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Author: Hwaseong Kongming

Sense of Substitution: The Social Brain and the Mirror Self

Please take out a piece of paper and a pen and draw a circle on the paper. Now, dot two dots at the top of the circle and draw a short line at the bottom. What do you see?

Well, a face?

If rational analysis is carried out, it is impossible for anyone's face to grow into a circle, two dots and a line. But when you see this picture, you can't help but think it's a face. Even when the line is an arc towards the smiling face, you will think that it is a happy smiling face, and when it is an arc down the slang, you will think that it is an unhappy face.

We are always searching for the same characteristics as ourselves in our surroundings.

People who don't think there are many yellow hairs around, but after dyeing their hair yellow, they find that they can see yellow hair everywhere. I bought a fashion with all my heart, but when I wore it out, I found that I could see people wearing the same clothes wherever I went shopping.

This is exactly the same characteristic that the social brain automatically collects.

The social brain cannot define the self itself, it can only locate itself within the social group. A parent's child, a teacher of a certain teacher, an employee of a certain company...... These relationships with others and the social roles they play are the way the social brain defines itself.

The social brain is made up of mirror neurons in the brain. As its name suggests, mirror neurons can find the same features as themselves from those around them, project their own characteristics onto those around them, and even experience the experiences and emotions of others.

When your friend tells you about his fingers, your fingers will tremble, as if they had been shaved as if they had been shaved as well. When you see a scary story, you will also feel terrifying, as if the female ghost in the story is under your bed, and the strange eyes are staring behind you.

After understanding the principle of mirror self, we can consider the problem of substitution in the novel.

Although it is not necessarily suitable for the environment of online novels, the sense of substitution in adventure novels and horror novels is often the strongest. This is precisely because the mirror self can experience the experiences and emotions of others, and this type of novel usually describes the scene, atmosphere, psychology and other aspects in place.

Appropriately adding detailed descriptions of scenes, movements, and psychology is one of the tricks to enhance the sense of substitution.

Some authors are afraid that the supporting characters will steal the limelight of the protagonist, and write the supporting characters and villains very rough and rudimentary. In fact, according to the way the social brain defines itself as mentioned above, the vivid supporting characters, and in the social system of the novel, giving the protagonist a clear social place and position are also powerful ways to enhance the sense of substitution.

I once saw a post that said that the reason why readers can substitute for your protagonist is because your character description is imperfect, and the missing parts can only be filled by the readers themselves.

In fact, a protagonist with a distinct personality can indeed attract readers with similar personalities, but it will also directly prevent readers with different personalities from having a sense of substitution.

Take a look at the popular novels and try to describe the character of their protagonists? You will find that in addition to the universal "pan-personality" such as perseverance and forbearance, it is difficult to find any distinctive character traits, but some popular supporting characters appear to be more "individual".

In fact, it is enough to make your protagonist have a "pan-personality". Readers can identify the same characteristics as themselves and then project their own other characteristics onto your protagonist, which is enough to form a sense of substitution.

Pleasure: Neural Chain and Reward Mechanism

All human actions are aimed at escaping punishment and being happy.

—Sigmund Freud

Many people will have this kind of experience: the company used to be in the east, and moved to the west. Before going out in the morning, I reminded myself that I was going west, and halfway through it I found that I was on the old road to the east again.

Some people may say that it is absent-mindedness that leads the wrong way. However, it should be possible to go in any direction in the southeast, north, and west, so why can't you help but go east in the first few days?

Our regular memories are stored in brain cells, and with the death of senescent cells and the birth of new cells every day, some memories are permanently lost.

But some memories are preserved for a long time. This is because, when we are impressed enough about something, the brain opens up separate neural chains to store these memories.

The neural chain is formed by packaging and storing information related to the memory. For people bitten by snakes, "elongated", "crooked", and "fearful" information is packaged and stored, and once the slender, crooked objects are seen, the memory of fear is retrieved. Therefore, there will be a saying that "once you are bitten by a snake, you will be afraid of the well rope for ten years".

The independent nerve chain that has been formed, unless it is not touched all the time, once it is touched, it is difficult to stop the inertial behavior.

For example, if a person is already addicted to cigarettes, it is difficult to stop the desire to smoke when they see cigarettes. Because as soon as I saw the cigarette, the pleasant memories were retrieved, and the nucleus accumbens began to accumulate desires. If you don't smoke all the time, the insula will kick in, the aversive system will kick in, and the body will start to feel sick.

Of all the neural chains, the "rewarding neural chain" and the "punishing neural chain", which have mastered the human instinct to seek pleasure and avoid pain, are the most powerful.

Addictions, such as smoking, alcohol, internet addiction, and drug addiction, are so difficult to get rid of because the pleasure of a strong rewarding neural chain is too strong. Children who have been subjected to domestic violence in childhood often follow the shadow for the rest of their lives, due to the punitive neural chain. (

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Online games have been the most successful in utilizing rewarding neural chains. Usually the first few levels of the game will be easier to climb, the rewards will be very large, and there will be various starter packs. The sense of accomplishment that comes from fighting monsters, leveling up, getting rewards, and fighting more advanced monsters will soon form an independent neural chain in the brains of teenagers who have little self-control, so that whenever they see the computer, pleasant memories will be retrieved, and the idea of opening the game will linger.

In fact, many people are like this when they first come into contact with online novels, reading novels like they are obsessed. Again, this is where the rewarded neural chain comes into play.

It can be said that being able to harness the rewarding nervous trait will bring you loyal readers.

For example, if a certain god who has been updated at 12 o'clock at noon for several days in a row has not updated it at noon one day, there will be a group of painful readers who keep posting questions and even chasing and scolding for updates. This so-called reading habit is because the expectation brought about by the stable neural chain cannot be satisfied, which can make people very unpleasant. In reality, the formation of the nerve chain only needs to last three to five times.

As for how your story engages readers and makes them follow along with your updates, that's where the rewarding plot of the story comes in. As long as the pacing is clear and the plot is reasonable, the triple bonus plot can keep your readers coming back for more.

Sense of anticipation: the desire for completion and the Chua effect

People have more impressions of things that have not been dealt with than of things that have already been dealt with.

- Zeignick

The former Soviet psychologist Zeignik once conducted a psychological experiment. She finds thirty-two people and asks them to do twenty-two tasks that take about a minute to complete, and then get paid.

Of those, sixteen were able to do all the work in one go, but the other sixteen were interrupted halfway through and asked to continue after five minutes. When you're done, ask the thirty-two people to recall what each of these twenty-two things was.

The results of the experiment showed that the average recall rate of the first 16 people was only more than 40 percent, while the average recall rate of the last 16 people was nearly 70 percent.

Through a series of follow-up tests, Zeignick came to the conclusion that people have an innate desire to accomplish things that have not been dealt with more than things that have already been dealt with.

People who are interrupted in the middle of the process will feel unhappy and look forward to the completion, so they are impressed; And those who have successfully completed it, the desire to complete has been satisfied, and they quickly forget.

This phenomenon came to be known as the Zeignick effect.

The Chua effect is also widely used, such as the white space effect in speeches and the advertising in TV dramas. We will feel that watching TV series online is not as cool as watching TV on TV, which is the influence of the Chua effect.

For example, in the CCTV program, although there are no advertisements in "Today's Statement", a case replay will be inserted every time there is progress in the case. As a result, the audience's desire to complete is hoisted, looking forward to the progress of the case, and the impression of the previous situation will be more profound.

And "Approaching Science" is even more extreme, sometimes it is the most heart-wrenching place, please see the next issue. So, here you go again for the next episode.

So, how to arouse the reader's desire to complete in the novel?

In the previous neural chain and reward mechanism, it is a complete process from the neural chain being touched to receiving the reward and satisfying the wish. If the neural chain is touched and the process of obtaining the reward is interrupted, then the desire to receive the reward will become the anticipation of the desire to complete ("" read the latest chapter).

It is precisely because of this that in many novels, there are plots in which the protagonist goes through hardships and is about to get a treasure, and suddenly someone comes to intervene. It is more pleasant to go through some twists and turns again to obtain the treasure in this way than to get it directly.

In terms of chapter division, the mediocre author, the previous chapter ends at the end of the event, and the latter chapter begins with a sudden change and a new plot begins. A good author will let the previous chapter end when the event is completed and the sudden change occurs, so that the reader can look forward to the detailed explanation of the new plot in the next chapter!