9 - The healing power of narrating

Summary

Whereas the preceding chapter concerns the diagnostic value of distortions in narratives, this chapter focusses on the process of narrating and its potential to help cope with problematic experiences. Narrating is the standard format for coping by reappraisal. The first of the three sections considers the cathartic, cognitive, and social mechanisms involved in coping by narrating. The second section begins to discuss how narratives change with time when narrating is indeed helpful. The main argument is that improved coping is reflected in a normalization of the distortions on the five aspects of narratives, leading to a more diverse representation of perspectives. However, it is not easy to determine what narratives look like that reflect successful coping. Reasons are the difficulty to define what is a good story, situational determinants of what is deemed an adequate narrative, and that a possible consequence of successful coping is that the event no longer needs to be narrated. The third section reviews pertinent theories and findings on the kinds of narrating that may be helpful for coping with an event.