The promises and pitfalls of personalization in narratives to promote social change

ABSTRACT

This study tests the effects of personalized and depersonalized narratives on cognitive responses, narrative engagement, and support for obesity prevention policies. We first explicate three dimensions of personalization: (1) identifiability, (2) individualization, and (3) inner states description. We then report on a randomized experiment (N = 368) showing that depersonalized narratives were more effective than personalized stories and a no-exposure control group in promoting targeted social policies. Revealing a character’s inner states was most detrimental to the audience’s narrative engagement, reducing levels of transportation, identification, and empathy. Empathy, in turn, fully mediated the impact of inner states description on policy support. Results indicate that personalized narratives have the potential to weaken public support for health policies aimed at changing social factors.

KEYWORDS:

• Health communication
• (de)personalization
• narrative persuasion
• policy support
• obesity