Psychology of Narrative Art

Artistic narrative has been recognized in fictional genres such as poetry, plays, novels, short stories, and films. It occurs also in nonfictional genres such as essays and biographies. We review evidence on the empirical exploration of effects of narrative, principally fiction, on how it enables people to become more empathetic, on how foregrounded phrases encourage readers to recognize the significance of events as if for the first time in ways that tend to elicit emotion, and on how literary works can help people to change their own personalities. We then suggest 3 principles that characterize narrative art in psychological terms: a focus on emotion and empathy, a focus on character, and a basis of indirect communication.