Narrative Empathy: A cognitive semiotic study of audience engagement with a story across different media
(2026) SPVR01 20261Master's Programme: Language and Linguistics
Cognitive Semiotics
- Abstract
- This thesis investigates the empathic relation between the audience, as the experiencing subject, and narrative characters of a fictional story, by introducing the concept of narrative empathy. A part from elaborating this concept, the thesis seeks to empirically investigate how two different media, film and novel, modulate this relationship and which narrative categories (perspective, direct speech, embodiment/imagery) affect the audience’s (spectator/reader’s)
narrative empathy with the characters.
To address these questions, a study with 20 native Italian speakers, divided into two groups, was conducted. Each group received the novel text (monosemiotic condition) or the film text (polysemiotic condition), the latter an adaptation of... (More) - This thesis investigates the empathic relation between the audience, as the experiencing subject, and narrative characters of a fictional story, by introducing the concept of narrative empathy. A part from elaborating this concept, the thesis seeks to empirically investigate how two different media, film and novel, modulate this relationship and which narrative categories (perspective, direct speech, embodiment/imagery) affect the audience’s (spectator/reader’s)
narrative empathy with the characters.
To address these questions, a study with 20 native Italian speakers, divided into two groups, was conducted. Each group received the novel text (monosemiotic condition) or the film text (polysemiotic condition), the latter an adaptation of the same story, presented in the novel L’amica geniale by Elena Ferrante (2011). Participants were asked to retell the story in their own words and to complete a questionnaire that assessed the comprehension of the text and a first evaluative judgment of the protagonists of the story. These two tasks were followed by a phenomenologically informed interview, during which they were asked to talk about their perceptions and experiences. In order to operationalise the narrative categories, five linguistic markers of narrative empathy (perspective taking, direct speech, emotional and sensory expressions and mental imagery) were identified in the transcripts and coded accordingly.
The questionnaire suggested stronger narrative empathy with the main protagonist in the film condition, as expected. However, the analysis conducted on the linguistic markers revealed that the monosemiotic text condition yield more frequent instances of perspective taking and direct speech, as well as mental imagery and emotional expressions. On the other hand, in the polysemiotic condition, occurrences of sensory language were higher. A closer analysis of the
interview transcripts revealed that the monosemiotic condition seemed to be associated with greater narrative empathy, facilitated by the absence of visual and auditory elements. This entailed that the participants in the monosemiotic condition had to draw more heavily on their own experiences, compared to the polysemiotic condition, to understand the characters’ actions. This resulted in more aspects of narrative empathy towards the characters in the novel than in
the film. More importantly, it showed that the concept of narrative empathy is multi-dimensional and in need of further research. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9240660
- author
- Fornaro, Sara LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- SPVR01 20261
- year
- 2026
- type
- H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
- subject
- keywords
- cognitive semiotics, empathy, experientiality, monosemiotic text, narrative, phenomenology, polysemiotic text, semiotic system, sign
- language
- English
- id
- 9240660
- date added to LUP
- 2026-06-17 15:16:33
- date last changed
- 2026-06-17 15:33:59
@misc{9240660,
abstract = {{This thesis investigates the empathic relation between the audience, as the experiencing subject, and narrative characters of a fictional story, by introducing the concept of narrative empathy. A part from elaborating this concept, the thesis seeks to empirically investigate how two different media, film and novel, modulate this relationship and which narrative categories (perspective, direct speech, embodiment/imagery) affect the audience’s (spectator/reader’s)
narrative empathy with the characters.
To address these questions, a study with 20 native Italian speakers, divided into two groups, was conducted. Each group received the novel text (monosemiotic condition) or the film text (polysemiotic condition), the latter an adaptation of the same story, presented in the novel L’amica geniale by Elena Ferrante (2011). Participants were asked to retell the story in their own words and to complete a questionnaire that assessed the comprehension of the text and a first evaluative judgment of the protagonists of the story. These two tasks were followed by a phenomenologically informed interview, during which they were asked to talk about their perceptions and experiences. In order to operationalise the narrative categories, five linguistic markers of narrative empathy (perspective taking, direct speech, emotional and sensory expressions and mental imagery) were identified in the transcripts and coded accordingly.
The questionnaire suggested stronger narrative empathy with the main protagonist in the film condition, as expected. However, the analysis conducted on the linguistic markers revealed that the monosemiotic text condition yield more frequent instances of perspective taking and direct speech, as well as mental imagery and emotional expressions. On the other hand, in the polysemiotic condition, occurrences of sensory language were higher. A closer analysis of the
interview transcripts revealed that the monosemiotic condition seemed to be associated with greater narrative empathy, facilitated by the absence of visual and auditory elements. This entailed that the participants in the monosemiotic condition had to draw more heavily on their own experiences, compared to the polysemiotic condition, to understand the characters’ actions. This resulted in more aspects of narrative empathy towards the characters in the novel than in
the film. More importantly, it showed that the concept of narrative empathy is multi-dimensional and in need of further research.}},
author = {{Fornaro, Sara}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Narrative Empathy: A cognitive semiotic study of audience engagement with a story across different media}},
year = {{2026}},
}