TY - JOUR
T1 - “First we invented stories, then they changed us”
T2 - The Evolution of Narrative Identity
AU - McAdams, Dan P.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2019, Academic Studies Press. All rights reserved.
Copyright:
Copyright 2020 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2019/3/1
Y1 - 2019/3/1
N2 - An integrative psychological concept that bridges the sciences and humanities, narrative identity is the internalized and evolving story a person invents to explain how he or she has become the person he or she is becoming. Combining the selective reconstruction of the past with an imagined anticipated future, narrative identity provides human lives with a sense of unity, moral purpose, and temporal coherence. In this article, I discuss how the evolution of human storytelling provides the basic tools for constructing self-defining life narratives. I then consider theory and research on the development of narrative identity over the human life course, socially consequential variations in narrative identity, and how culture shapes the stories people tell about themselves. My overall perspective on narrative identity was formulated within the fields of personality and developmental psychology, but it is also informed by concepts and constructs in evolutionary biology, cognitive neuroscience, philosophy, and literary studies.
AB - An integrative psychological concept that bridges the sciences and humanities, narrative identity is the internalized and evolving story a person invents to explain how he or she has become the person he or she is becoming. Combining the selective reconstruction of the past with an imagined anticipated future, narrative identity provides human lives with a sense of unity, moral purpose, and temporal coherence. In this article, I discuss how the evolution of human storytelling provides the basic tools for constructing self-defining life narratives. I then consider theory and research on the development of narrative identity over the human life course, socially consequential variations in narrative identity, and how culture shapes the stories people tell about themselves. My overall perspective on narrative identity was formulated within the fields of personality and developmental psychology, but it is also informed by concepts and constructs in evolutionary biology, cognitive neuroscience, philosophy, and literary studies.
KW - Agency
KW - Autobiographical memory
KW - Culture
KW - Episodic future thought
KW - Evolution
KW - Narrative identity
KW - Psychological development
KW - Sociality
KW - Stories
KW - Theory of mind
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UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85077482939&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.26613/esic.3.1.110
DO - 10.26613/esic.3.1.110
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85077482939
VL - 3
SP - 1
EP - 18
JO - Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture
JF - Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture
SN - 2472-9884
IS - 1
ER -