The Appeal of Insight: Why Riddles and Whodunits Captivate Us

Insight, or the ‘Aha’ experience, is pivotal in the appreciation and engagement with various cultural products. This article explores how the feeling of insight contributes to the success of riddles and whodunits, two popular products with a strong cross-cultural appeal. We report a series of five experiments manipulating the probability of experiencing an insight when solving, or being provided with the solution of a riddle or a short whodunit story. Participants are more likely to declare wanting to consume and to share material that generates more insight. We also observe that many participants choose to consume a new riddle or a new whodunit instead of immediately finishing the experiment, but that only High Insight riddles, and not whodunits, were significantly preferred. These results suggest that feelings of insight play an important role in shaping some popular cultural products.