Inference or enaction? : the impact of genre on the narrative processing of other minds

Carney, James and Wlodarski, Rafael and Dunbar, Robin (2014) Inference or enaction? : the impact of genre on the narrative processing of other minds. PLoS ONE, 9 (12): e114172. ISSN 1932-6203

[thumbnail of journal.pone.0114172]
Preview
PDF (journal.pone.0114172)
journal.pone.0114172.PDF - Published Version
Available under License Creative Commons Attribution.

Download (287kB)

Abstract

Do narratives shape how humans process other minds or do they presuppose an existing theory of mind? This study experimentally investigated this problem by assessing subject responses to systematic alterations in the genre, levels of intentionality, and linguistic complexity of narratives. It showed that the interaction of genre and intentionality level are crucial in determining how narratives are cognitively processed. Specifically, genres that deployed evolutionarily familiar scenarios (relationship stories) were rated as being higher in quality when levels of intentionality were increased; conversely, stories that lacked evolutionary familiarity (espionage stories) were rated as being lower in quality with increases in intentionality level. Overall, the study showed that narrative is not solely either the origin or the product of our intuitions about other minds; instead, different genres will have different-even opposite-effects on how we understand the mind states of others.

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
PLoS ONE
Additional Information:
© 2014 Carney et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Uncontrolled Keywords:
/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/1100/1100
Subjects:
?? general agricultural and biological sciencesgeneral biochemistry,genetics and molecular biologygeneral medicineagricultural and biological sciences(all)biochemistry, genetics and molecular biology(all)medicine(all) ??
ID Code:
79516
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
16 May 2016 11:02
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
09 Aug 2024 00:04