Self-report measure

Fantasy

Fantasy uses 7 International Personality Item Pool statements to assess Fantasy.

You learn how readily you step into the lives of fictional characters.

For anyone who loves to imagine themselves inside stories and characters.

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Report and PDF $4, paid after you finish.

Your answers stay private.

It comes from empathy research on identifying with fictional people and worlds.

Sample result, example data. Illustrative chart with invented scores; it does not describe any real respondent.

What this test is

Welcome. Fantasy uses 7 International Personality Item Pool statements to assess Fantasy.

The measure

The Fantasy was developed by Davis (1983). It has 7 items, each answered on a 5-point (Does Not Describe Me Well … Describes Me Very Well) scale.

Davis, M. H. (1983). Measuring individual differences in empathy: Evidence for a multidimensional approach. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 44(1), 113–126. Items hosted at ipip.ori.org.

At a glance

Items

Response scale

5-point (Does Not Describe Me Well … Describes Me Very Well)

Est. time

~1 min

Access

Free to take · Full report and PDF for $4, or $2 to repeat

What it measures

Seven statements describe imaginative involvement in fiction: daydreaming about things that might happen, becoming deeply involved with the characters in a novel, imagining how one would feel if events in a story were happening to oneself, and getting caught up in a good film. The scale concerns the capacity to transpose oneself into the feelings of fictional people.

Davis (1983) included fantasy as one of four components of empathy, alongside perspective-taking, empathic concern and personal distress. It reflects the imaginative side of empathy, the readiness to take on the perspective of someone who exists only in a story. The statements here come from the public-domain International Personality Item Pool (IPIP) and parallel Davis's scale.

The ratings are combined into a single score. Higher scores describe stronger imaginative involvement in fiction and daydreams; lower scores describe a more detached, observational relationship to stories. The trait is related to absorption and to openness to experience.

The scale is used in research on empathy, imagination and reading. On this site, the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI) Battery measures all four components of empathy, the Absorption scale describes immersive experience more broadly, and the Empathic Concern scale describes compassion for real people.

Example item

“I daydream and fantasize, with some regularity, about things that might happen to me.”

Does Not Describe Me WellSlightly Describes MeSomewhat Describes MeMostly Describes MeDescribes Me Very Well

Illustrative only. During administration items are presented one screen-set at a time; response-key direction is never shown to respondents.

Scoring & interpretation

Your report explains each of your scale scores in plain language.

References

Davis, M. H. (1983). Measuring individual differences in empathy: Evidence for a multidimensional approach. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 44(1), 113–126.
International Personality Item Pool. A Scientific Collaboratory for the Development of Advanced Measures of Personality Traits and Other Individual Differences. https://ipip.ori.org/

Sample report preview

The report shows your total score and where it falls across the range of possible scores, followed by a plain-language explanation of what scores in that region describe. Where the instrument has published interpretive bands, the report names the band and what it means. It closes with notes on how to read the result and on when a conversation with a qualified professional may be useful.

Report contents
Section	What it shows
Score	Your scale score, computed with the published scoring key.
Comparisons	How your scores compare with a published comparison group.

It is free to take, and the full report with a downloadable copy is $4.

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