English
College of Liberal Arts
Twin Cities
Award Year
2018
University Award
McKnight Land-Grant Professorship
How stories fit the mind: The human scale of narrative design
Elaine Auyoung uses cognitive research on reading to uncover the relationship between narrative technique and literary experience. Her current book project explores and illuminates cognitive biases that have shaped longstanding narrative conventions. By demonstrating how the stories we tell ourselves can delimit our capacity to understand the world, this project seeks to cultivate broader critical awareness about the habits of mind that hinder us from comprehending and addressing global challenges.