Story-Modeling™

A new storytelling method — using narrative theory, modeling + simulation, neuroscience and communications — to produce useful stories that generate knowledge about the real world.

Effective stories are models — communicated through literature.

This communications era uses stories differently — we are inundated with “real stories” on social media, streaming platforms and podcasts, blurring the line between life and content.

The flood of story “content” has revealed the distinctions between two story types.

We’re all familiar with the stories that prompt an emotional response — tugging on your heartstrings or making your heart surge with exhilaration. They’re entertaining, so we keep going back to watch them again. We like the feeling — the escape from our lived emotion and the temporary experience of someone else’s. Marketers and advertisers love these stories because they create an association between the emotion and the product they want us to buy. These are “stories”.

Then there’s another kind of story — that feels more like learning than empathy. They’re also entertaining, but less emotional — we stay watching through the end because we want to know what happened not because we want to stay on the ride. We don’t watch them as often, because we remember them more easily. We like them because we learned something — but we weren’t taught. These stories are models: “Story-Models”.

The difference between stories and Story-Models™ is in how they affect the audience:

  • stories prompt embodied simulation: the audience feels the experiences of the character as though it’s happening to them

  • Story-Models™ prompt simulation learning: the audience imagines possible outcomes of the story,

What is the theory of Story-Modeling™?

Storytelling — or the study of storytelling — originates from literature — but what if a story is just the representation of an underlying object — not the object itself?

Story-Modeling™ considers some stories to be conceptual or agent-based models represented with natural language, simulated by forcing agent data or an end-state outcome. Story-Models™ are based on theories of mental models, and Story-Modeling™ is based on the discipline of Modeling & Simulation.

This approach to storytelling answers questions from communications practice about stories that are effectively communicated (communication + language expertise) — and may even generate narrative affect (embodied simulation) — but do not generate narrative effect (change experienced by the audience).

FAQ

  • If you need to tell stories that build trust, generate alignment and enable predictions — you need Story-Modeling™. You’re most likely a CEO or founder of a startup, but you could also work at a nonprofit.

    If you have a story that is working for you — don’t change a thing. But if you’re getting reactions that aren’t what you expected — or you feel like your story doesn’t “work” — this might be right for you.

  • No.

    Persuasion sits within a binary framework: there’s a “right” and “wrong” point of view, and the persuader’s effort is to shift the audience’s point of view to the “right” one. 

    Story-Modeling™ sits within a plurality framework: there are multiple points of view that are coherent or incoherent — and useful or not.

    Persuasion is successful when the audience’s opinion is aligned with the persuader’s; Story-Modeling™ is successful when your audience is able to generates useful knowledge from your story.

  • Story-Modeling™ uses knowledge from narrative theory, modeling & simulation, and neuroscience to enable simulation learning.

    The science is not new, but combining knowledge from these disciplines into a storytelling method is new.

  • There are 4 stages:

    • Close reading

    • Narrative critique

    • Revision

    • Verification + Validation

    Depending on your schedule, it will take a few weeks.