate in book clubs receive an even more literal social benefit.
Another reason reading improves longevity is that it appears to be a very real form of stress reduction. “When people read, they often enter a focused yet contemplative mental state,” explains Mar. For some, it even becomes a form of meditation, he says, "and like other forms of meditation, the calm that reading brings may help mitigate stress and promote longevity.”
This makes sense because stress is one of the most powerful accelerators of aging, with studies showing that it increases inflammation, disrupts sleep, weakens immune function, and strains the cardiovascular system—even at a molecular level.
In short, "reading gently pulls the nervous system into regulation,” Shaw says, “engaging the brain while allowing the body to rest.”
Reading as a shield against cognitive decline
But living longer is only part of the story as most people would also like to keep their brains healthy as they age. This is where reading’s influence may be even more powerful.
For instance, a landmark 14-year study published in 2020 found that adults who regularly engaged in mentally stimulating activities such as reading experienced significantly slower rates of cognitive decline than those who did not.
Another major study, published the same year, showed that lifelong reading and writing were associated with slower memory decline—even among people whose brains showed signs of Alzheimer’s disease.
In these studies, the experts say it’s important to note that reading does not appear to stop the biological processes of dementia—but it does help the brain function better despite them.
One reason for this is that “reading activates multiple brain networks at once—language, attention, memory, and imagination—which strengthens cognitive reserve over time,” says Shaw. Cognitive reserve is the brain’s capacity to compensate for age-related damage or change, which helps it to remain flexible and resilient as we age.
"We are all familiar with the idea of ‘use it or lose it,’” Mar adds, "and reading exercises our mental muscles as it has us imagine new experiences and identities, transports us to fascinating new worlds that stimulate our curiosity, and keeps a lot of information in mind."
How reading strengthens memory, attention, and emotional intelligence
Reading can also actively sharpen the mind in a few other ways. In 2022, Stine-Morrow led a study in which older adults were randomly assigned either to read novels or complete verbal puzzles for eight weeks; and the reading group showed greater improvements in both working memory and long-term memory.
“Working memory is the attentional capacity needed for memory,” she explains. “It’s what allows you to hold information in mind while processing something new, which reading constantly requires.”
Neuroscience studies have also shown that reading a novel increases connectivity in brain regions associated with language and sensory processing—and these changes can persist even days after finishing a book.
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In similar fashion, reading has been associated with improvements in processing speed and attention span. "Readers learn to use ever more time to allocate their attention to understanding what they are reading," says Maryanne Wolf, director of UCLA’s Center for Dyslexia, Diverse Learners, and Social Justice. "And this requires the development, elaboration, and maintenance of highly sophisticated and more time-consuming cognitive, linguistic, and affective processes."
Emotionally, reading is equally powerful, as Mar’s team demonstrated in a study linking fiction reading to better performance on an empathy-based emotion recognition test.
“Our research has focused on the potential for fiction to foster empathy,” Mar says. "Stories place us in the shoes of people with different identities and experiences. To understand them, we draw on our own emotional memories—and that practice strengthens our ability to understand others in the real world.”
Nick Buttrick, an assistant professor of social psychology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, further explains these effects. “People who read more tend to see the social world through a more complex lens," he explains, which helps with "understanding the everyday world in a richer, less stereotyped sort of way."
Audiobooks and the brain’s love of words
If you’re wondering whether audiobooks also “count” towards these benefits, neuroscience offers reassurance. For instance, a study in The Journal of Neuroscience found that the brain processes stories almost identically whether they are read or heard. “While listening to an audiobook, we are still building mental models of characters and story worlds,” Mar says. “So many of the same processes are engaged.”
Buttrick agrees, noting that "it’s not about moving your eyes across a page—it’s about grappling with difference, challenge, and newness.”
Audiobooks may even offer unique advantages. “They allow people to pair stories with movement, such as walking or exercising,” Shaw says. “And that combination can provide additional health benefits while also amplifying retention.”
In short, regardless of the medium, "reading is a whole-brain activity,” Stine-Morrow says. “It engages memory, attention, meaning, emotion, and imagination at once.”
How to start reading more
To reap these benefits of reading, you do need to make it a habit—but you don’t need to make any dramatic changes. Ten to 30 minutes a day is enough to create meaningful benefits over time, so “the best tip is simply to do it,” Buttrick says.
Mar agrees and advises setting aside specific time to make sure you get to do it: "Schedule it like anything else you value."
It's also important to make sure the habit will be fun for you. “Choose books that genuinely interest you rather than what you think you should read," suggests Shaw.
Because in the end, reading pays dividends far beyond entertainment—no matter when you get started. "It is never too late," Mar says, "to discover—or re-discover—the joys and long-lasting benefits of reading."
