Listening to Narratives: An Experimental Examination of Storytelling in the Classroom

Abstract

In an age of PowerPoint, much everyday public communication is semantically organized as an expository presentation. This contrasts with traditional approaches such as storytelling that are episodically organized and presented as narratives. The constructivist theory of narrative comprehension, along with other theoretical perspectives, suggests that a narrative form should present advantages related to listening retention. Further, it is argued that organization could interact with communication load in determining the likelihood of recalling information. In a controlled experiment, participants listened to videotaped instruction presented in either narrative or expository form and presented at either a normal or a moderately compressed rate. Results indicate a relationship between organization and retention such that audience members retain more information when it is presented in a narrative style and when it is presented at a normal presentation rate. Practically, the results suggest advantages for narrative form in the everyday practice of instructional communication. Theoretically, the results demonstrate that constructivist theory of narrative comprehension is relevant to contexts beyond written texts—to listening contexts.