The Theory of Narrative Thought is a theory of thought designed to bridge the gap between the neurological functioning of the brain and the flow of everyday conscious experience. Proposed by Lee Roy Beach, the theory is expanded by Beach, Byron Bissell, and James Wise (2016).
Contents
Background
The theory of narrative thought (TNT) is a refinement of image theory which was developed as an alternative to rational choice theory. The essence of image theory is that decisions are shaped by long-term attempts to manage the future rather than short-term results. The image theory model of the decision process, called the compatibility test, held up in both laboratory and field tests (Beach, L. R., & Connolly, T. (2005). The Psychology of Decision Making: People in Organizations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage) and has been retained, but renamed, as the discrepancy test in TNT.
Image theory’s weakness was its failure to adequately specify the concept of image. Subsequent attempts to specify it led to its replacement by narrative, the specification of which was based upon the work of Walter R. Fisher (1987) in communications theory. Exploration of the specification’s implications led to TNT, in which narrative is supposed to be the natural mode of human thought in a story that defines what led up to this moment, what is happening now, and what can be expected to happen in the future. This, in turn, led to examination of the apparently “natural” urge to think narratively and its roots in known neurological processes that format neural events in a rudimentary narrative form. This, in turn, led to the view that narrative thinking is a product of evolution.
Narrative development
The theory of narrative thought (TNT) describes the brain as being composed of subsystems that act together to give rise to consciousness. Some of these subsystems, such as perception and memory, contribute content to consciousness. One subsystem in the left hemisphere codes the content in language while a corresponding subsystem in the right hemisphere links it with emotions. Working together as a single system, called the “interpreter,” they organize the content of consciousness. This order is the origin of narrative but at this point it is rudimentary, a proto-narrative. The proto-narrative is simple but up-to-date; it reflects what is happening at the moment. For infants, proto-narratives are pretty much the whole story, but as memories are formed, past proto-narratives become linked with present proto-narratives and, as caregivers lend a hand, more elaborate narratives take shape. As a store of elaborated narratives develops, proto-narratives continue to update them with current information from the perceptual system. This keeps the narratives aware of what is going on in the internal and external environments. Over time, two kinds of narratives develop.
Two kinds of narrative
Chronicle narratives are about what happened in the past, what is happening now, and what is expected to happen in the future. They are the ongoing story of one’s conscious experience. Procedural narratives are about how to do things. They are about the actions one can take to better inform one’s chronicle narratives. They also are about the actions one can take to shape the future by acting directly upon the internal or external environment to produce desired results. Procedural narratives are subordinate to chronicle narratives. When used alone, the word “narrative” refers to chronicle narratives. [Note that chronicle and procedural narratives are parallel to, but not identical to, Daniel Kahneman’s (2011) System 1 and System 2.]
Nature of narratives
Narratives are more than just updated memories about what has happened recently. They are the stuff of ongoing conscious experience, of moment-to-moment thinking, of the richness of mental life, and they are the foundations for informed guesses about the future. They are a mixture of memories and of visual, auditory, and other imagery as well as the accompanying emotions. Their elements are symbols that stand for real or imagined events and actors (including oneself), where the actors are animate beings or inanimate forces. The events and actors are linked by causality. Causality implies temporality and, for animate actors, purpose. That is, a narrative consists of a temporal arrangement of events that are purposefully caused by animate beings (including oneself) or are the result of inanimate forces. The narrative’s storyline is its meaning, which is created by a coherent arrangement of the events and actors.
Causality, plausibility, and coherence
Causality is the structural backbone of all narratives, both chronicle and procedural. This is because it is the source of narrative temporality. This temporal aspect of causality works retrospectively, from effect to cause, which allows one to account for what is happening now as a result of what has happened in the past. And it works prospectively, from cause to effect, which allows one to set expectations for what will happen in the future as a result of what is happening now and what came before. A good narrative is plausible if its actors’ actions contribute to the story line and are not uncharacteristic, i.e., are reasonably consistent across narratives. A good narrative is coherent if the actions of the actors and the effects of those actions conform to one’s causal rules. In short, a good narrative makes sense in that there are no loose ends.
Causal rules
Noncontingent rules are about what to expect to happen as a result of actions by other people or outside forces over which one has no control. Contingent rules are about what one expects to happen as a result of one’s own actions. These rules form the causal linkages among narratives’ elements and are the bases of expected and action projections respectively.
Causal rules tell one what caused something to happen or how to make something happen. Another kind of rule, normative rules, tell one why something should happen. Normative rules are about what qualifies as desirable and what does not. That is, normative rules are standards for what is ethical, right, proper, principled, reasonable, appropriate, preferred, and so on, all of which are one’s values and preferences.
Current narrative
The current narrative is the narrative one is focused upon at the moment. It is the narrative that makes sense of what has happened leading up to the present, what is happening right now, and what will happen next. The latter, results from extrapolating the past and present segments of current narrative to make educated guesses about the future. A guess about how the future might unfold if one does not make an effort to change it is called an expected projection and a guess about how the future might unfold as a result of one’s efforts to change it is called an action projection. Both projections are narratives. Both are extrapolations of the current narrative. Both are constructed using one’s store of causal rules. Both are subject to the scrutiny of normative rules. Both are imaginary.
Decision making
When the future is projected, based upon the current narrative, the emotions associated with the relevant normative rules provide the criteria for evaluating the desirability of that future. Each feature of the projected future elicits an emotion that reflects how well it meets the relevant standard(s) set by one’s normative rule(s). A positive emotion is elicited if it meets the standard(s) and a negative emotion is elicited if it doesn’t. The strength of the elicited emotion is a function of the degree to which the feature exceeds or falls short of the standard(s). When evaluating the desirability of the projected future, the focus is on the features that fall short of one’s standards—called violations. If the violations are too abundant, too large, or too important, the associated negative emotions mount to a point at which one must conclude that the projected future will be undesirable. When this happens, survival, or simply unacceptable discomfort, dictates that something must be done to change the future so that when it arrives it will be more desirable than if things are simply allowed to happen as they will. The action agenda for changing the future is called a plan and execution of that plan is called implementation. The anticipated result of implementing the plan is the action projection. An acceptable plan is one that offers a sufficiently desirable future, a future that is compatible with one’s values and preferences.
Plans
A plan is a narrative about how one intends to go from the present to a more desirable future—how one intends to influence the course of ongoing events in a desirable direction. Like other narratives, plans must be plausible and coherent. Plausibility means that all the relevant elements, including oneself, are included and that their proposed actions are reasonable. Coherence means that the sequence of tactics creates a feasible causal chain from the present to the desired future. Plausibility is revealed by the ease with which one can imagine oneself and other actors engaging in a successful implementation of the plan, even if it will require hard work. Plausibility also requires that this activity seems natural and lifelike, and that success doesn’t rely on unlikely events or unrealistic amounts effort and resources. Coherence is revealed by the completeness of the causal chain of tactics, even though one knows one probably won’t end up doing things exactly as planned. A plan that lacks plausibility and/or coherence inspires little confidence (which is an emotion associated with a normative standard), which prompts its revision or replacement by another plan.
Briefly stated: (1) There are two kinds of narratives: chronicle narratives, which are stories about ongoing events, including the expected future, and procedural narratives, which are stories about how to do things; (2) both kinds of narrative are structured by time and causality and both are “good narratives” if they are plausible and coherent; (3) the undesirability of the expected future is assessed by its failure to meet standards set by one’s values and preferences; (4) action is prompted when the projected future is determined to be so undesirable as to be unacceptable.
TNT as a theory of mind
Both Beach (2010) and Beach, Bissell, and Wise (2016) open with a historical description of the ebbing fortunes of “executive mind,” as a scientific concept but how, over the past 50 years, it has come back, albeit on firmer ground, as “the brain.” But while the “the brain” may be the new name for “mind,” the fact that the old name continues to be used in both scientific and everyday discourse suggests that the new name doesn’t quite do the job. That is, rather than merely reflecting sloppy usage, the word “mind” reflects something more than merely neural activity in the brain.
Other than the computer analogy and the information processing metaphor, cognitive science has produce no encompassing theory. But it seems to be widely assumed that when such a theory appears, it will necessarily be in terms of brain function to which conscious experience is subsidiary and derivative. TNT challenges this assumption by recognizing that brain functioning and conscious experience are two qualitatively different things. Although subjective experience derives from brain activity, it is not reducible to it. Therefore, the theory recognizes the importance of the brain and how it works, but it also recognizes the importance of conscious experience and how it works. Putting the two together as equally legitimate and complementary provides the “something more” than neural activity in the brain that is implied by the word “mind.”
Much has been written about the characteristics of mind, mostly by philosophers. The commonalities across those discussions reveals three primary characteristics that a theory of mind should address and that are, in fact, addressed by TNT: Thinking that is both reflective and reflexive—that is able to consider both itself and things other than itself. Knowing that allows distinctions between truth and falsity, error and ignorance, and belief and opinion. Purpose that results in actions aimed at foreseen objectives. In addition, TNT addresses the most common questions raised in these philosophical discussions: How does the mind operate? What are its “intrinsic excellences or defects?” How is it related to matter, to bodily organs, to material conditions, and to other minds? Is it possessed in common with animals? Does it exist separate from corporeality? Insofar as the theory adequately deals with these characteristics and answers these questions, it qualifies as a modern theory of mind.