Flores, Andrew; Boden, Dan; Haider-Markel, Donald; Lewis, Daniel; Miller, Patrick; Taylor, Jami K
description
This paper uses the Narrative Policy Framework to explore the effects of a policy a narrative on attitudes about transgender rights. This framework focuses on the stories that are told about public policy. As opposed to conceptualizing communications as informational, the framework suggests that getting lost in the story is primary for attitude change. We also incorporate a perspective taking exercise to examine the effects of perspective taking on individual attitudes. Using an experimental approach on a large sample of American adults, we found that individuals who received the transgender inclusive policy narrative by either watching or reading the narrative held more transgender inclusive views. In addition, those who experienced greater narrative transportation, being more lost in the story, reported more supportive attitudes, and transportation partially mediated the effect of narratives on policy attitudes and beliefs. We further find that those with traits that lead them to become more imaginatively involved in stories are more greatly affected by watching policy narratives than those who are less imaginatively involved. The effect was greater for those who viewed the narrative as opposed to reading the narrative. However, perspective taking did not influence respondent views. Further, exposure to the transgender inclusive narrative did not enhance the effects of perspective taking, and the exercise weakened the treatment effects of the narratives. Our findings suggest stories can affect policy attitudes and beliefs, which may be conceptually distinct from traditional framing-based accounts and implies distinctive causal mechanisms that result in attitude change.
