How does narrative content influence enjoyment versus appreciation? Applying Berlyne’s curves to understand how the dimensions of narrative challenge should impact appraisals

Joshua Baldwin [Grady College post-doc, Center for Advanced Computer-Human Ecosystems (CACHE)] and Sara Baldwin "How does narrative content influence enjoyment versus appreciation? Applying Berlyne’s curves to understand how the dimensions of narrative challenge should impact appraisals," paper presented at the National Communication Association conference, November 21-24, 2024.

Abstract: What content features reliably predict enjoyment, appreciation, or both? We apply Berlyne's (1970) curve to describe how specific content cues can vary the level of narrative challenge, which will have concave, curvilinear relationships with both enjoyment and appreciation. These curves are distinct: enjoyment peaks at lower challenge, whereas appreciation peaks at higher challenge. This work synthesizes previous, sometimes conflicting work, on the nature of enjoyment and appreciation, and explains instances of their co-occurrence.