Narrative Transportation and Cognitive Responses: The Other Side of the Story

Narrative transportation is the sensation of being physically relocated (“transported”) into a story (Green and Brock 2000). Narrative transportation is posited to robustly and positively affect persuasion (Escalas, Moore, and Britton 2004; Hamby, Brinberg, and Daniloski 2017; Moyer-Gusé 2008). A key explanation for the effectiveness of narrative persuasion is that narrative transportation reduces counterarguing (Escalas 2007; Green and Brock 2000; van Laer et al. 2014)where people become absorbed in a story\u2014in this case, in their storylike thoughts (Green and Brock 2000. Because narratives engross the consumer in the story, the transported consumer engages in less counterarguing of the advertised product, which increases persuasion. The implication for marketers is clear: “stories are orders of magnitude more powerful than sets of facts, no matter how those facts are packaged,” (Aaker 2018, 6). The current work explores two critical questions on this topic. First, do stories always beat facts? Second, can story-based advertisements be improved by incorporating compelling facts, or will facts detract from story enjoyment?