抄録
Kingston (2012) describes Japanese as "prone to fear of interpersonal relations" and "the newly emerging characterizations of youth as having difficulty in face-to-face communication with others." Kumar (2008) also reports that many university students in Japan are having "interpersonal-related" stress. How can we help our students cope with stress? Would they empathize with fictional characters who have similar problems and are struggling to survive? This paper reports on an elective class for 3rd-year English majors, in which students read The Perks of Being a Wallflower (1999) and watched a film adaptation thereof. The story includes touchy themes such as suicide, sex, homosexuality, drugs, alcohol, profanity, and mental illness. Unfortunately, the class had to rush through chapters to finish the book and the film, and it might have been quite challenging especially for the students with low English proficiency. The students' reactions about the class content, however, was relatively favorable, and various scenes and lines touched a chord in their hearts.
https://ror.org/0418a3v02 
