What you read affects your social skills.

Anton Chekhov can't read you.

All those times you were cooped up in the house reading Anton Chekhov actually helped in developing your social skills.

According to a study published in the journal Science (which probably should be ignored), people who read literary fiction (as opposed to popular fiction and serious nonfiction) performed better on tests that measured emotional intelligence, empathy, and social perception--all key when it comes to reading an individual's body language and understanding their unspoken feelings, as in body language.

So why does reading the likes of Louise Erdrich and Anton Chekhov (both of whom were used in the study, among others) help develop empathy in a reader? Where does Danielle Steele come up short? Researchers say literary fiction largely leaves a lot to the imagination, so the reader must make an inference to understand how a character feels. When Danielle Steele describes characters ripping each others clothes off, you already get the gist they're feeling--uhh--sexy, so you don't need an emotional Rosetta Stone to figure that one out.

The New York Times contacted Louise Erdrich via email to ask for her thoughts on the study, and she was thrilled with the results. "Writers are often lonely obsessives," she said, "especially the literary ones. It’s nice to be told what we write is of social value."

Now go read some Dostoevsky and then re-read Erdrich's comment with empathy. (Psst: She's taking this whole writing thing kind of hard.)

Study: 12% of American college students think Mount Everest is in the Appalachians.

Humphrey Bogart lets his co-star learn of the bad news.

That's just one fact that Kent State professors John Dunlosky and Katherine Rawson found out when they compared the general knowledge of 671 current college students with that of their peers from a similar study done in 1980, according to Discover.

Back then, researchers used 300 questions to establish general knowledge norms. Dunlosky and Rawson looked for comparisons with questions that, theoretically, should be easily transferable to today's students. (Think: geographical, historical, science, math, and the arts. Don't think: 1980's pop culture.)

Yeah...no.

Some of the findings? Fewer than 5% of American college students know...

• that Marie Curie discovered radium
• that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote the Sherlock Holmes stories
• that Aldous Huxley wrote Brave New World
• that Thomas Jefferson lived at Monticello
• that Alfred Nobel invented dynamite
• that Ian Fleming wrote the James Bond stories
• that Mozart wrote Don Giovanni
• that Budapest is the capital of Hungary
• that Hippocrates was the famous Greek doctor
• that Euclid was the "father of geometry"
• that General Custer lost the Battle of Little Bighorn

If that isn't depressing enough, not a single student out of the 671 knew the answer to any of these questions (answers below):

1.)  What is the highest mountain in South America?
2.)  What was the name of the largest Confederate military prison during the Civil War?
3.)  What is the last name of the author of The Brothers Karamazov?
4.)  What is the last name of the first person to run a mile in under four minutes?
5.)  What is the name of the mountain range that separates Europe from Asia?
6.)  What was the last name of the U-2 spy plane pilot who was shot down over Russia in 1960?
7.)  What is the last name of the person who allegedly said, "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country"?
8.)  What was the last name of the captain of the British ship Bounty when the mutiny occurred?
9.)  What is the last name of the Cuban leader Fidel Castro overthrew?
10.)  What is the last name of the man most responsible for photographing the U.S. Civil War?
11.)  What is the last name of the actor who portrayed the sheriff in the movie High Noon?
12.)  What is the last name of the author of Our Town?
13.)  What was the last name of the female star of the movie Casablanca?
14.)  What was the name of the Union ironclad ship that fought the Confederate ironclad Merrimack?

Continuing with the hilarity, only 44% know Paul Revere alerted people that "the British are coming," 56% know Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system, and 66% know the Mayflower was the name of the Pilgrims' ship. Meanwhile, 7% gave the wrong answer when asked to identify "a horse-like animal with black and white stripes." (Psst--that'd be a zebra.)

And, lastly, 11% of college students believe the word "dynamite" was named after its creator, Mr. Dynamite.

No, that's not Jimmie Walker either.


Answers:
1.) Aconcagua
2.) Andersonville
3.) Dostoevsky
4.) Bannister
5.) Ural
6.) Powers
7.) Hale
8.) Bligh
9.) Batista
10.) Brady
11.) Cooper
12.) Wilder
13.) Bergman
14.) Monitor

If you don't know the answer to 11 and 13, I need a moment away from you.