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Ideas and insights from Harvard Business Publishing Corporate Learning

The Science Behind The Art Of Storytelling

 This is the first of two posts co-written by Lani and Vanessa Boris, Senior Manager, Video Solutions at Harvard Business Publishing Corporate Learning.

Storytelling has the power to engage, influence, teach and inspire listeners. That’s why we argue for organizations to build a storytelling culture and place storytelling at the heart of their learning programs. There’s an art to telling a good story, and we all know a good story when we hear one. But there’s also a science behind the art of storytelling.

Here’s how it works, starting with the science of the non-story:

We’ve all listened to (and suffered through) long PowerPoint presentations made up of bullet points – bullet points that may be meaningful to the presenter, but lack the same punch for the audience. Even if the presenter is animated, when we hear information being ticked off like this, the language processing parts in our brain, known as Broca’s area and Wernicke’s area, get to work, translating those bullet points into story form where we can find our own meaning. The problem with this, however, is that the story we come up with in our mind may not be the same one the speaker is intending to convey through data.

When a speaker delivers those same facts within a story, however, something else happens in the brain. In his essay “The Science of Storytelling: What Listening to a Story Does to Our Brains”, entrepreneur and storyteller Leo Widrich noted that there’s research to suggest that when we hear a story, “not only are the language processing parts in our brain activated, but any other area in our brain that we would use when experiencing the events of the story are, too.” For example, sensory details like  the client was as excited as if he had won the lottery  engage a listener’s sensory cortex. Action words like  drive this project home  engage the motor cortex, all leading to a more connected and richer experiencing of the message. In short, the more a speaker conveys  information in story form, the closer the listener’s experience and understanding will be to what the speaker actually intended.

Neuroscientists are still debating these findings, but we know from experience that when we’re listening to a good story — rich in detail, full of metaphor, expressive of character — we tend to imagine ourselves in the same situation. Just think about all those scary stories told around the campfire. Your heart rate increases, you get goosebumps, the hair on the back of your neck stands on end. The stories told in a business setting might not be quite as dramatic (or hair-raising), but nevertheless  can be more impactful than data alone.

Lisa Cron, in  Wired for Story , speaks to additional benefits of sharing stories in business settings, “Stories allow us to simulate intense experience without having to actually live through them. Stories allow us to experience the world before we actually have to experience it.” Leo Widrich, citing Princeton neuroscientist Uri Hasson, writes that “a story is the only way to activate parts in the brain so that a listener turns the story into their own idea and experience.” The potential value here for managers to use story to mentor and coach is clear. Through stories, we can utilize vicarious experience, mentally rehearsing how we might handle a situation before we have to face it. Internal data banks, so full of  what if’s  and  how to’s , are refreshed with new options, without our having to live through an experience and all the risk that might entail.

There are additional scientific elements at play. Scientists are discovering that chemicals like cortisol, dopamine and oxytocin are released in the brain when we’re told a story. Why does that matter? If we are trying to make a point stick, cortisol assists with our formulating memories. Dopamine, which helps regulate our emotional responses, keeps us engaged. When it comes to creating deeper connections with others, oxytocin is associated with empathy, an important element in building, deepening or maintaining good relationships.

Perhaps most importantly, storytelling is central to meaning-making and sense-making. It is through story that our minds form and examine our own truths and beliefs, as well as discern how they correlate with the truths and beliefs of others. Through story listening, we gain new perspectives and a better understanding of the world around us. We challenge and expand our own understanding by exploring how others see and understand the world through their lens.

By sharing and listening to each other’s stories, we all get a little bit closer to what’s true.

Ultimately, storytelling is about the exchange of ideas, about growth – and that’s learning. That’s why we believe that it’s important that we embed storytelling in our organizational cultures and in our learning programs. Storytelling is essential. If you’re trying to engage, influence, teach, or inspire others, you should be telling or listening to a story, and encouraging others to tell a story with you. You’ll have plenty of science to back you up.

Lani Peterson, Psy.D. is a psychologist, professional storyteller and executive coach who specializes in the use of story as a powerful medium for personal growth, connection and change. Drawing on her broad experience with individuals, teams and organizations in the profit and nonprofit worlds, Lani brings a unique combination of personal stories, knowledge of the theory behind stories, and deep experience helping people use stories to transform their understanding of themselves and others. Lani’s professional training includes a doctorate in psychology from William James University, a master’s in counseling psychology from Lesley University, and bachelor’s degree in literature from Smith College.  She is a member of the National Speakers Association, the National Storytelling Network, and serves on the Executive Committee of the Healing Story Alliance, which she recently chaired for five years.

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• Published: 14 September 2020

The art of scientific storytelling: framing stories to get where you want to go

• Rafael E. Luna 1 , 2  

Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology volume  21 ,  pages 653–654 ( 2020 ) Cite this article

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Storytelling provides a platform to learn, publish and share your science. Framing information into a compelling story can be a useful tool to disseminate your data and share your passion for science, to make a greater impact with your research and to advance your career.

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Acknowledgements

R.E.L. acts as an Associate Dean, Boston College; Director, Pre-Health Program, Director, Gateway Scholars Program for STEM; Faculty Advisor, STEM & Health Outreach for AHANA (SHOfA) student organization; Co-Chair, Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Committee at Boston College; Board Member, Biomedical Science Careers Program; Advisory Council member, National Postdoctoral Association; External Advisory Board member, LS-PAC MODELS Center-National Science Foundation Regional Center of Excellence; External Advisory Committee member, Louisiana Biomedical Research Network, which is funded by NIGMS-NIH. R.E.L. also thanks Profs. P.Q. Blair, M. Eichhorn, and J.S. Davis, along with Drs. L.E. Luna and M. El-Kouedi, and Ms. U.J. Luna, for helpful feedback on this article.

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Rafael E. Luna, Ph.D. is the Author of the Book, ‘The Art of Scientific Storytelling: Transform Your Research Manuscript with a Step-By-Step Formula’, 2013 Amado International; EAN-13: 978–0615821993; ISBN-10: 0615821995.

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• v.9(12); 2019

Storytelling as a research tool and intervention around public health perceptions and behaviour: a protocol for a systematic narrative review

Becky mccall.

1 Institute of Health Informatics, University College London, London, UK

Laura Shallcross

Michael wilson.

2 School of the Arts, English and Drama, University of Loughborough, Loughborough, UK

Christopher Fuller

3 Institute of Health Informatics, UCL, London, UK

Andrew Hayward

4 Institute of Epidemiology and Health, University College London, London, UK

Associated Data

Introduction.

There is a growing trend to use storytelling as a research tool to extract information and/or as an intervention to effect change in the public knowledge, attitudes and behaviour (KAB) in relation to public health issues, primarily those with a strong element of disease prevention. However, evidence of its use in either or both capacities is limited. This protocol proposes a systematic narrative review of peer-reviewed, published literature on the use of storytelling as a research tool within the public health arena.

Methods and analysis

Medline, EMBASE, PsycINFO, ERIC (Educational Resources Information Center), Web of Science, Art and Humanities database (ProQuest), Scopus and Google Scholar will be searched for studies that look at the use of storytelling in the research of pressing current public health issues, for example, vaccinations, antimicrobial resistance, climate change and cancer screening. The review will synthesise evidence of how storytelling is used as a research tool to (a) gain insights into KAB and (b) to effect change in KAB when used as an intervention. Included studies will be selected according to carefully defined criteria relevant to public health issues of interest, and data from qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies will be extracted with a customised data extraction form. A narrative synthesis will be performed according to Economic and Social Research Council guidance from Popay, J, 2006.The study protocol follows the recommendations by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocols (PRISMA-P).

Ethics and dissemination

Formal ethical approval is not required for this study, as no primary data will be collected. Dissemination will involve publishing results of this study in relevant peer-reviewed journal(s). Where possible, the study results will also be presented as posters or talks at relevant medical conferences and meetings.

PROSPERO registration number

CRD42019124704

Strengths and limitations of this study

• The review will provide information on how storytelling has been used in important public health issues, for example, climate change, vaccination and cancer screening.
• The review will inform further use of storytelling in these and other public health issues, in particular antimicrobial resistance, to gain insight on public perceptions, and to communicate and disseminate information, and to potentially effect change in relevant behaviours.
• This study protocol follows the recommendations by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocols.
• The selection of studies, and data extraction will use systematic review management software (SUMARI; Joanna Briggs Institute, Australia), and critical appraisal will use the QATSDD quality assessment tool, developed by Sirriyeh, R and colleagues, 2012, which is suitable for the quality assessment of qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies. The review will be conducted by two independent authors.
• Studies included following this review protocol are unlikely to be homogeneous in methods limiting the ability to draw reliable conclusions and generalisations.

Stories and storytelling help us to make sense of our thoughts and experiences, our interactions with the environment and each other, to formulate our beliefs, our identities and our values. 1 Most poignantly, the making of stories ‘reveals things to us that we know but didn’t know we knew’, according to phenomenological philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty in 1964. 2

Essential to storytelling is that it seeks to convey an experience in such a way that it seems real. 3 There is appeal in storytelling because it often presents information incorporated within a personal account that engages the reader and may validate their own experiences. 4

A story is often loosely defined as having a beginning, a middle and an end, with a protagonist (often human), an object, a practice or an idea, followed by a form of transformation or conflict. 5 Throughout the relevant literature, the term ‘narrative’ is often used interchangeably with ‘story’. However, the events that comprise a certain story can be presented in many different ways forming different narratives, chronologically or not, but the story remains the same. Reshuffling the order of events changes the narrative, not the story. 6 The terms ‘story’ and ‘storytelling’ will be preferred in this review, unless specific cases require the use of ‘narrative’.

Storytelling as a research method

This review seeks evidence of peer-reviewed studies that use storytelling as a research method or tool and relates to people telling their personal stories of real-life or authentic experiences around public health issues.

The process of storytelling has multiple research aims. Included in these aims is its ability to inform the researcher (through extraction of information), but also as an intervention to facilitate a process of ‘reflection and reworking of experience and knowledge in the research participant’. 7 Storytelling has been used as a tool to gain insight into public knowledge, attitudes and behaviour (KAB), for example, storytelling has been used with African-American women who fail to attend breast cancer screening and has revealed attitudes and behaviour driven by pain, fear, loss and faith in God. The same research also used storytelling to clarify misinformation, validate personal experiences and enhance learning around the importance of screening. 8

It needs to be noted that unlike more conventional qualitative research methods, storytelling is an emergent research method and validation remains to be established. However, lack of a substantial body of validation does not justify dismissing storytelling as a research method. Ideally, this review will identify studies that provide evidence of the validity of storytelling as used in the research context.

Storytelling has been used as a research method in various disciplines, some of which touch on public health, some of which are removed from it. For example, social work, 9 10 healthcare and its delivery, 11 understanding marginalised communities 12 and anthropology, 13 to provide a few examples.

In attempting a definition of storytelling as a research tool, first, there is a distinction to be made between science and storytelling/narrative as two research paradigms. Second, storytelling needs to be distinguished from other forms of narrative research, for example, narrative medicine. According to Bleakley, science and narrative are two ways of knowing. Bleakley points out the value of story compared with more conventionally analytical methods that ‘tend to lose the concrete story and its emotional impact to abstract categorisations, which may claim explanatory value but often remain descriptive’. Essentially, within clinical education at least, Bleakley refers to how narrative offers value over and above objective measures, pointing out that while objective morbidity and mortality data characteristically remain faceless, narrative inquiry often seeks to personalise and also to engage proactively with its research population through deliberate intervention, as research with, not on, people. 14

Reflecting Bleakley, this systematic review aims to find examples of where research has been carried out with people (within the context of various public health topics) rather than on people, and work that seeks to engage proactively with the study population via storytelling as a method.

Storytelling as a research method shares some similarities but also notable differences to narrative medicine as a research method. According to Columbia Narrative Medicine, Columbia University Irving Medical Center, ‘narrative medicine fortifies clinical practice with the narrative competence to recognize, absorb, metabolize, interpret, and be moved by the stories of illness’. 15 Physician and advocate of narrative medicine, Rita Charon, in a paper in JAMA, describes narrative medicine as, ‘Medicine practiced with narrative competence,… is proposed as a model for humane and effective medical practice’. 16 Narrative medicine appears to be more closely aligned with physicians’ practice and the patient–physician relationship (aimed at improving patient care) than the storytelling research method that this systematic review aims to explore. This review aims to seek data on KAB from members of the public and does not serve the purpose of improving a physician–patient relationship or improving care as directly as narrative medicine appears to do.

In practice, storytelling as a tool in research might adopt various formats. One that has found prominence in recent years, with an emergent literature base generally, as well as in the field of health research, is digital storytelling (DST) comprising a 25 min video 17 , a 3–5 min short video, 18 ‘Photovoice’ (photo collections to promote dialogue) 19 or verbal telling of personal stories. 8 20 DST has the potential to capture lived experiences and share research findings in a manner that is highly engaging and possibly made accessible on a digital platform. 21

Storytelling as a research tool alongside conventional qualitative research methods

Storytelling as a qualitative research method is still an emergent area and may serve to complement data sourced via more conventional, empirical qualitative research methods. However, certain nuances of individuals’ insights associated with their experiences might not be accessible via some of these more established methods of inquiry.

Moreover, stories do not reveal one, single discoverable truth because truth is a matter of degree and perspective. In this respect, using the telling of a story as a research tool rests on a premise that is starkly different to that of a conventional scientific method. 5 Both the established scientific method and the storytelling research method each provide a distinctive way of ordering experience and constructing reality, and using the two knowledge systems to complement and enhance each other might provide broader and more in-depth insight into an experience than using one method alone.

In a discussion paper by Dahlstrom, the author addresses storytelling as a means to communicate science to non-expert audiences. According to Dahlstrom, narratives are easier to comprehend, and audiences find them more engaging than traditional logical-scientific communication. The nature of learning from storytelling differs from that derived from more conventional scientific information, for example, from statistical data. Scientific information provides abstract truths that can be applied to a specific case, as in deductive reasoning, whereas narrative information follows inductive reasoning, which often involves a depiction of an individual experience from which an inference to a general or even a collective truth can be made. 22

Storytelling is a highly nuanced means of communication, usually articulating cause-and-effect relationships between events over a period of time, and often in relation to a certain character. 16 It is also grounded in a level of realism that might be less evident with other forms of communication. Storytelling potentially draws on commonalities between the story or the storyteller and the listener or reader. This, combined with the underlying assumption of credibility in the teller’s story or experience, can potentially motivate and persuade individuals towards behavioural change and reduces resistance to any action implied by the message. 23

Studies have used stories and storytelling for their value in both communicating with and influencing others. Among the reasons for choosing storytelling as a research tool, one of the most important is that it is a highly accessible modality that does not require specialised knowledge and skills to connect with, or derive meaning from. 24

Storytelling to change KAB in public health

Whether smoking cessation, obesity, health-related climate change or cancer screening, many of the key issues in public health today require the sharing of information in a meaningful way that resonates with the receiver and triggers a positive change in knowledge, attitudes and ultimately behaviours. The lay public largely sources its information on scientific matters in narrative format, for example, from mass media, which relies on storytelling to optimise engagement with the reader, listener or viewer. 22 In addition, most health-related knowledge and/or evidence is largely objective, often referring to statistics and appeals to logic and reason to support a certain practice or health-related behavioural change. However, there is a growing movement towards other forms of health communication including storytelling. 25

The list of public health issues that might lend themselves to storytelling as a research tool is extensive, but of key interest in this review is any public health issue that bears a personal cost in the immediate term but potentially provides a wide-scale health benefit on a population level in the longer term. Vaccination, climate change, antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and cancer screening all provide typical examples.

Of particular interest to the authors of this review is any public health issue that closely reflects key features of AMR because future research aims to focus on this topic.

Regarding AMR and antibiotic use, a 2018 report by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development estimated that AMR could cause approximately 2.4 million deaths in Europe, North America and Australia by 2050 if effective control measures are not taken. 26 AMR needs to be addressed on multiple fronts, but of interest here is the public perception of AMR and how a more nuanced understanding of this, potentially sourced via storytelling, might help to change public perceptions and practices towards antibiotic use and AMR. In 2009, Edgar et al note that ‘This [antibiotic resistance] is not a problem that will go away without a concerted effort to change the beliefs, attitudes and behaviour of key populations’. 27

Various studies shed light on the need for more, and alternative research methods to investigate public understanding of AMR and antibiotic use. 28 29 Storytelling might reveal insights not necessarily obtainable via interviews and focus groups.

Potential research would use the storytelling approach as an alternative to, or to complement other more conventional qualitative research methods, to investigate public perceptions of the issues at stake, and to potentially develop a storytelling intervention to improve understanding and behaviours.

Rationale for the review

The rationale for this systematic narrative review rests on the premise that storytelling may have value as a qualitative research method used in the context of a public health issue with global impact.

To explore this, the review will involve two stages aimed at arriving at the most relevant studies for full-text review. Stage 1 will involve a search that will be wider in the scope of public health issues included than in stage 2, and will involve basic quantification of peer-reviewed studies on the use of storytelling as a research and/or an interventional tool in public health. Stage 2 will involve the careful selection of topics that will enter into later stages of the review. Topics will be selected based on certain criteria outlined in table 1 , but essentially, topics of interest will be public health issues with a strong preventative element that involve a personal cost in the immediate term but population-wide gain in the long term.

Characteristic criteria of public health issues used to select topics for full text review (four examples are provided; the criteria used here will be applied to other public health issues found as part of the search and selection process)

This systematic narrative review proposes to explore storytelling as a means of sourcing data to uncover public KAB through gathering, analysing and critiquing, as well as to explore storytelling as an intervention used in the research context to effect change in KAB.

To synthesise studies that use storytelling as a research tool for understanding and/or influencing public opinion on public health/prevention issues.

This systematic narrative review aims to

• Quantify the distribution of peer-reviewed, published studies that use storytelling as a research tool according to the public health issue.
• Use narrative synthesis to report on studies that employ storytelling as (a) a research tool to gain insight into KAB, and/or (b) an intervention to effect change in KAB.
• Describing the nature of, and the value of information obtained via storytelling,
• Determining to what extent storytelling can uncover the barriers and facilitators (mis/information, mis/beliefs, mis/understanding) that underlie perceptions and behaviours relating to certain public health issues, and to what extent storytelling as an intervention may effect change in these respects,
• Determining the impact and validity of storytelling as a research tool to source information, and/or to engage and communicate public health messages to effect change,
• Comparing data obtained via storytelling to other qualitative and quantitative methods, if these data are available.
• To gain understanding of how to run effective storytelling workshops with a view to guiding future research.

Research question

In accordance with the aim and objectives, the following question will guide the project:

What evidence supports the use of storytelling as a research method: (a) to gain insight on public KAB, and (b) as an intervention to effect change in public KAB, in relation to issues of public health?

This systematic narrative review will follow a comprehensive process using rigorous methodological guidelines to synthesise the diverse forms of research evidence found (different public health issues; qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies). The recommendations by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocols (PRISMA-P) 2015 will be followed. 30

The study started in June 2019 and the anticipated completion date is January 2020.

Patient and public involvement

Patients or public were not involved in the development of this protocol.

Inclusion and exclusion criteria (eligibility of studies)

Study design.

Qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods peer-reviewed primary studies that use storytelling within the context of research will be included.

Studies should include storytelling used as a research tool to extract information on KAB relating to any chosen public health topic (part ‘a’ of the research question) whether or not they formally seek to measure the validity of storytelling; and/or studies that use storytelling as an intervention aimed at effecting change in KAB whether or not they formally evaluate the impact on these outcomes (part ‘b’ of the research question).

Studies should be included if the stories are told by individuals, for example, as a community participation project that seeks storytelling of personal experiences as opposed to stories related via the media (print, online, broadcast or other media including social media). Personal stories, as told by the individual or someone close to the individual who is central to the experience being related, are sought, rather than stories that are told in a journalistic or reporting setting.

Studies that formulate a story or stories based on an integration of the findings of numerous interviews will be excluded—such studies are not first-hand, direct, personal experiences. Also, any studies that discuss storytelling or take a review format will be excluded.

Studies will most likely include participants who are members of the general public, often belonging to a defined subgroup, and/or patients. Storytelling will be shared between participants and the researcher(s).

Subject matter

According to the WHO definition, public health comprises the ‘art and science of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts of society’. 31 In this review, any public health topic that satisfies this definition but that also satisfies most, if not all, criteria listed in table 1 will be selected for full-text review. In particular, studies should have an element of prevention, for example, prevention of AMR, prevention of HIV/AIDs, prevention of climate change, prevention of future cancers or prevention of vaccine-preventable diseases. Studies should also incur some personal cost, for example, forgoing the opportunity to shorten your illness through avoidance of antibiotics, risk of adverse consequences such as severe disease following a mild infection, screening-related harm, vaccine side effects, aversion to use of condoms or inconvenience of recycling.

Studies will be excluded if they are primarily clinical in nature rather than public health related, or if they do not relate to either enhanced understanding or seek to change KAB. They will also be excluded if the public health topic addressed does not have a preventative element nor incur some personal cost in the immediate or short term.

Studies will also be excluded if they apply to highly specific population subgroups, findings of which cannot reasonably be used to guide future research.

The systematic review will be restricted to English-language studies only. An unrestricted scoping review suggests no evidence that limiting to English language only would be associated with bias.

Dates will include studies from 1990 to the present, which is a deliberately wide period of time due to the anticipated limited number of peer-reviewed and relevant reported studies available. Also, storytelling as a research tool is a relatively emergent area of research, so most papers are likely to have been published since the year 2000.

Demographics

Again, due to the anticipated limited number of relevant studies in the emergent field of storytelling in public health, studies will include populations of all age ranges and demographic backgrounds.

Types of interventions

Storytelling or digital storytelling as a research tool to understand and/or effect change in KAB towards the public health issue of interest.

Climate change

Vaccination

Cancer screening

Sexual health

Mental health

Other public health topics as found on the search

Note that not all contexts will proceed to stage 2 of the selection process if the specified criteria are not met, at least in most part.

Outcome measures

Primary outcomes.

Within the context of the public health issues selected for review, the following outcomes will be explored:

• The protagonist: a personal story, a story about others or a collective community story;
• The vehicle for storytelling: written, verbal, visual, audio-visual, other;
• The narrator: first or third person;
• Any other relevant characteristics.
• Storytelling used as a research tool to extract information including information on KAB,
• Storytelling used to effect change in KAB when used as an intervention.
• Gain insight into KAB relating to the public health issue of interest,
• Effect change in KAB relating to the public health issue of interest (eg, the dispelling of misinformation, knowledge acquisition or change, or change in beliefs, attitudes and practices).

Secondary outcomes

Evidence to support the ‘validity’ or, in broad terms, the ‘value’ and ‘appropriateness’ of storytelling as a means of drawing out nuanced information on the public’s experiences, and of effecting change or having an impact on KAB. 32

Information sources

Electronic searches.

To capture all relevant studies, the search will refer to the following databases. To maximise the return of relevant articles, numerous databases will be searched given the limited history of publication in the field of storytelling in public health.

Medline, Embase, PsycINFO, ERIC, Web of Science, Art and Humanities database (ProQuest), Scopus and Google Scholar will be searched. The reference lists of identified articles will be searched for additional studies, and forward citations of identified articles will be retrieved using University College London libraries. Ongoing or recently completed trials will be searched for using alerts from the above databases.

Grey literature was considered for inclusion but determined unsuitable for this specific review because it aims to focus on studies with well-reported methodologies and findings that have been subject to peer review. Based on the scoping search and given the breadth of topics covered, together with the wide extent of grey literature, as well as the process required to filter and validate the material, inclusion would require a substantially different approach that warrants a separate study.

Search strategy

This systematic narrative review will identify relevant articles by combining search terms for storytelling; context—comprising public health issues with a preventative element; change in KAB. The provisional search terms are listed in table 2 . English language and dates 1990–present will be the only filters.

Search terms composed of concepts and synonyms (broadly based on PICO)

*refers to any expansion of the word to which it refers such that a search will be inclusive

Study records

Data management.

The search results will be uploaded into reference management software (EndNote) to remove duplicate records of the same report. The unique records will then be uploaded into web-based, systematic review management software (SUMARI; Joanna Briggs Institute, Australia). Using this software, the initial title and abstract screening, and the full-text review will be logged. Both reviewers will use this system. All standardised forms will be piloted and revised as needed by the reviewers before starting the review.

Screening and selection process

Initial review will be by title only, or title and abstract depending on the quantity of titles returned, and the relevance of information provided.

A scoping search conducted to provide an approximate indication and map of where storytelling has been used in public health research to date found the following quantities of published studies. The search was limited to three databases and five public health topics. Search terms used in the scoping search included storytelling or stories or story; public health; knowledge or attitude* or perception* or behavio*r*. Years 1990 to present were included because storytelling is an emergent research tool and it is unlikely that relevant studies would be published prior to this date.

• Climate change (Scopus 19, Web of Science 8, Medline 3);
• Vaccination (Scopus 9, Medline 8, Web of Science 5);
• Cancer prevention and screening (Scopus 21, Web of Science 5, Medline 13);
• HIV/AIDS (Scopus 31, Web of Science 16, Medline 16).
• AMR (no studies were found on storytelling in AMR in this scoping search).

Following the search across public health generally (stage 1), the screening and selection procedure will involve the selection of public health topics as determined by their fit to specified criteria ( table 1 ). Relevant studies will be quantified and a decision made regarding which public health issues and studies (using storytelling as the research tool) to advance to stage 2 which will comprise a full-text review.

In determining the relevance of each of these topics according to the criteria listed in table 1 , vaccination and cancer screening were found to satisfy all listed criteria, followed by climate change and HIV/AIDs. Despite not fulfilling all criteria, the latter two topics would still be included because they fulfil more criteria than not, for example, the only criterion not fulfilled by climate change as a topic is the existence of studies relating to large populations (to date, the use of storytelling in climate change appears to refer to specific populations, eg, Inupuits). However, ultimately findings from this systematic review will inform primary research into the public health issue of AMR and there are enough parallels between the two issues that justify retaining climate change. 33 HIV/AIDs is an issue that has seen a large amount of community participation in terms of storytelling around the topic. Given the relative paucity of published data on the use of storytelling as a research method, it is proposed that HIV/AIDs is included as a topic of interest in the search. 34

The criteria in table 1 are addressed by the following questions to be asked of studies identified by stage 1:

• Is there an individual, immediate cost but a long-term population gain? Does the issue involve an element of prevention?
• Is there misunderstanding, misinformation or misperception associated with the issue?
• Is there a need to change KAB associated with the issue?
• Which populations are most relevant to this issue? (Ideally, a ‘healthy’ population in relation to a preventative public health measure).
• Are there publications on storytelling used as a research method for this issue?

The criteria in table 1 were chosen after focusing on the public health issue of particular interest to the researchers, with a view to future research, namely, on the topic of AMR. Although inconclusive, the scoping search did not yield any peer-reviewed primary studies that use storytelling in the field of AMR. Consequently, this protocol proposes that an understanding of the use of storytelling as a tool to gain insight into public KAB might be obtained through focusing on other public health issues that have parallel dimensions to AMR. As such, criteria for the selection of public health issues will be based on characteristics of AMR as a public health issue (as considered in the light of public KAB), as well as volume of studies found.

The roots of AMR are multifold; however, of concern to public KAB in particular are reasons that include the misuse and overuse of antibiotics, whether due to over-prescribing by the clinician, over-demand or misuse by the patient, or over-availability of antibiotics to the public without control measures. Essentially, one means of potentially controlling this misuse might be to improve public perception and behaviours in relation to when and why an antibiotic is needed. Forgoing an antibiotic for a minor infection might entail some personal cost, including a slightly longer illness in the immediate term, but help to reduce the development of antibiotic resistance at a population level in the long term. 35

Another key feature related to public KAB around antibiotics is the misunderstanding and misinformation about how resistance arises, as well as how antibiotics should be used. 36 There is a need among the general public to improve understanding of when and why an antibiotic is needed and how resistance develops. Satisfying this need might involve a greater understanding of public KAB as well as more effective communication and message dissemination. 37 38

In light of this, key characteristics of interest include that a personal action and cost now will prevent a wide-scale, serious public health crisis in the future (eg, AMR or poor rates of cancer detection across a population). Effectively, public health issues with a strong leaning towards preventative health issues will be a preference. Likewise, there will be a preference for issues that, to some extent, rest on a premise of misuse, misconception and misunderstanding by the general public, precipitating a need for change in these elements. Evidence for the use of storytelling as a tool to both understand the issues of concern and effect change is also required.

Due to the scarcity of peer-reviewed and published primary studies on the use of storytelling in the public health issues of interest, studies will be selected if they meet most if not all of the listed criteria.

Each study report will be categorised according to status as ‘include’, ‘exclude’ or ‘unclear’. Reasons for exclusion of ineligible studies will be recorded, and any uncertainties will be resolved by correspondence with study investigators. Articles categorised as ‘include’ or ‘unclear’ will be retrieved, and each will be independently reviewed in full-text format. A second independent reviewer will repeat all stages of the review. In cases of unresolved discrepancy between the two reviewers, a third-party adjudicator will be consulted.

The study selection process will be recorded and presented in flow diagram format according to the recommendations of PRISMA.

Critical appraisal of study quality

Critical appraisal of included studies will use the 16-item QATSDD tool developed by Sirriyeh et al for qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies. 39

There is some debate about the value of critical appraisal of qualitative research due to uncertainty around which criteria should be used to assess a study. This stems from the inherent diversity of data found in qualitative studies, the subjective nature of the data as well as the many different qualitative research methods used. Selection of the most suitable assessment criteria is therefore problematic. 40 Some researchers argue that weak studies should be excluded, but given the lack of consensus around critical appraisal tools, and the limited range of studies in the field of storytelling in public health research, on full-text review encompassing the extent to which the storytelling method and public health topic are relevant, a decision will be made as to whether to include or exclude a study. If the study comprises low quality, then this will be stated.

The QATSDD tool is designed to provide a score for the body of evidence, which is expressed as a percentage of the maximum possible score. The application of this tool also enables comparisons to be drawn between the qualities of quantitative, qualitative or mixed-methods papers within the same field of research. 39

Data extraction form

A standard data extraction form will be customised to serve the purposes of extracting data from qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies.

Data will be extracted by two reviewers and independently entered into the customised form. Disagreement will be resolved by consulting a third review author and uncertainties by correspondence with study investigators.

Information extracted will include (non-exhaustive list)

• Study participants: inclusion and exclusion criteria, method of recruitment/selection and study population characteristics;
• Detail of how the storytelling research tool is applied in the study (either to extract information from participants, or as a tool to effect change in KAB);
• Study quality and study biases (as per the critical appraisal specified below).
• Insights (including quotations) gained via storytelling that provide information on KAB of study participants. These might be quantitative, qualitative or mixed data.
• Insights (including quotations) on how storytelling can effect change in KAB of study participants. These might be quantitative, qualitative or mixed data.
• Insights that support the validity (or appropriateness or value) of storytelling as a research tool in public health.
• Study funding and conflicts of interest.

Data expected to be sourced from storytelling studies include quotations from stories captured as recounted by tellers of their personal experiences; explanations of digital stories; data on themes identified through analysis of story transcripts (the actual transcripts unlikely to be available); qualitative and quantitative data on changes in knowledge, attitudes and practices/behaviours relating to the storytelling intervention.

Assessment of bias in conducting the systematic review

The systematic review will be conducted following this pre-specified protocol and any differences will be reported between the methods outlined in this protocol and the complete review.

Data synthesis

Data synthesis will use the narrative synthesis approach developed by the Economic and Social Research Council, as described by Rodgers et al, 41 that is suitable for qualitative and/or quantitative data. The defining characteristic of narrative synthesis is that it adopts a textual approach to the process of synthesis to ‘tell the story’ of the findings from the included studies, while it may still include the manipulation of some statistical findings. It can also accommodate questions concerned with the implementation of interventions (ie, the storytelling method or tool), as well as with the effects of interventions in experimental settings (ie, impact of storytelling on KAB). 41

The narrative synthesis will address the two parts of the research question and effectively comprise two separate syntheses that apply to the use of storytelling: (a) as a tool to understand/gain insight into public KAB and (b) as an intervention to determine the impact (including effect) of storytelling as a tool on changing public KAB. Each respective synthesis will be categorised by the nature of the methodological storytelling approach used, the impact and the validity of storytelling as a research tool as it applies to qualitative data, 32 the insights obtained via storytelling and the impact in terms of the effectiveness if quantitative measures form part of the study. These categories apply to storytelling as both a tool for extracting information and as a tool to effect change.

Determining the validity of storytelling as a research tool, based on a mixture of qualitative and quantitative data, is challenging. The term ‘validity’ and its meaning in the context of qualitative research lacks consensus. It tends to mean appropriateness of the tool, processes or data. 32 One attempt at a definition suggests that validity refers to the integrity and application of the methods undertaken and the precision with which the findings accurately reflect the data. 42 Noble and Smith suggest an equivalent to the term ‘validity’ is the term ‘truth value’. This recognises that in qualitative data, multiple realities exist; and note that a researcher’s personal experiences and viewpoints can have an impact on methodological and outcome bias. 42 Rolfe argues for the recognition that each study is individual and unique, and that the task of producing frameworks and predetermined criteria for assessing the quality of research studies is futile. 43 In attempting to validate the storytelling studies identified, the findings might be compared with existing KAB/KAP (knowledge, attitude and practice) surveys to aid interpretation.

In conducting the narrative synthesis, studies might be viewed as providing data that are framed within the story format and by storytelling. In the context of clinical education, Bleakley 14 explains that stories can be treated as raw material for narrative inquiry (an analytical approach) or, alternatively, a story as the end product of narrative inquiry (a synthesis approach). The former emphasises the structure of a story by analysing content, and the latter approach emphasises the meaning and social context of a story nurturing a discourse around the meaning of the story.

Proposed value of the systematic review and use of findings

To gain an understanding based on the systematic review of available peer-reviewed, published studies on the use of storytelling as a research tool to extract information, as well as an intervention to effect change used in a research context in various public health settings that meet the criteria of most, if not all, criteria detailed in table 1 .

The findings of this systematic review will have value by potentially informing future research studies into different public health issues, in particular AMR, that employ storytelling as a method to source information or as an intervention to effect change with respect to public KAB.

Supplementary Material

Contributors: The study was conceived by BM. BM developed the eligibility criteria, search strategy, risk of bias assessment strategy and data extraction plan with guidance from AH, LS, CF and MW. BM wrote the manuscript, to which all authors contributed. All contributors meet the ICMJE criteria for authorship.

Funding: This work is supported by the Medical Research Foundation (MRF) grant number MRF-145-0004-TPG-AVISO.

Disclaimer: The funders played no role in the development of the protocol, in writing of the report or in the decision to submit the protocol for publication.

Competing interests: None declared.

Patient consent for publication: Not required.

Provenance and peer review: Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

Author note: Research question: What evidence supports the use of storytelling as a research tool: (a) to gain insight into public knowledge, attitudes and behaviour (KAB), and (b) as an intervention to effect change in public KAB, in relation to issues of public health?

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Engagement and Storytelling

How to tell an engaging science story from your research project.

Since the beginning of human consciousness, stories have been fundamental in our culture. We use them to make sense of the world, learn and convey information .

Our brains are wired in a way that we often forget stand-alone facts. However, when these facts are put into context or interwoven within an engaging story, our memory connects more to what we are learning. Chances then are higher that our brain locks in this story and we remember the facts themselves.

Storytelling is one of the most effective ways to communicate , which makes it a critical tool in science communication. This is why many science communicators appeal to researchers to use the storytelling approach when informing audiences about their research projects.

In this post, we will discuss the basics of storytelling and explore the three essential parts that make a science story.

These parts are:

• a main player with a strong character = the focus of your research project
• the devastating struggle your main player is facing = your research question
• how your player is overcoming this struggle = the system of interest in your research project

Each is based on transforming your research project into a relatable story for your audience. Let’s dive into each of these.

A good (science) story starts with a strong character

In your research, you likely focus on one main component: a microbe, a protein, an atomic particle, a star, or the immune system. This component will be the main player of your science story. The whole story develops around the actions of this player.

To start your science story, introduce your main player to your audience. Tell them about its character in a relatable way as if you are talking about a friend. Try to answer these questions to help your audience identify with your main player:

• Who is your main player?
• What are its characteristics? What are its strengths and weaknesses? Does it have any interesting personality traits that will be important for the story?
• What does its daily life look like?

Give your player a real-life struggle

After your audience meets your main player, you can start telling your science story. A memorable story usually comes with an interesting struggle - just as it’s done in movies and books.

In your science story, this struggle relates to your research question. At the same time, it is important that you translate your research question into a struggle your audience can relate to. This means that your research question drives your project just as it advances the story of your grant proposal.

For example, your research project might be on microbes adapting to low-nutrient environments. Here, the main player of your story would be the microbe of interest and its struggle is that it is hungry. So, in this case, you would talk about how hungry microbes desperately search for food.

Such a struggle is a relatable challenge. Everyone knows how it feels to be hungry and how we change our behavior to look for or buy food. To help your audience relate to your story, your character, and your research problem, explain your player’s challenges by describing the following aspects:

• What is your player struggling with?
• Why does your player seem powerless against this struggle?
• Who are its enemies and supporters and why? What do they have against or in support of your main player?

Get your player out of the struggle with a good story

A relatable challenge hooks your audience. They know and enjoy your main player; they understand its strengths and weaknesses, and they sympathize with it.

Now, you need to solve your player’s challenge for your audience. Tell your audience how your player uses its strengths to get out of its struggles. Explain, how is it fighting to overcome enemies, challenges, and its own weaknesses.

The answer to that struggle is most likely the system or research concept you are working on. Hence, during this step, you will explain to your audience your actual research topic.

For the example of the hungry microbe, you could explain to your audience how microbes use little antennae on their surfaces to find food. You could compare this to our nose and how we also smell food and follow its scent. Similarly, these microbial antennae “sense” chemicals and tell the microbe to swim towards the food source.

Depending on your audience, your research focus, and the goal of your science communication project, you should explain the system in enough detail. Always make it clear to your audience that your main player is using this system to overcome a devastating struggle. This will help your audience understand why your project is important and what they will gain from your insights. 

For your audience to relate to your research project, answer the following questions with your science story:

• What does your player do to get out of the struggle?
• How does it use its strengths and weaknesses to overcome the struggle? Does it have a special system, superpower, or personality trait that is essential for this?
• Is it defending its enemies? Is it recruiting resources for its own advantage?

Tell your science story with imaginable words

As you might have seen, just as you remember great movies or books based on engaging and vivid stories, your audience will remember your research project if it is told in an understandable and logical story. By triggering your audience’s imagination and describing scenes and actions,  they will find it easier to memorize the concept . This will help them understand your research project, so you have an easier time conveying its importance.

Dr. Sarah Wettstadt

Dr. Sarah Wettstadt is a microbiologist-turned science writer and communicator working on various outreach projects and helping researchers disseminate their research results. Her overall vision is to empower through learning: she shares scientific knowledge with both scientists and non-scientists and coaches scientists in science communications. Sarah publishes her own blog BacterialWorld to share the beauty of microbes and bacteria, and she is blog commissioner for the FEMSmicroBlog, as well as co-founder of STEMcognito, a platform publishing STEM-related videos. Previous to her science communication career, she did her PhD at Imperial College London, UK, and a postdoc in Granada, Spain.

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• Published: 03 December 2014

The effectiveness of digital storytelling in the classrooms: a comprehensive study

• Najat Smeda 1 ,
• Eva Dakich 2 &
• Nalin Sharda 1  

Smart Learning Environments volume  1 , Article number:  6 ( 2014 ) Cite this article

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In recent years the use of new technologies in educational systems has increased worldwide as digital cameras, personal computers, scanners, and easy-to-use software have become available to educators to harness the digital world. The impact of new technologies in educational contexts has been mostly positive as new technologies have given educators the opportunity to enhance their knowledge, skills, and therefore enhance the standard of education. Researchers have found that student engagement, achievement and motivation are enhanced through integration of such technologies. However, education systems still face many challenges: one of these challenges is how to enhance student engagement to provide better educational outcomes. It has become increasingly important to use innovative pedagogical models to engage learners. Digital storytelling is one of the innovative pedagogical approaches that can engage students in deep and meaningful learning. This research project aimed to create a constructivist learning environment with digital storytelling. The research investigated the pedagogical aspects of digital storytelling and the impact of digital storytelling on student learning when teachers and students use digital stories.

A multi-site case study was conducted in one Australian school at primary and secondary levels. In selected classrooms, students and teachers had the opportunity to engage in innovative learning experiences based on digital storytelling. In order to enhance the reliability and validity of the research, multiple methods of data collection and analysis were used. Data was collected with qualitative and quantitative methods. An evaluation rubric was used to collect quantitative data, while interviews and observation were used to collect qualitative data. Data collection was guided by a mixed methods research design in order to evaluate if and how digital storytelling enhances teaching and learning outcomes.

The findings from this study suggest that digital storytelling is a powerful tool to integrate instructional messages with learning activities to create more engaging and exciting learning environments. It is a meaningful approach for creating a constructivist learning environment based on novel principles of teaching and learning. Thus, this approach has the potential to enhance student engagement and provide better educational outcomes for learners.

Introduction

From ancient times to the present, storytelling has served as a popular education tool, utilised to pass knowledge from one generation to another. Over the past few years drastic changes have been experienced in the processes used for creating stories, the variety of media used to convey the message, and the target audience. Storytelling, in general, is a powerful pedagogical approach that can be used to enhance learning outcomes for general, scientific and technical education (Sharda [ 2007 ]). Stories have been told as a way of passing on traditions, heritage and history to future generations. Even today people continue to tell stories through new digital media tools. A digital story can be viewed as a merger between traditional storytelling and the use of multimedia technology (Normann [ 2011 ]). Technological advances, such as digital cameras, editing software and authoring tools, have increased the use of technology in the classroom to help students in constructing their own knowledge and ideas to present and share them more effectively (Standley [ 2003 ]).

As confirmed by Armstrong , computers, digital cameras, editing software, and other technologies are becoming more readily accessible in the classrooms, and provide learners and teachers with the tools to create digital stories more easily than ever before (Armstrong [ 2003 ]). Furthermore, digital storytelling helps students to develop their creativity to solve important problems in innovative ways (Ohler [ 2008 ]). It is an effective pedagogical tool that enhances learners’ motivation, and provides learners with a learning environment conducive for story construction through collaboration, reflection and interpersonal communication. Students can use multimedia software tools as well as other technology skills to create digital stories based on given educational issues.

Digital storytelling is used as an embodiment of multimedia production for education purposes. Therefore, this is becoming a part of our lives, and is on the threshold of becoming an important part of teaching and learning as well. All of this is being facilitated by ready access to hardware, such as digital cameras and scanners, in conjunction with easy to use software. Many educational institutions have already been exploring the application of digital storytelling for the past few years (Robin [ 2008 ]).

The power of storytelling as a pedagogical tool has been recognised since the beginning of humanity, and in more recent times, for e-Learning (Neal [ 2001 ]). Digital storytelling has become a modern incarnation of the traditional art of oral storytelling; it allows almost anyone to use off-the-shelf hardware and software to weave personal stories with the help of still/moving images, music, and sound, combined with the author’s creativity and innovation.

This research project aimed to explore the impact of digital storytelling on student engagement and learning outcomes. It focuses on exploring the potential of digital storytelling as an innovative teaching and learning approach, and investigates the impact of digital storytelling on student learning. The research involved a case study of an Australian P-12 school. It explored the use of digital storytelling within the primary and secondary curriculum. In selected classrooms students and teachers had the opportunity to engage in innovative learning experiences based on digital storytelling.

The outcomes of this research project aim to help teachers and learners tap into the power of digital storytelling and partake in more engaged teaching and learning.

Background and literature review

In recent years, our lives have become more involved with technological tools. Developing technology resulted in new generations being more technology savvy than their parents and, even more so, their grandparents. Consequently, researchers have argued that “the impact of the digital technologies and especially the Internet in the 21st century post-secondary classroom is unquestionable and dramatic” (Tamim et al. [ 2011 ]).

According to Prensky, today’s students are the first generation to grow up surrounded by digital technology (Prensky [ 2001 ]). During their daily lives these students have been routinely exposed to computers, electronic games, digital music players, video cameras and mobile phones. They are immersed in instant messaging, emails, web browsing, blogs, wiki tools, portable music, social networking and video sites (Prensky [ 2001 ]; Lea & Jones [ 2011 ]; Sternberg et al. [ 2007 ]). These technologies allow them to communicate instantly and access any information from virtually any place by pushing a few buttons (Autry & Berge [ 2011 ]).

It is likely that the rise of some changes in educational practice, such as distance education, online learning and blended learning, has been the response to the integration of computers and the Internet to the new generation’s lives (Tamim et al. [ 2011 ]). Today’s school environment includes technology, and teachers use it on a daily basis; the basic school infrastructure includes computers, printers, scanners, digital cameras and the Internet, and the majority of teachers have access to word processing, calculations, multimedia and communication software (Hsu [ 2013 ]). According to Pitler, “Applied effectively technology not only increases students’ learning, understanding, and achievement, but also augments their motivation to learn, encourages collaborative learning, and develops critical thinking and problem-solving strategies” (Pitler [ 2006 ]). Therefore, attention should be given to the subject of technology integration (Sadik [ 2008 ]).

Storytelling

Throughout the history of human and social development, storytelling has been used as a tool for the transmission and sharing of knowledge and values, because it is a natural and yet powerful technique to communicate and exchange knowledge and experiences. Its application in the classroom is also not new; and in relation to the use of storytelling in the classroom Behmer stated, “Storytelling is a process where students personalise what they learn and construct their own meaning and knowledge from the stories they hear and tell” (Behmer [ 2005 ]).

Over the last two decades, however, much has changed in how stories can be planned and created; and, as a result, how multimedia can be used to facilitate the dissemination of stories. With the increased use of computers to tell stories, by using a variety of hardware and software systems, there has been a significant improvement in the way stories can be created and presented (Van Gils [ 2005 ]). According to Normann, “People have always told stories. It has been part of our tradition and heritage since the time we gathered around the fire to share our stories. Today people still tell stories, but now we have new media tools with which to share them. A digital story can hence be seen as a merger between the old storytelling tradition and the use of new technology” (Normann [ 2011 ]). To some extent, traditional storytelling and the application of computer technology in education have followed different paths to date (Banaszewski [ 2005 ]). Thus, there is a need to further increase the convergence of storytelling and the use of computers in the classroom. It has been argued that technology is more useful when it is used as part of a broader educational improvement agenda (Pitler [ 2006 ]).

Fortuitously, with the increase in computer power and associated cost reduction, computers and related technologies can play a significant role in making storytelling a more widely used pedagogical tool, given that “Digital storytelling provides students with a strong foundation in what are being called ‘21 st Century Skills’” (Miller [ 2009 ]). While the essential technology is currently accessible in the classroom, storytelling has not been fully recognised as a valuable tool for developing students’ learning skills and achieving 21st century learning outcomes.

• Digital storytelling

Digital storytelling emerged at the Center for Digital Storytelling in California in the late 1980s as a method employed by community theatre workers to enable the recording, production, and dissemination of stories (Lambert [ 2009 ]). Normann defines digital storytelling as “a short story, only 2–3 minutes long, where the storyteller uses his own voice to tell his own story. The personal element is emphasised, and can be linked to other people, a place, an interest or to anything that will give the story a personal touch” (Normann [ 2011 ]). This has developed in a number of ways, shaped by advances in personal computing and recording technology, and by its use in a range of academic and non-academic contexts (Normann [ 2011 ]; Clarke & Adam [ 2012 ]).

Digital storytelling is defined by The Digital Storytelling Association, as a “modern expression of the ancient art of storytelling” (The Digital Storytelling Association [ 2011 ]). Although there is not a single digital storytelling definition, the majority emphasise the use of multimedia tools including graphics, audio, video, and animation to tell a story. Benmayor’s digital storytelling definition is: “a short multimedia story that combines voice, image, and music” (Benmayor [ 2008 ]). According to Kajder, Bull & Albaugh, a group of still images, combined with a narrated soundtrack, constitutes a digital story as long as they relate a story. Focusing on its presentation on screen, Alan Davis offers another definition of digital story as “a form of short narrative, usually a personal narrative told in the first person, presented as a short movie for display on a television or computer monitor or projected onto a screen” (Kajder et al. [ 2005 ]).

Meadows offers a more technology-focused definition, where digital storytelling makes use of low-cost digital cameras, non-linear authoring tools and computers to create short multimedia stories to accomplish social endeavours of storytelling. It is a technology application which takes advantage of user-contributed content and assists teachers in utilising technology in their classrooms (Meadows [ 2003 ]).

Digital storytelling: a constructivist approach to learning

In recent decades, various learning paradigms have been used to enhance teaching and learning practice; each one of these learning theories, such as behaviourism, cognitivism and constructivism, has its own perspective on learning methods. Before explaining the main concepts underpinning each of these theories, first let us consider what a learning theory is. According to Hill, a learning theory is the attempt to explain how people (and animals) learn, and a paradigm to understand what is fundamentally involved in the learning process (Hill [ 2002 ]).

The Behaviourism school founded by Thorndike, Pavlov and Skinner, was based on the assumption that learning changes behaviour, and resultant responses outside the environment (Thorndike [ 1913 ]; Pavlov [ 1927 ]; Skinner [ 1974 ]). Behaviour patterns include the use of direction signs and learning practice. A change in behaviour is based on corresponding changes in observable aspects of learning and the learning process. The key elements of behavioural patterns are motivation, answers, and the connection between them. One of the most important features is the incentive present for learning within a learning environment (Jung [ 2008 ]).

Compared with behaviourism, which explores students’ behaviour, cognitive theories inquire into the processes driving the behaviour. It places greater emphasis on the environment to facilitate the learning process (Jung [ 2008 ]). Cognitivism focuses on the construction, organization and arrangement of educational content to facilitate optimal management of information, and how to remember, store, and retrieve information. In addition, learning is seen as a dynamic process, which is created by the learners themselves (Anderson [ 2008 ]).

Constructivism is one of the most influential educational approaches developed in recent times. It overlaps the cognitive learning school in many ways; however, it is characterised by its emphasis on learning through the use of authentic contexts, and a focus on the importance of the social dimension of learning. Wilson defines it as “a place where learners may work together and support each other as they use a variety of tools and information resources in their guided pursuit of learning goals and problem-solving activities” (Wilson [ 1996 ]).

In addition, according to Anderson the constructivist has more than a simple perspective on learning, recognising that people explain the learnt information and the world around them, based on their personal vision (Anderson [ 2008 ]). Jonassen argues that learning environments should offer constructive, active, intentional, collaborative, complex, conversational, contextualised and reflective learning (Jonassen et al. [ 1999 ]). To sum up, the most important learning characteristics of constructivism are that learners can build on their own interpretation of the world, depending on experience and interaction, and that will generate a new understanding through the collection of knowledge from various sources (Duffy et al. [ 2012 ]).

On the other hand, the education theories developed in the 20th century consider teaching and learning as more than mere interaction or transmission of knowledge (Daniels [ 2001 ]; Dewey [ 2007 ]; Vygotsky et al. [ 1978 ]; Wells [ 1999 ]). These theories consider teaching as a specific paradigm of teacher–student interaction, where the desired role of the adult is a collaborator and/or co-constructor.

Bouman defines learning as the acquisition of knowledge or skills through experience, practice, or study, or by being taught. He classifies learning under different headings: the two main ones are student-led and teacher-led learning. Student-led learning is a process of learning information where students ask questions of one another, while they assist each other as peers in discussing the method used to acquire the answers to those questions; students are also allowed to work with one another in a student-centred environment. Teacher-led learning is currently the most popular form of teaching students. This method involves the teacher holding all the information and sharing it with the students over time. The most recent works in the literature favour student-led over teacher-led learning since it leads to longer retention. This hinges on the fact that when students take a more active role in their learning process, this results in a more meaningful connection to the information (Bouman [ 2012 ]).

The learner’s active position is strongly emphasised as it is indispensable for the development of lifelong learning skills (Verenikina [ 2008 ]). The zone of proximal development (ZPD), developed by Vygotsky (Wells [ 1999 ]), is defined as the distance between what a student can do with or without help (Vygotsky et al. [ 1978 ]). The main focus in the ZPD is to ensure that students are actively engaged in learning that will make them self-directed, lifelong learners in the long run. In this sense, teaching becomes a co-construction of knowledge between learner and teacher. It also facilitates further transformation of that knowledge into individual student knowledge (Verenikina [ 2008 ]; Dakich [ 2014 ]).

Digital storytelling can thus facilitate a constructivist approach for teaching and learning. It can be a helpful educational tool, as it provides a vehicle for combining digital media with innovative teaching and learning practices. Apart from building on learners’ technology skills, digital storytelling encourages additional educational outcomes (Dakich [ 2008 ]). It enhances learners’ motivation, and helps teachers in building constructivist learning environments that encourage creative problem solving based on collaboration and peer-to-peer communication. In addition, digital storytelling can be used to facilitate integrated approaches to curriculum development, and engage learners in higher order thinking and deep learning (Dakich [ 2008 ]).

Consequently, as the literature review has revealed, digital storytelling is a powerful model for creating constructivist e-Learning environments. Digital storytelling has the potential to engage learners in integrated approaches to learning with digital media. Furthermore, digital storytelling enhances learners’ motivation, and helps teachers in building constructivist learning environments. To facilitate the harnessing of these pedagogical benefits we need an overarching framework for creating digital stories. This framework should be cognisant of the needs and capabilities of learners at their various stages of learning (i.e. catering for learners from primary school to university level, and even professional e-Learning content creators).

This research presented a new e-Learning Digital Storytelling (eLDiSt) framework to be able to use digital storytelling as a pedagogical model for constructivist learning (Additional file 1 : Appendix A). This framework was developed for application of digital storytelling at various stages of learning. The e-Learning Digital Storytelling (eLDiSt) framework also articulates how storytelling can be used at different levels of education. The eLDiSt framework is designed primarily as a tool to help story creators in producing engaging digital stories, the framework is based on thirteen storytelling aspects and five levels, and each aspect advances in complexity as the learner’s level advances from level one to five. It considers the needs and abilities of learners at different stages of learning, including learners from primary school to university, and even professional e-Learning content creators. With the help of this eLDiSt framework, digital storytelling can be used as an efficient and effective learning tool at various levels of education. Different aspects identified in this framework enable teachers as well as students to fully grasp the elements required for an engaging and educative digital story.

Therefore, the mission of this research is to create a methodology for building constructivist learning environments based on digital storytelling, the outcomes of this research project aim to help teachers and learners tap into the power of digital storytelling and partake in more engaged teaching and learning.

This research project investigated impact of digital storytelling on student engagement and outcomes. It focused on exploring the potential of digital storytelling as an innovative teaching and learning approach and its potential to enhance student engagement and student outcomes. This research involves a multi-site case study of an Australian P-12 school, and explores the use of digital storytelling within the primary and secondary curriculum. In the selected classrooms students and teachers had the opportunity to engage in innovative learning experiences based on digital storytelling. In order to enhance the reliability and validity of the research, both qualitative and quantitative methods of data collection and analysis were used. A rubric was used to collect quantitative data, while interviews and observation were used to collect qualitative data. Data collection and analysis of the feedback provided by teachers was based on mixed methods research to thoroughly evaluate the benefits of digital storytelling vis-à-vis teaching and learning.

Research questions

The rationale for this project is to explore the pedagogical benefits of digital storytelling. Therefore, the overall research question is: How can digital storytelling enhance the student engagement and provide better educational outcomes for learners? This question can be divided into the following sub-questions:

How can digital storytelling be used to enhance student engagement?

How can digital storytelling be used to improve educational outcomes?

What are teacher perceptions about student learning through digital storytelling?

Significance of the study

Since the main aim of this research is to investigate the impact of digital storytelling on student learning, the outcomes of this research will enable both teachers and students to tap into the power of digital storytelling, leading to more engaged teaching and learning. This study contributes to new understandings of how to create authentic and constructivist learning contexts that can be used in a range of educational settings. The research focuses on how to implement digital storytelling in the classroom, describing the digital story workshop, and explaining teacher roles and student tasks; i.e. this research gives a clear picture of how to integrate digital storytelling into schools. Therefore, it is expected that the new knowledge generated by this research will inform educational policy and practice.

Methodology

A case study design that uses multiple case studies was chosen for this research (Mello [ 2001 ]). Case study research is a qualitative approach in which the researcher explores a case or multiple cases over time, involving multiple sources of information, for example, observations, interviews, documents and reports (Yin [ 2009 ]; Creswell et al. [ 2007 ]). The research methodology is designed to utilise both quantitative and qualitative methods. As previously mentioned, this research aims to explore the pedagogical benefits of digital storytelling; therefore, this research will focus on the level of the student engagement and the associated educational outcomes using digital storytelling. In order to achieve a complete understanding of these phenomena, both quantitative and qualitative data were collected.

Classroom observations

To record both qualitative and quantitative observations an observation tool was created (Additional file 1 : Appendix B). This observation tool was adapted from WestEd ([ 2002 ]) to fit the purpose of this study. This tool contains three different forms:

Pre-observation form (qualitative)

Timed observation form (quantitative)

Field notes form (qualitative)

The pre-observation and field notes forms were used to collect qualitative data. The pre-observation form was used to collect information about the class being observed, objectives of the story, and materials used. Whereas the field notes form was used immediately after the class, to write up research notes.

The timed observation form was used to collect quantitative data about the use of new technologies. The timed interval observation sheet is divided into several components, analysed for the percentage of time each variable observed in the classroom. To collect data, the observer checks the presence of various attributes of technology integration observed during three-minute intervals. The check marks for the noted intervals are then tallied for an overall distribution of observed events (Sadik [ 2008 ]). This observation was conducted to examine the quality of student engagement in authentic learning tasks using digital storytelling, and specifically focuses on: class collaboration, knowledge gain, student roles, teacher roles, student engagement, technology integration and modes of learning.

Evaluation rubric

In addition to classroom observations, a scoring rubric was used by teachers to assess the quality of the digital stories created by the students. This stage had two different aims: to assess the level of student engagement, and document the educational outcomes achieved through digital storytelling. The level of engagement is a quantity that can be measured with the help of a scoring rubric. According to Sadik, it is appropriate to use an assessment instrument, such as a scoring rubric, to evaluate ICT-based learning projects (Sadik [ 2008 ]). Therefore, the role of digital storytelling was assessed by means of an evaluation rubric. An evaluation rubric created by the University of Houston ([ 2011 ]) was chosen as a guide to create the rubric for this research (Additional file 1 : Appendix C). The evaluation rubric included nine criteria; these are: Purpose, Plot, Pacing of Narrative, Dramatic Question, Story Content, Grammar and Language Usage, Technological Competence, Emotional Content and Economy of Content. Four levels of descriptors were given for each category, with scores of 4, 3, 2, or 1 possible, depending on the level of success in that area.

Teacher interviews

Once the level of engagement was measured, we needed to ascertain the educational outcomes associated with digital storytelling. To perform this step qualitative data was collected through teacher interviews. After conducting interviews, the interview data were analysed to identify the benefits related to the use of digital storytelling as a pedagogical approach, and the teacher’s opinion about integrating new technologies in their curricula and classroom.

Therefore, three different methods were utilised for data collection: observation, teacher evaluation rubric, and interview. Timed observation and field notes were used as the observation method, while a scoring rubric instrument was used for teacher assessment. Finally, an interview protocol was used for interviewing the participating teachers. The overall conclusions will be extracted by integrating the findings of each method (Creswell [ 2008 ]).

Participant groups

This study involved five teachers from prioritised curriculum areas (Science, Art, English, Library and Social Studies) to integrate digital storytelling into the primary and secondary school curriculum during third and fourth terms in 2012.

Table  1 lists the details of each setting including the subject area in which the digital storytelling was implemented, the number of students, and days spent observing the project development, including viewing the digital story.

Implementation of digital storytelling in classrooms

Since the main aim of this research was to investigate the impact of digital storytelling on student learning when teachers and students use digital stories, and evaluate if and how digital storytelling could enhance student engagement and improve educational outcomes; the next section will focus on how digital storytelling is implemented in the classroom, describing the digital story workshop, and explaining the teachers’ roles and students’ tasks (Smeda et al. [ 2012 ]).

As mentioned by Sadik, the use of technology is only effective if the teachers have the expertise to customise the use of technology for story creation. The benefits can only be received if teachers have the ability to use it in the classroom effectively (Sadik [ 2008 ]). Therefore, the researcher started by giving an orientation seminar, followed by workshops to teachers during the first two weeks to support and engage them in the project.

The following steps were used to help teachers easily integrate digital storytelling in their classroom. It is not the only way to implement digital storytelling; however, it can provide clear strategies on how to integrate digital storytelling when teachers and their students do not have any previous training in digital storytelling (Ohler [ 2008 ]; Sadik [ 2008 ]; Miller [ 2009 ]; Kajder et al. [ 2005 ]; [ University of Houston 2011 ]; Smeda et al. [ 2012 ]; Robin [ 2006 ]; Sharda [ 2005 ]; Lasica [ 2006 ]).

Teachers’ workshop

Two workshops were conducted for the teachers with the following main objectives:

Introduce Digital Storytelling (Workshop 1):

Objective: Describe the concept of digital storytelling

Facilitator: Researcher

Description: The workshop started with a conversation about teachers’ experiences with digital sound, video, and storytelling. An overview of possible strategies for using digital storytelling as a medium for engaging students and improving learning outcomes. The potential power of digital storytelling as a teaching and learning tool was then explored within the constructivist paradigm.

Introduce Moviemaker software (Workshop 2):

Objective: Describe how to create a digital story with the Moviemaker software

Description: In this workshop Moviemaker software was introduced to the teacher with an explanation of how to create a digital story using this software; various features and options available in Moviemaker were demonstrated.

Students and teacher roles

Students at different levels have different skills and knowledge, so they need different levels of help. For example, primary school students who have basic skills and knowledge need more direction and guidance to create a digital story. Obviously, students in different grades might need different levels of assistance and scaffolding. Therefore, students worked under the supervision of their teachers, and depending on each individual student, teachers provided help in constructing and creating the story. It is expected that the level of teacher support and the extent of scaffolding may vary across levels; teachers were prepared to provide this support through a series workshops ([ Smeda et al. 2012 ]).

Using the following lessons, teacher and student worked together to create the digital stories step-by-step:

Lesson 1: brainstorm

The objective of this lesson is to brainstorm the story. Typical expected duration is 1 to 3 days. In this lesson, teachers divide students into groups and allocate topics for them to discuss between themselves, share their ideas with each other and brainstorm the story in different ways. The students jot down ideas and write the initial narrative for the story for a particular topic the teacher had given them.

Lesson 2: storyboard

The purpose of this lesson is to create the storyboard. The estimated duration is 2 to 4 days. In this lesson, teachers help their students in writing the storyboard to organise the story sequences. They also help students clarify the main ideas of the story. Students, on the other hand, create the storyboard and select the right element(s) for it. They may also start by writing a draft of their storyboard. This assists in planning the visual materials in the right order, and thinking about how to match images or videos with the voiceover and music.

Lesson 3: search the material

This lesson is directed towards collecting the material required to create the digital story over a period of 2 to 4 days. Teachers demonstrate to their students how to look for images from different sources such as books, magazines, and the internet. They also explain copyright and digital rights issues related to the materials used. Furthermore, teachers show the students how to use the digital camera, if required. It is the students’ responsibility to choose elements which match their digital story such as photos, videos, and music.

Lesson 4: creating the digital story

The objective is to use Moviemaker software for creating a digital story. Due to the amount of work associated, the duration of this lesson is 5 to 10 days, the longest among digital story creation steps. For teachers, this lesson is designed to help students create the digital story and explain how to import pictures and videos into the Moviemaker software. Moreover, teachers help the students who want to record their voices and use them within the story. The students created the digital story based on the storyboard by importing the elements to Moviemaker software and recording their voice to add to the narrative and test if it works effectively with the digital story. They can also add special effects and adjust the length of each visual element. This is achieved by choosing and adding some special effects, such as music and transitions, to make the story more attractive, adjusting the length of each visual element to make sure it matches the narration, and this is done over the entire digital story.

Lesson 5: editing and feedback

This lesson is aimed at editing and finalising the digital story, after the student has created its first version. The duration of this lesson is 1 to 3 days. In this lesson teachers provide some feedback to incorporate further improvements before the final draft of the digital story. Students revise and edit the drafts based on teachers’ comments and feedback. Then they discuss the final drafts with the teacher and other students. The final form of the story is prepared based on these comments and feedback.

Lesson 6: presentation and evaluation

The final step of digital story creation is about presenting and evaluating the finalised digital stories over 1 or 2 days. Teachers attend the student presentation and evaluate them based on story elements, story creation and presentation. The sole responsibility of the students in this lesson is to present the digital story to teachers, classmates, and parents.

Results and discussion

Individual case studies using mixed methods constitute the body of this research. Data for this study was collected through observations, the evaluation rubric, and teacher interviews. Five separate case reports were prepared. The case reports aim to answer the research questions; and a cross-case matrix was developed for each research question. The intent of the study was not comparative, due to the fact that it was conducted in a single school and all five practice case studies were conducted at different educational levels such as Years 3–4 in primary school, and Year 11 in secondary school. In addition, the approach assumed in the implementation of this research was dependent on teachers. Therefore, in one-class students worked autonomously, while in others they worked in groups.

Considering all the above parameters, the main focus of the research was not to perform a comparative analysis, but rather to evaluate the effects of digital storytelling on education. The intent was to capture the benefits of using digital storytelling to explore student engagement and outcomes, as well as teacher experience with digital storytelling.

Therefore, in this section will focus on the main conclusion derived from the discussion of main findings related to student’s engagements and learning outcomes, as well as the teacher perceptions about digital storytelling as a pedagogical tool.

Enhancing engagement

The findings of this research indicate that levels of student engagement fluctuate between moderate and high. In other words, students were always engaged in the classroom. The use of software and conducting searches for digital media took these levels to very high, and were the highest for student presentations. In all cases students liked using technology, searching the internet, and watching other digital stories. There were some differences in implementation. For instance, Year 7 students had very low engagement levels when they had to complete their storyboards. Year 9 students had a constant, high level of engagement as they occasionally presented their completed works. Some Year 11 students’ lack of interest in school curriculum presented as an engagement problem. However, the use of digital media managed to increase their engagement level. This finding is supported by Dupain and Maguire who argued that educators continuously need methods to engage students’ interest with teaching material. With the aid of the latest developments in technology, classrooms welcome digital storytelling as a means of teaching, and students are motivated to conceive an academic concept and transmit their own (Dupain & Maguire [ 2005 ]).

The above findings are also in agreement with the current literature which encourages this new teaching approach, that is, digital storytelling permits students to utilise technology in an effective manner. Provision of appropriate resources and editing tools paves the way for student motivation and maximises its positive effect (Sadik [ 2008 ]; Morris [ 2011 ]). This encourages students to put more effort into their stories and to create quality products.

Yet another result confirming the above findings is reported by Gils, this research showed that pupils are more engaged with the practical environment. Digital storytelling makes practice and training more engaging, diverse, and customised to their needs and challenges, which makes it more realistic. In this sense, it encourages students to focus on using English to communicate with classmates. Digital storytelling has the advantage of engaging three different senses: hands, eyes and ears. It also increases students’ technical literacy (Van Gils [ 2005 ]).

On the other hand, the findings of this research indicate students had a hard time getting engaged in the class when they had to finish their storyboard; some students were not interested in any school activity including digital storytelling. Therefore, they had a low engagement level. However, when these students started recording their own videos, engagement levels increased significantly.

Consequently, it is possible to use digital storytelling to integrate instructional messages with learning activities to create more engaging and exciting learning environments. This teaching approach enhances emotional interest and cognitive attention, and reflects consistent and reliable transfer of knowledge in line with modern learning theories. Considering Barrett’s findings, it can be concluded that digital storytelling combines student engagement and effective integration of technology into instruction, which are student-centred learning strategies (Barrett [ 2006 ]).

Fostering collaboration

The findings of this research indicated that students work collaboratively and engage with digital content. They did more work while directly using applications and digital resources, such as the internet and/or libraries, instead of conventional printed media, such as books. This research also observed collaboration between groups where different groups helped each other with technical or grammar issues. This increased their levels of communication.

The above findings are in agreement with Standley who found that the creation of digital stories encourages collaboration between students, which in turn leads to the utilisation of various cognitive capabilities. Moreover, when working in a group, individuals pay more attention to content (Standley [ 2003 ]).

In addition, other researchers have found similar findings to those in this research. According to them, the digital learning experience can promote collaborative studying and encourages students to share resources online. Students’ skills are also enhanced by using databases and internet sources. Furthermore, digital content ensures that different groups are helping each other, as networked digital content connects the whole class; students who participate in digital storytelling projects have better communication, organisational skills, and more confidence in terms of asking questions and expressing opinions (Robin [ 2006 ]; VanderArk and Schneider. [ 2012 ]; Hung et al. [ 2012 ]).

The fact that students helped one another in problem solution and concept development reinforces the idea that cooperation and collaboration levels are increased with digital storytelling, in other words students have a higher engagement level when they are working in groups to create a story.

In conclusion, this research demonstrates that digital storytelling can increase students’ collaboration and communication skills.

Transforming learning

This research affirms that digital storytelling is suitable for a constructive approach to learning; because students work on their own story after receiving basic instructions from the teacher. Students have their own individual approach based on their interactions and experiences and generate novel outputs by using different sources in their creation of the digital story. These findings are in line with those reported by other researchers, such as Garrard who observed that digital storytelling supports constructivist learning and concluded that digital storytelling is a good method of teaching with positive impacts (Garrard [ 2011 ]).

In addition, the findings of research conducted by Normann concur with this research. He concluded that digital storytelling is a perfect way of learning new things and to implement constructive approaches to education, he reported that the method of conducting lessons impacted the students’ approach to learning activities (Normann [ 2011 ]).

The constructivist approach has several perspectives on learning since it recognises that human beings use their own personal vision in explaining the acquired information (Duffy et al. [ 2012 ]). This was supported by teachers in our study who concluded that digital storytelling permits students to learn by doing, and providing a flexible learning environment enables students to use their own ideas.

In addition, the findings of this research confirm that facilitating or scaffolding the learning process is the teacher’s main role. At the beginning, tasks, software and digital storytelling are explained by the teacher, which requires a teacher-led mode. Following this step, students have the necessary knowledge from which to start working autonomously, with some teacher supported learning.

Robin, who has a similar outlook on digital storytelling, found that a story created by the teacher will help students to enhance their abilities. The teacher thus builds the framework for discussing storytelling topics and makes conceptual and/or abstract subjects more comprehensible. Building on experience and knowledge with teacher support, students create their own story using iMovie and/or Moviemaker. Thus students improve their skill set with teacher support in project development (Robin [ 2008 ]).

This has significant congruence with Miller’s findings, i.e. students imitate interactions with their teacher and use these interactions to help others, thus building their interpersonal skills and confidence (Miller [ 2009 ]).

Building digital literacy

This research indicates that the utilisation of digital storytelling in education increases skills. Teachers witnessed that digital storytelling via technology integration assisted students, and helped them overcome their problems. As supported by Ohler, who viewed digital storytelling as a concept supporting creativity, students could solve crucial problems in unprecedented ways. Furthermore, teachers viewed digital storytelling as a valuable tool to increase research skills. A myriad of skills, such as spelling, writing, teamwork or collaborating with students and teachers, can be improved. Needless to say, the uptake of technology improves technical skills (Ohler [ 2008 ]). Sadik arrived at a different conclusion in his research, where classroom observations and interviews showed that the use of technology is only effective if teachers have the expertise to customise content for story creation (Sadik [ 2008 ]).

In addition, the findings of teacher interviews indicate that digital storytelling is an effective tool to help students improve their technical skills and information literacy. Students have the opportunity to choose the skill they want to work on and improve. This may include individual skills, such as spelling and writing, as well as interpersonal skills such as working in a team, or collaborating with students and teachers. Miller also found that in every class engaged in digital storytelling, one student acted like a tutor. This student not only worked on the project, but also provided technical support to peers in terms of developing their stories. In this sense, students are empowered to use their strongest skills, and improve them. Their research skills are also honed during video searches, scanning images and selecting audio content for the story (Miller [ 2009 ]).

Also, the findings indicated that teachers believe that the use of stories in education is very beneficial for countries receiving immigrants, such as Australia, because a digital story incorporates multiple aspects of the curriculum, and all teachers should use this medium at some stage. One teacher commented that in their school, where they work with many students from non-English-speaking countries, students welcome the opportunity to express themselves through visual media, rather than more words; it facilitates communication for new students and builds their confidence. Similar finding were reported by Benmayor who stated that digital storytelling can help learners to transfer their knowledge, skills and culture, thereby evolving their thinking process and helping them gain confidence. Accordingly, digital storytelling can be classified as an asset based pedagogy (Benmayor [ 2008 ]).

Additionally, the findings of teacher interviews indicated that, with digital storytelling, not only students but the teachers also got the opportunity to improve their technological skills. This included the use of electronic devices such as personal computers, cameras and recorders. Miller reported similar findings. She stated that digital storytelling is the best application for teachers to encourage students to increase their use and knowledge of technology and technical skills. Furthermore, in order to create these stories, not only the students but also the teachers are obliged to increase their technical proficiency in using personal computers, digital cameras, recorders, etc. This helped teachers keep up with the latest technology (Miller [ 2009 ]).

Personalising learning experience

The findings of this research show that digital storytelling can cater for greater diversity by personalising student’s experience. It can help them improve their confidence, and contribute to enhanced social and psychological skills. It can also be used to support students with special needs such as ESL a and VCAL b students.

These findings are in line with other research outcomes reported in literature. Van Gils found that personalised education is one of the main advantages of digital storytelling. He argued that learners can present their experiences, reflections and evaluate their achievements while creating digital stories (Van Gils [ 2005 ]). According to Ohler, digital storytelling helped students to become active participants rather than passive consumers of information (Ohler [ 2008 ]).

Academic efforts that focus on the benefits of digital storytelling are supported by government agencies. Several governing and regulatory authorities have been working on improving the education system in terms of motivation, learning outcomes and professional integration. For instance, the Australian Curriculum in Victoria (AusVELS) was specifically designed to ensure that curriculum content and achievement standards established high expectations of all students (AusVELS [ 2013 ]). According to AusVELS students are expected to enrich their learning experience, not only in a single aspect of the curriculum, but in all areas. It is known that students in Australian classrooms have varying needs based on individual’s learning histories, abilities, cultural and educational backgrounds. In recognition of this fact, the Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) is developing additional curriculum to promote learning outcomes for students with disabilities, and/or to assist students from different linguistic and learning backgrounds (ACARA [ 2013 ]).

This fact is also recognised by the UNESCO program for the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. It considers storytelling to be one of the modules which can be used to equip students with professional learning and teaching skills. This helps students achieve a wide range of knowledge, skills and values, which is the objective of Education for Sustainable Development (UNESCO [ 2010 ]). The use of storytelling in Australian schools is bound to have a lasting impact, since it is defined by UNESCO as “a key teaching strategy for achieving the objectives of education for sustainable futures” (p.1).

Consequently, suffice to say that digital storytelling has, inter alia, the benefit of increasing student motivation, especially for those students who have difficulties with reading and writing, allowing personalisation of the learning experience, acquiring experience with in-depth and comprehensible reading and becoming more proficient at technical aspects of language. Digital storytelling can be used to develop personalised learning experiences for students, thereby responding to diverse individual needs.

Impact of digital storytelling on student outcomes

As the latest report for the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) indicated that the use of technology in education can increase various skills of learners, the findings of this research also suggested that digital storytelling can enhance several learning skills including writing, designs, library and research, technology and communication.

In addition, digital storytelling can help students with tasks they previously found very difficult including spelling, sentence formation and building, and forming the whole body of a text; this integration of technology assisted students to overcome their writing problems.

However, age and ability to learn technological subjects have some impact on the outcomes. When compared with primary school students, secondary school students have the ability to learn more and faster. They use the internet and computers more than primary school students. This was apparent during the study, especially where primary school students worked exclusively on their stories in the class, secondary school students worked on their stories, both inside and outside the class.

Furthermore, teachers observed that students were learning without realising. Provided that students are clearly informed about the task that is required of them, digital storytelling is useful as an all-round skill development tool; the use of digital storytelling can therefore reinforce various complementary skills.

The findings of the cross-case analysis based on the rubric data are presented in the following sections.

Overall mean level of student scores

Figure  1 shows the mean of overall scores received by students for digital story quality for all cases. The overall scores were very close, despite the differences in age, subject, knowledge, technology use, etc. Nevertheless, the students in primary school (i.e. ESL and Years 3/4), received the lowest scores while those in secondary school had much better results. There are two reasons for this. Firstly, primary school students did not have prior exposure to Moviemaker software while more secondary school students had used it before.

Overall scores for digital story quality for the five case studies.

Furthermore, age and ability to learn technological subjects have sme impact. When compared with primary school students, secondary school students have the ability to learn faster and learn more. They use the internet and computer more regularly than primary school students. This was apparent during the study where the primary school students worked on their stories only in the class. On the other hand, secondary school students worked more regularly on their stories, both inside and outside the class.

It is observed that the subject does not impact student performance. However, the approach taken by the teacher proved to have significant impact. This was observed in two cases. In Years 3–4, the teacher observed that students were struggling with their writing and opted to introduce software so that the students had a clear idea about what was required of them. This additional step increased student performances.

In Year 7, the teacher asked the students to present their work when it was finished. Consequently, almost every fortnight there was a story presentation in class and this contributed to their engagement and better performance. Year 11, Victorian Certificate of Applied Learning (VCAL) students were a special case. There were two groups, one of which was working very well, while the other group was not interested in school work. Although digital storytelling created some interest in the second group, especially during video shoots and presentation, it was not easy to engage them with the overall task. They did not work on the story creation, required constant help from the teacher and received a very low mark.

Overall performance based on evaluation criteria

Figure  2 shows the mean score obtained for the selected criteria for the five case studies. This shows that primary school students performed well in story aspects such as purpose, plot, pacing of narrative, dramatic question, story characters, and emotional content. This is because they planned their storyboard well. The key to their success was that they spent more time in writing and editing their story with some help from the teacher, before actually starting the creation process. However, they did not perform as well in technological components, emotional content and economy of the story. Nor did they perform as well in the “Dramatic Question” and “Grammar and Language Usage” since their knowledge of English was limited.

Mean Score for criteria for the five case studies.

On the other hand, secondary school students were a complete contrast. They performed not so well in the story aspects since they did not want to spend much time writing and storyboarding. This affected their scores in “Plot” and “Pacing of Narrative”. Their competency in technology helped them receive high marks in technological components such as “Technological Competence”, “Emotional Content” and “Economy of content”. This can be traced back to their age group and knowledge in technology use.

Teacher perceptions about student learning through digital storytelling

Teachers had a positive attitude towards the use of digital storytelling as a teaching tool in their classrooms, as both students and teachers had the opportunity to improve their technological skills, which included the use of various electronic devices, as previously mentioned.

Teachers indicated that digital storytelling increased and enhanced the use of technology in the classroom, which helped students improve their technical skills and information literacy; digital storytelling can also be applied to subjects such as English and History, and in almost all the sciences including mathematics, social studies and humanities.

Furthermore, teachers confirmed that the use of digital stories in education is beneficial for countries receiving immigrants, such as Australia. The ability for expression through visual media, rather than words, facilitates communication for new students and builds their confidence. In addition, teachers fulfilled the role of facilitator, consultant, and could scaffold the learning process more effectively when they used digital storytelling in class.

Since the main aim of this research was to investigate the impact of digital storytelling on student learning, the outcomes of this research will enable both teachers and students to tap into the power of digital storytelling and more engaged teaching and learning. This study contributes to new understandings of how to create authentic and constructivist learning contexts that can be used in a range of educational settings. The research focused on how to implement digital storytelling in the classroom, describing the digital story workshop, and explaining teacher roles and student tasks; therefore, this research gives a clear picture of how to integrate digital storytelling into schools. Consequently, the new knowledge generated by this research can inform future educational policy.

Furthermore, a number of story development models have been created in the past to help educators achieve better learning outcomes with digital storytelling; however, none of these models provide a holistic pedagogical framework for engaging students with digital storytelling during various stages of learning. This research presented a new e-Learning Digital Storytelling (eLDiSt) framework for using digital storytelling as a pedagogical model for constructivist learning.

In addition, even though the findings of this research are important and have the potential to inform policy, practice and theory, generalisations could not be derived due to the following reasons. The research only included participants from one school (even though there were two levels: primary and secondary) and limitations related to the participant sample used, since unequal numbers of students from primary and secondary schools took part in this research. In future research this limitation could be overcome by using multiple sites instead of one school, and the same participant sample, if possible. Another issue is related to the limited access to technology in the school; the students faced some technical problems while creating their digital stories, also there was some shortage of computers in the labs.

The results of this research indicate that digital storytelling can provide support to students with special needs, such as ESL and VCAL students. In addition, digital storytelling can help students to improve their confidence, and can contribute to better social and psychological skills.

a English as Second Language.

b Victorian Certificate of Applied Learning.

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful for the support we received from East Preston Islamic School; we would like to thank all the students and teachers who participate in this research. Also we would like to acknowledge the support and help provided by Prof. Neil Diamond and Dr. Ewa Sztendur for their statistical support in analysing the data.

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Najat Smeda & Nalin Sharda

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NS is a lecturer at Al-Jabel Al-Gharbi University, Libya.Najat received her PhD from the College of Engineering and Science at Victoria University in Melbourne, Australia , her research project titled “Creating a Constructivist Learning Environment with Digital Storytelling”. She received her Master’s degree from University of Twente, Netherlands in technology applications in education and training. She finished her Bachelor’s degree from University of Al-Jabel Al-Gharbi, Libya and she worked as an academic teaching member at University of Al-Jabel Al-Gharbi, Libya for more than 8 years. ED is a Senior Lecturer and Program Leader of Secondary Teacher Education at the Faculty of Education, La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia. ED was a recipient of the Australian Postgraduate Award and has published widely about the pedagogical and social transformations occurring in the digital age. These included a co-edited book, book chapters, journal articles, monographs and refereed conference papers focusing on 21 st century learning and digital inclusion. Eva worked as a researcher and consultant on large Australian research projects, such as the National Evaluation of The Smith Family’s Tech Packs Project (2009-2010), as well as on the Evaluation of the Victorian Technology Enriched Curriculum Project, TECP (2011-2013), a Closing the Gap initiative. She is committed to transdisciplinary research and supervision of doctoral candidates, and works internationally with colleagues from a variety of scholarly disciplines. She is a member of several international associations promoting new learning and eCitizenship. NSh gained B.Tech. and Ph.D. degrees from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi. Presently he teaches and leads research in innovative applications of computer technologies at the College of Engineering and Science, Victoria University, Australia. NSh publications include the Multimedia Information Networking textbook, and around 120 papers and handbook chapters. Nalin has invented Movement Oriented Design (MOD) paradigm for the creation of effective multimedia content based experience, and applied it to e-Learning and other applications. NSh has led e-Tourism projects for the Australian Sustainable Tourism CRC, and is currently guiding research in the innovative applications of ICT systems to sustainable living. NSh has been invited to present lectures and seminars in the Distinguished Lecturer series of the European Union’s Prolearn program, and by the IEEE Education Society. He has presented over fifty seminars, lectures, and Key Note addresses in Austria, Australia, Finland, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia, Pakistan, Japan, Singapore, Sweden, Switzerland, UAE, and USA. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Additional file 1: Appendix A: The e-Learning Digital Storytelling (eLDiSt) Framework. Appendix B: Classroom observation protocol. Appendix C: The scoring rubric instrument. (DOCX 62 KB)

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Smeda, N., Dakich, E. & Sharda, N. The effectiveness of digital storytelling in the classrooms: a comprehensive study. Smart Learn. Environ. 1 , 6 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40561-014-0006-3

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How Stories Connect And Persuade Us: Unleashing The Brain Power Of Narrative

Elena Renken

When you listen to a story, your brain waves actually start to synchronize with those of the storyteller. And reading a narrative activates brain regions involved in deciphering or imagining a person's motives and perspective, research has found. aywan88/Getty Images hide caption

When you listen to a story, your brain waves actually start to synchronize with those of the storyteller. And reading a narrative activates brain regions involved in deciphering or imagining a person's motives and perspective, research has found.

When you listen to a story, whatever your age, you're transported mentally to another time and place — and who couldn't use that right now?

"We all know this delicious feeling of being swept into a story world," says Liz Neeley , who directs The Story Collider, a nonprofit production company that, in nonpandemic times, stages live events filled with personal stories about science. "You forget about your surroundings," she says, "and you're entirely immersed."

Depending on the story you're reading, watching or listening to, your palms may start to sweat, scientists find. You'll blink faster, and your heart might flutter or skip. Your facial expressions shift, and the muscles above your eyebrows will react to the words — another sign that you're engaged.

A growing body of brain science offers even more insight into what's behind these experiences.

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Storytelling Helps Hospital Staff Discover The Person Within The Patient

On functional MRI scans , many different areas of the brain light up when someone is listening to a narrative, Neeley says — not only the networks involved in language processing, but other neural circuits, too. One study of listeners found that the brain networks that process emotions arising from sounds — along with areas involved in movement — were activated, especially during the emotional parts of the story.

As you hear a story unfold, your brain waves actually start to synchronize with those of the storyteller, says Uri Hasson , professor of psychology and neuroscience at Princeton University. When he and his research team recorded the brain activity in two people as one person told a story and the other listened, they found that the greater the listener's comprehension, the more closely the brain wave patterns mirrored those of the storyteller.

Brain regions that do complex information processing seem to be engaged, Hasson explains: It's as though, "I'm trying to make your brain similar to mine in areas that really capture the meaning, the situation, the schema — the context of the world."

Other scientists turned up interesting activity in the parts of the brain engaged in making predictions. When we read, brain networks involved in deciphering — or imagining — another person's motives, and the areas involved in guessing what will happen next are activated, Neeley says. Imagining what drives other people — which feeds into our predictions — helps us see a situation from different perspectives . It can even shift our core beliefs, Neeley says, when we "come back out of the story world into regular life."

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'there's no fruit or veg': u.k. nurse makes emotional plea to panicked shoppers.

Your Brain On Storytelling

Listeners, in turn, may keep thinking about the story and talk to others about it, she says, which reinforces the memory and, over time, can drive a broader change in attitudes.

Different formats of information — lists of facts, say, or charts — may be better suited to different situations, researchers say, but stories wield a particularly strong influence over our attitudes and behavior.

In health care contexts, for example, people are more likely to change their lifestyles when they see a character they identify with making the same change, notes Melanie Green , a communication professor at the University at Buffalo who studies the power of narrative, including in doctor-patient communication. Anecdotes can make health advice personally important to a patient, she finds. When you hear or read about someone you identify with who has taken up meditation , for example, you might be more likely to stick with it yourself.

Stories can alter broader attitudes as well, Green says — like our views on relationships, politics or the environment. Messages that feel like commands — even good advice coming from a friend — aren't always received well. If you feel like you're being pushed into a corner, you're more likely to push back. But if someone tells you a story about the time they, too, had to end a painful relationship, for example, the information will likely come across less like a lecture and more like a personal truth.

Neeley has been taking advantage of these effects to shift perceptions about science and scientists in her work with Story Collider. "We try and take everybody — all different people and perspectives — put them onstage, and hear what a life in science is really like," she says.

Solid information in any form is good, Green says. "But that's not necessarily enough." A vivid, emotional story "can give that extra push to make it feel more real or more important." If you look at the times somebody's beliefs have been changed, she says, it's often because of a story that "hits them in the heart."

This story adapted from an episode of NPR's weekday science podcast Short Wave.

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Storytelling as research offers insights into society’s needs

Buying or obtaining groceries and preparing food may sound like mundane tasks, but collecting information on how people seek and connect with food can actually foster understanding and help us communicate in a polarized world, said Nicole Welk-Joerger.

Welk-Joerger, former deputy director of UWM’s Center for 21st Century Studies , directed the center’s Story Cart Project , in which UWM graduate students and researchers traveled with a mobile cart to 27 Milwaukee locations to question strangers about food.

They went to grocery stores, farmers markets, food pantries and even a few block parties to record interviews and invite participants, including kids, to talk about or do artwork about food in their lives. Questions included where they usually gather their food, how they get to those places, and what meaningful, trusting food connections look like to them.

“There are historical, sociological, political and environmental conditions that impact why we do the things that we do day-to-day,” Welk-Joerger said. “So those impacts will be incorporated into the stories we collect.”

The Story Cart Project spans multiple years and themes, exploring three topics that foster or push back on ideas of democracy. This year, interviews focused on the theme of “Nourishing Trust” with food stories. Last year’s project, “ Lonely No More! ,” centered on people’s views about loneliness or connectedness. For next year’s project, which gets underway in spring, the theme is “Trust in the Vote.”

For “Nourishing Trust,” location was key to gathering different kinds of stories, so the C21 researchers chose neighborhoods that reflect Milwaukee’s diverse population.

By summer’s end, the graduate students had amassed more than 10 hours of audio recordings, hundreds of photographs and dozens of drawings. The information has inspired “Milwaukee Food Journeys: A Story Exhibition,” featuring the creative interpretation of artists affiliated with LUNA and True Skool .

The interactive mixed media installation highlights issues of food access, food justice and how Milwaukeeans think about sustenance and trust. The exhibit is on display at The Table , 5305 W. Capitol Drive, until the end of the winter market season.

Where food and democracy intersect

Because the results are closely tied to places, they figure prominently in the next step of the project – mapping the information.

“Mapping this will be a really eye-opening because then you will be able to see that, within only a few minutes’ drive, how different people’s habits are and if that’s by necessity or choice,” Welk-Joerger said. “But we’re also interested in the commonalities it will reveal. Because, if we’re trying to find ways to have hard conversations about public issues, we need to know what we have in common.”

Jessie Thompson, a master’s student in the Sustainable Peacebuilding program, worked as a story cart interviewer during the summer. The program is closely related to other work she is involved in – helping to build a sortable map of all the food actors in the county.

“This will help determine where the needs are. For example, in the Milwaukee ZIP code 53206 there’s a high concentration of food pantries, but not a lot of grocery stores,” Thompson said. “So we’re trying to dig into the system and ask why this is happening.”

An eye-opening experience

For interviewer and doctoral student Jamee Pritchard, the Story Cart experience was often “eye-opening.” She remembers speaking to a nurse who said that every member of her household was employed, yet they still had to supplement their food budget by signing up for SNAP benefits and using food pantries.

“I also noticed that the theme of food and trust came out in the interviews,” Pritchard said. “Many of the people we spoke to said they did not trust the food at traditional grocery stores and preferred to shop at farmer’s markets or stores like Outpost, where they felt more comfortable with the quality and freshness of the food.” One interviewee, she said, refused to shop in Milwaukee and drove to Madison instead.

Yuchen Zhao , a doctoral student in the Urban Studies Program, also joined the Story Cart team this year. He was drawn by his own scholarship that examines how food places link people and how food is integrated into the family culture.

Food as culture

He remembers a story that came from two Hmong farmers who were selling their produce at the Fondy Farmers Market. Zhao wanted to know what pantry food is common in the Hmong community. Hmong families, the farmers told him, gather to make and eat spring rolls together.

“The entire thing is a social event,” he said. “For my own interests, I wanted to see what the cultural traditions are. Through the stories we’re collecting, we can get a broader understanding of those cultural aspects.”

Others who were involved in the project were AJ Segneri, doctoral student in geography; Haley Rose Steines, master’s student in art history; Muriel Marseille, doctoral student in urban studies; and Spanish translators Maria Julia Baldor and Maria Estrella Sotomayor.

The Nourishing Trust Story Cart Project was funded in part by the USDA’s Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program with additional support from the College of Letters & Science, the Center for 21st Century Studies, The Table and Alice’s Garden.

By Laura Otto, Marketing & Communications

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The Stanford Storytelling Project  is an arts program at Stanford University that explores how we live in and through stories and, even more importantly, how to deepen our lives through our own storytelling. Our mission is to promote the transformative nature of traditional and modern oral storytelling, from Lakota tales to  Radiolab , and empower students to create and perform their own stories. The project sponsors courses, workshops, live events, and grants. In 2012, we created a new radio show,  State of the Human,  where we share stories that deepen our understanding of single, common human experiences—fighting, giving, lying, resilience—all drawn from the experiences and research of the Stanford community. Download our podcast on  iTunes,  Spotify, Soundcloud, and other platforms.

Current Staff

Jonah willihnganz , director.

Jonah has taught literature, writing, and critical theory at Stanford since 2002. He published fiction, essays, and literary criticism, and currently researches how narrative practices can help develop capacities such as presence, courage, empathy, and belonging.  In 2014 he co-founded the LifeWorks Program for Integrative Learning in the Stanford School of Medicine, an experiential education program that helps students learn practices for developing insight and compassion about themselves, others, and the world.  He  holds a PhD in English from Brown University and an MFA in Creative Writing from Hollins University. He is currently trying to write three books at the same time. It’s slow going.

Laura Joyce Davis, Managing Editor & SSP Lecturer

Laura is the Executive Producer and host of the award-winning narrative podcast Shelter in Place, CEO and co-founder of NarrativePodcasts.com, and a  Podcast Magazine  Top Influencer in Podcasting. Her work has been recognized with a Social Impact Award for Mentoring and DEI initiatives, a Fulbright scholarship, a  Poet & Writers  Exchange Award, and the International Women’s Podcasting Award for “Changing the World One Moment at a Time.”

Melissa Dyrdahl, Senior Producer

Melissa was most recently a Stanford University DCI Fellow, where, thanks to Jonah Willihnganz, her love of storytelling was reignited. A strong believer in the benefits of intergenerational learning, Melissa enjoys mentoring students of all ages. In addition to practicing her story craft skills, Melissa runs a small organic farm and worries about who will be the next Masked Singer.

Megan Calfas, Program Coordinator

Megan is a multi-disciplinary storyteller based in San Francisco. As a journalist, she has reported on the environment for the Los Angeles Times and investigated maternal mortality in Zanzibar.  She produces the podcasts  The Feminist Present  and  In Bed With the Right . At Stanford and beyond, she has coached over 150 people on telling their true, personal stories live on stage. Most recently, she directed and produced a sold-out run of the original live storytelling show  Crushing  at Dixon Place Theater in New York City. Her original play, Sleepover , will premier at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in August 2024.

Dawn J. Fraser , Senior Producer

Dawn J. Fraser is a storyteller, podcaster and nationally acclaimed communications coach based out of San Jose, CA. She’s the Founder/ CEO of Fraser’s Edge, Inc, which provides coaching and consulting services for businesses, thought leaders and creatives to develop their leadership potential through storytelling. Past clients have included Google, the Gates Foundation and Spotify, as well as many notable celebrities. Dawn serves as a Senior Producer at the Stanford Storytelling Project, a Lead Instructor with The Moth and was featured among some of the nation’s top change makers at TED@NYC. She loves being a twin, a Trinidadian, and touch-baseable at  www.dawnjfraser.com

Student Producers

Ana De Almeida Amaral  (she/her) is a chicana storyteller from southern San Diego in California. She studies Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity at Stanford and aims to center marginalized voices in everything she creates. Her work is heavily influenced by her passion for bilingual storytelling and liberatory community organizing. When she is not working on her stories, you can find her listening to vinyl, hanging out with her grandma, and journaling at the beach.

Natasha Charfauros  is a Junior majoring in Economics. She loves podcasts that highlight the importance of self-discovery, environmental sustainability, and cultural heritage and educational series that focus on personal finance and professional development. During school, you can find her on campus at the Native American Cultural Center or at club meetings at Stanford Women in Business.

Destiny Cunningham  is a Senior from Chicago, IL, and majors in American studies with a focus on disability, gender, and race in American literature and media. She finds joy in actively listening to others’ stories, recognizing the power of each individual’s unique experiences. Outside of SSP, you can find her working on theater productions as BlackStage’s Vice President. 

Max Du  is an AI researcher by day and a writer by night. As a storyteller, he is especially interested in the human-animal relationship: the mysticism, the controversies, the spirituality. In addition to working on pieces for the Storytelling Project, he is currently doing fieldwork for a non-fiction book that features the stories of whale & dolphin trainers. He also enjoys writing fiction whenever he gets the chance.

Aru Nair (she/they) is a senior from Laramie, Wyoming studying Human Biology and Comparative Literature. Her favorite part of being a producer at SSP is working alongside other students to create audio stories about culture and identity. Storytelling in all its forms (audio, video, writing) is one of their biggest passions because of its incredible power to bring people together. In her free time, Aru loves watching live music, hiking, and playing board games.

Carolyn Stein  has been with the Storytelling Project since her freshman year. Originally from Los Angeles, she is double majoring in Communication and East Asian Studies and hopes to use storytelling in her future career endeavors. When she isn’t conducting interviews or listening to podcasts with other producers, you can find her going on unnecessarily long walks.

Alina Wilson  studies human biology with a concentration in medical humanities. She is drawn to the power stories have to facilitate meaning-making, connection, and healing. She can be found learning to play the drums, practicing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and Muay Thai Kickboxing, and walking confidently in the wrong direction while exploring new places.

Shameeka “Smeek” Wilson  is a doctoral candidate in education. Her research interest spans multiple topics within education. Shameeka was born and raised in North Carolina and is very proud of her Southern roots. She readily allows these roots to shine through while she produces audio stories. When she isn’t consumed with doctoral work and audio producing, she enjoys the simple things in life. Nature walks, trying new recipes, and binge-watching reality TV are among her favorite pastimes. She also enjoys traveling, cross-stitching, and shenanigating with her immediate and extended family.

Former Staff and Contributors

More From Forbes

Storytelling: a powerful tool for early-stage companies.

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Valerie Chan is the Founder and Principal of Plat4orm, a strategic communications agency.

Stories help companies connect with their audiences. They appeal to human senses and emotions, forming a visceral link. They provide a channel through which organizations can reflect back customers’ problems, setting the company up to be the hero. Stories transform abstract ideas into something relatable so buyers can easily learn about new concepts. With a unique spin on a common storyline, organizations can also stand out from the competition. Fundamentally, stories are a powerful way to deliver a message—especially for companies just starting out.

Storytelling For Early-Stage Companies

No one knows this better than the founders of Warby Parker. They told a story about cofounder Dave Gilboa, who lost his glasses on a backpacking trip and would have had to pay $700 to replace them . They spun a tale about how that problem inspired them to transform the optical industry, producing stylish, affordable eyewear that buyers could get online and try at home.

They told that story again and again. Soon, investors , customers and the media were hooked. In September 2021, Warby Parker went public, and today the company is valued at around $1.6 billion .

The takeaway: In the early years—before the product is even market-ready—a tight story can fill the gaps and generate demand. Warby Parker's success demonstrates just how powerful storytelling can be for connecting with customers, investors and even cofounders. ­Ultimately, it reveals just how critical storytelling is at the beginning of the company life cycle (before substantial revenue is coming in).

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Trump vs. harris 2024 polls: harris’ lead grows—winning by 5 points in one survey, samsung slashes galaxy s24 price ahead of iphone 16 release, founder narratives: the foundation of early storytelling.

Central to the Warby Parker story were the founders themselves. Founder narratives are often the key to early storytelling—people want to know who they’re spending their dollars with.

Regularly sharing the founder's story humanizes the brand and builds trust with audiences, especially in those early days. More specifically, people are drawn to authentic expertise. Investors want to back experts to ensure a return, and customers want to buy from experts to feel safe using the product.

If the founder is already an expert in the field, storytelling should tie in their previous successes. All pitching and marketing should reference that earned expertise. If the founder isn’t an expert, they need to build credibility in a different way. Maybe they had success in another market and have a strong hypothesis that similar tactics might work in this industry, or maybe they’ve brought in a partner to supplement their skill set.

Take Audible, for example, and its founder Don Katz. Katz had no direct experience in tech when he launched Audible. He was simply a writer who liked jogging and wanted a better experience listening to books during his runs. He leaned into that story to appeal to publishers in the early days, but most importantly he hired experts around him. In a recent story about Katz’s success , Audible’s former chief technology officer and chief scientist, Guy Story, shared that, "Don always tried to hire people who knew things he didn't know.” Audible was bought by Amazon in 2008 for $300 million thanks to this strategy.

Compelling founder narratives develop a kind of soul for the company; they lay the early groundwork for company culture. As the founders’ vision and “why” get shared more often, their values and personality show through. The result: More talent will be motivated to work with the company, more customers will be motivated to buy from it, and more investors will be motivated to back it.

Early-Stage Storytelling To Investors Vs. Customers

When it comes to investor storytelling in particular, companies must tell stories in a language that investors understand, which means leaning on data and forecasting to drive the plot. Story backers are looking for a financially viable business model. They want narratives about market potential, product-market fit, scaling up and projected gains––and they want these stories delivered with passion. Investors need to know that leaders have what it takes to see the project through. Companies should also make clear how investors fit into the storyline. What strengths do they bring to the vision? How will they help write the conclusion of the story?

Customer storytelling, on the other hand, should focus on pain points and lean into those problems with empathy, understanding and expertise. Customers need a “why” to buy. By storytelling around a core problem that customers face in their daily lives, organizations can cultivate an emotional connection and then find ways to introduce the product as a solution. While cost and functionality matter, customers care most about buying from a reputable, trustworthy vendor. That means early-stage storytelling must be authentic and values-aligned to build a relationship with potential customers.

The Mechanics Of Early Storytelling

For young companies, telling the right story requires some groundwork. Audience research on customer attitudes and behaviors helps construct a relatable, impactful story. These insights also guide tone, style and delivery—ensuring the story resonates and meets customers where they are (in the right communication channel).

Carefully defining values, mission, purpose and other brand pillars can create a consistent, recognizable, authentic framework for delivering stories. When customers, investors and reporters hear a story that reflects those brand pillars over and over again, they’ll be more likely to remember it and repeat it to others.

Early-stage organizations should pair audience research and early brand work with competitive analysis to build a storyline that speaks to the company’s core differentiators, focusing on how they solve the core problem better than anyone else. Highlighting those differences in the storyline will make it clear to customers and investors why the company is the best choice.

Storytelling Is A Strategic Asset

Especially in the early years of building a business, storytelling isn’t simply a marketing tool; it's a strategic asset. Effective storytelling builds credibility, connects with audiences on an emotional level and differentiates the brand in a crowded market. By centering founder narratives, tailoring messages to specific audiences and focusing on the mechanics of telling a good story, companies can build a loyal customer base, attract the right investors and set the foundation for a successful future.

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What makes a story successful? Researchers have figured out a way to predict it

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Narrative reversals, or changes in fortune that take characters from heights to depths and vice versa, are a good predictor for how successful a movie, TV show or book will be, Northeastern marketing researchers say.

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There are very few universal truths about humanity, but one thing is for certain: We love stories.

Whether it’s movies, TV shows, books, political campaigns or even advertisements, people are constantly being told or telling stories every day. Entire industries are built around storytelling and understanding which stories connect with people the most.

It’s why a group of researchers at Northeastern University have tried to crack the code and answer one question: What makes a story successful?

“If you watch ‘Mad Men,’ you see it’s more of an art form, having an inspiration of how to tell a beautiful story and everything falls in place and it just magically works,” says Yakov Bart , a professor of marketing at Northeastern. “But lately a lot of people have been thinking maybe it’s not just art –– maybe there’s some science to this as well.”

By applying advanced quantitative analysis and statistical techniques to tens of thousands of movies, TV shows, books and even fundraising pitches, the researchers found one core element of storytelling that helped predict a story’s success with audiences: narrative reversals. 

Most people are familiar with what a narrative reversal is, even if they don’t know it by name. Something is going well for a character –– Romeo falls in love with Juliet –– only for something bad to happen to that character –– Tybalt, Juliet’s cousin, is enraged and tries to kill Romeo. Or a character is down in the dumps and has a positive experience that changes things for the better.

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“We develop a way, using these advanced text analysis techniques, to quantify and try to measure the frequency and intensity of narrative reversals across a wide set of storytelling contexts,” says Samsun Knight, a research affiliate at Northeastern’s DATA Initiative and published author. “We show that this does indeed predict which stories tend to be more successful. This holds even if you look in a given TV show which episodes are more successful.”

Using a collection of 30,000 texts, which included TV shows, movies, books and fundraising pitches, the researchers analyzed them based on how positive or negative the language in a given section was. Based on that, they were able to measure how well things are going for the characters in a given story and when that situation changed, or reversed.

They counted the number of reversals that took place in each story, also measuring the frequency and intensity of each reversal and discovered it’s a fairly accurate predictor of how well a story will connect with people. In this case, that meant a movie or TV show’s audience rating on IMDb, how frequently people downloaded a book and how much money a fundraising pitch earned.

“It’s not the sole determiner of how successful a story is, but we were impressed with its consistency and the fact that it’s so simple,” Matt Rocklage , an assistant professor of marketing at Northeastern says. “The more of those reversals there are, the more successful these stories are, and the bigger these reversals are, the more successful these stories are.”

Knight says this research isn’t meant to create a formula for writers to tell their stories, but he hopes it can help writers avoid easy pitfalls when charting their story.

“In the most intuitive sense, people tend not to respond to places where nothing is getting better and nothing is getting worse,” Knight says. “You don’t want these sags in your story. … I love Samuel Beckett –– there are exceptions to every rule –– but broadly speaking, this type of unit of narrative propulsion tends to be exceptionally important. Leon Katz, a prominent dramaturg at the Yale School of Drama, called such narrative reversals the ‘formal unit’ of plot. In the same way that paragraphs are constructed out of sentences, a plot will tend to be structured out of reversals.”

Beyond people who are intent on writing the next Oscar-winning screenplay or bestselling novel, Knight says this research highlights how narrative reversals can be a useful tool in more practical contexts too. For those writing a cover letter to apply to their dream job or working up a fundraising pitch to sell people on their business concept, “tell it like a story,” reversals and all, Knight says.

“Tell us where the reversal came in where now you’re actually needing to ask for help or tell us where things could maybe come back up if you were to receive that help,” Knight says. “Structuring your communications with this rule of thumb in mind might help get your point across and just engage people more successfully.”

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• Volume 9, Issue 12
• Storytelling as a research tool and intervention around public health perceptions and behaviour: a protocol for a systematic narrative review
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• Becky McCall 1 ,
• Laura Shallcross 1 ,
• Michael Wilson 2 ,
• Christopher Fuller 3 ,
• Andrew Hayward 4
• 1 Institute of Health Informatics , University College London , London , UK
• 2 School of the Arts, English and Drama , University of Loughborough , Loughborough , UK
• 3 Institute of Health Informatics , UCL , London , UK
• 4 Institute of Epidemiology and Health , University College London , London , UK
• Correspondence to Becky McCall; becky.mccall.18{at}ucl.ac.uk

Introduction There is a growing trend to use storytelling as a research tool to extract information and/or as an intervention to effect change in the public knowledge, attitudes and behaviour (KAB) in relation to public health issues, primarily those with a strong element of disease prevention. However, evidence of its use in either or both capacities is limited. This protocol proposes a systematic narrative review of peer-reviewed, published literature on the use of storytelling as a research tool within the public health arena.

Methods and analysis Medline, EMBASE, PsycINFO, ERIC (Educational Resources Information Center), Web of Science, Art and Humanities database (ProQuest), Scopus and Google Scholar will be searched for studies that look at the use of storytelling in the research of pressing current public health issues, for example, vaccinations, antimicrobial resistance, climate change and cancer screening. The review will synthesise evidence of how storytelling is used as a research tool to (a) gain insights into KAB and (b) to effect change in KAB when used as an intervention. Included studies will be selected according to carefully defined criteria relevant to public health issues of interest, and data from qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies will be extracted with a customised data extraction form. A narrative synthesis will be performed according to Economic and Social Research Council guidance from Popay, J, 2006.The study protocol follows the recommendations by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocols (PRISMA-P).

Ethics and dissemination Formal ethical approval is not required for this study, as no primary data will be collected. Dissemination will involve publishing results of this study in relevant peer-reviewed journal(s). Where possible, the study results will also be presented as posters or talks at relevant medical conferences and meetings.

PROSPERO registration number CRD42019124704

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This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See:  http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ .

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2019-030597

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Strengths and limitations of this study

The review will provide information on how storytelling has been used in important public health issues, for example, climate change, vaccination and cancer screening.

The review will inform further use of storytelling in these and other public health issues, in particular antimicrobial resistance, to gain insight on public perceptions, and to communicate and disseminate information, and to potentially effect change in relevant behaviours.

This study protocol follows the recommendations by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocols.

The selection of studies, and data extraction will use systematic review management software (SUMARI; Joanna Briggs Institute, Australia), and critical appraisal will use the QATSDD quality assessment tool, developed by Sirriyeh, R and colleagues, 2012, which is suitable for the quality assessment of qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies. The review will be conducted by two independent authors.

Studies included following this review protocol are unlikely to be homogeneous in methods limiting the ability to draw reliable conclusions and generalisations.

Introduction

Stories and storytelling help us to make sense of our thoughts and experiences, our interactions with the environment and each other, to formulate our beliefs, our identities and our values. 1 Most poignantly, the making of stories ‘reveals things to us that we know but didn’t know we knew’, according to phenomenological philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty in 1964. 2

Essential to storytelling is that it seeks to convey an experience in such a way that it seems real. 3 There is appeal in storytelling because it often presents information incorporated within a personal account that engages the reader and may validate their own experiences. 4

A story is often loosely defined as having a beginning, a middle and an end, with a protagonist (often human), an object, a practice or an idea, followed by a form of transformation or conflict. 5 Throughout the relevant literature, the term ‘narrative’ is often used interchangeably with ‘story’. However, the events that comprise a certain story can be presented in many different ways forming different narratives, chronologically or not, but the story remains the same. Reshuffling the order of events changes the narrative, not the story. 6 The terms ‘story’ and ‘storytelling’ will be preferred in this review, unless specific cases require the use of ‘narrative’.

Storytelling as a research method

This review seeks evidence of peer-reviewed studies that use storytelling as a research method or tool and relates to people telling their personal stories of real-life or authentic experiences around public health issues.

The process of storytelling has multiple research aims. Included in these aims is its ability to inform the researcher (through extraction of information), but also as an intervention to facilitate a process of ‘reflection and reworking of experience and knowledge in the research participant’. 7 Storytelling has been used as a tool to gain insight into public knowledge, attitudes and behaviour (KAB), for example, storytelling has been used with African-American women who fail to attend breast cancer screening and has revealed attitudes and behaviour driven by pain, fear, loss and faith in God. The same research also used storytelling to clarify misinformation, validate personal experiences and enhance learning around the importance of screening. 8

It needs to be noted that unlike more conventional qualitative research methods, storytelling is an emergent research method and validation remains to be established. However, lack of a substantial body of validation does not justify dismissing storytelling as a research method. Ideally, this review will identify studies that provide evidence of the validity of storytelling as used in the research context.

Storytelling has been used as a research method in various disciplines, some of which touch on public health, some of which are removed from it. For example, social work, 9 10 healthcare and its delivery, 11 understanding marginalised communities 12 and anthropology, 13 to provide a few examples.

In attempting a definition of storytelling as a research tool, first, there is a distinction to be made between science and storytelling/narrative as two research paradigms. Second, storytelling needs to be distinguished from other forms of narrative research, for example, narrative medicine. According to Bleakley, science and narrative are two ways of knowing. Bleakley points out the value of story compared with more conventionally analytical methods that ‘tend to lose the concrete story and its emotional impact to abstract categorisations, which may claim explanatory value but often remain descriptive’. Essentially, within clinical education at least, Bleakley refers to how narrative offers value over and above objective measures, pointing out that while objective morbidity and mortality data characteristically remain faceless, narrative inquiry often seeks to personalise and also to engage proactively with its research population through deliberate intervention, as research with, not on, people. 14

Reflecting Bleakley, this systematic review aims to find examples of where research has been carried out with people (within the context of various public health topics) rather than on people, and work that seeks to engage proactively with the study population via storytelling as a method.

Storytelling as a research method shares some similarities but also notable differences to narrative medicine as a research method. According to Columbia Narrative Medicine, Columbia University Irving Medical Center, ‘narrative medicine fortifies clinical practice with the narrative competence to recognize, absorb, metabolize, interpret, and be moved by the stories of illness’. 15 Physician and advocate of narrative medicine, Rita Charon, in a paper in JAMA, describes narrative medicine as, ‘Medicine practiced with narrative competence,… is proposed as a model for humane and effective medical practice’. 16 Narrative medicine appears to be more closely aligned with physicians’ practice and the patient–physician relationship (aimed at improving patient care) than the storytelling research method that this systematic review aims to explore. This review aims to seek data on KAB from members of the public and does not serve the purpose of improving a physician–patient relationship or improving care as directly as narrative medicine appears to do.

In practice, storytelling as a tool in research might adopt various formats. One that has found prominence in recent years, with an emergent literature base generally, as well as in the field of health research, is digital storytelling (DST) comprising a 25 min video 17 , a 3–5 min short video, 18 ‘Photovoice’ (photo collections to promote dialogue) 19 or verbal telling of personal stories. 8 20 DST has the potential to capture lived experiences and share research findings in a manner that is highly engaging and possibly made accessible on a digital platform. 21

Storytelling as a research tool alongside conventional qualitative research methods

Storytelling as a qualitative research method is still an emergent area and may serve to complement data sourced via more conventional, empirical qualitative research methods. However, certain nuances of individuals’ insights associated with their experiences might not be accessible via some of these more established methods of inquiry.

Moreover, stories do not reveal one, single discoverable truth because truth is a matter of degree and perspective. In this respect, using the telling of a story as a research tool rests on a premise that is starkly different to that of a conventional scientific method. 5 Both the established scientific method and the storytelling research method each provide a distinctive way of ordering experience and constructing reality, and using the two knowledge systems to complement and enhance each other might provide broader and more in-depth insight into an experience than using one method alone.

In a discussion paper by Dahlstrom, the author addresses storytelling as a means to communicate science to non-expert audiences. According to Dahlstrom, narratives are easier to comprehend, and audiences find them more engaging than traditional logical-scientific communication. The nature of learning from storytelling differs from that derived from more conventional scientific information, for example, from statistical data. Scientific information provides abstract truths that can be applied to a specific case, as in deductive reasoning, whereas narrative information follows inductive reasoning, which often involves a depiction of an individual experience from which an inference to a general or even a collective truth can be made. 22

Storytelling is a highly nuanced means of communication, usually articulating cause-and-effect relationships between events over a period of time, and often in relation to a certain character. 16 It is also grounded in a level of realism that might be less evident with other forms of communication. Storytelling potentially draws on commonalities between the story or the storyteller and the listener or reader. This, combined with the underlying assumption of credibility in the teller’s story or experience, can potentially motivate and persuade individuals towards behavioural change and reduces resistance to any action implied by the message. 23

Studies have used stories and storytelling for their value in both communicating with and influencing others. Among the reasons for choosing storytelling as a research tool, one of the most important is that it is a highly accessible modality that does not require specialised knowledge and skills to connect with, or derive meaning from. 24

Storytelling to change KAB in public health

Whether smoking cessation, obesity, health-related climate change or cancer screening, many of the key issues in public health today require the sharing of information in a meaningful way that resonates with the receiver and triggers a positive change in knowledge, attitudes and ultimately behaviours. The lay public largely sources its information on scientific matters in narrative format, for example, from mass media, which relies on storytelling to optimise engagement with the reader, listener or viewer. 22 In addition, most health-related knowledge and/or evidence is largely objective, often referring to statistics and appeals to logic and reason to support a certain practice or health-related behavioural change. However, there is a growing movement towards other forms of health communication including storytelling. 25

The list of public health issues that might lend themselves to storytelling as a research tool is extensive, but of key interest in this review is any public health issue that bears a personal cost in the immediate term but potentially provides a wide-scale health benefit on a population level in the longer term. Vaccination, climate change, antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and cancer screening all provide typical examples.

Of particular interest to the authors of this review is any public health issue that closely reflects key features of AMR because future research aims to focus on this topic.

Regarding AMR and antibiotic use, a 2018 report by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development estimated that AMR could cause approximately 2.4 million deaths in Europe, North America and Australia by 2050 if effective control measures are not taken. 26 AMR needs to be addressed on multiple fronts, but of interest here is the public perception of AMR and how a more nuanced understanding of this, potentially sourced via storytelling, might help to change public perceptions and practices towards antibiotic use and AMR. In 2009, Edgar et al note that ‘This [antibiotic resistance] is not a problem that will go away without a concerted effort to change the beliefs, attitudes and behaviour of key populations’. 27

Various studies shed light on the need for more, and alternative research methods to investigate public understanding of AMR and antibiotic use. 28 29 Storytelling might reveal insights not necessarily obtainable via interviews and focus groups.

Potential research would use the storytelling approach as an alternative to, or to complement other more conventional qualitative research methods, to investigate public perceptions of the issues at stake, and to potentially develop a storytelling intervention to improve understanding and behaviours.

Rationale for the review

The rationale for this systematic narrative review rests on the premise that storytelling may have value as a qualitative research method used in the context of a public health issue with global impact.

To explore this, the review will involve two stages aimed at arriving at the most relevant studies for full-text review. Stage 1 will involve a search that will be wider in the scope of public health issues included than in stage 2, and will involve basic quantification of peer-reviewed studies on the use of storytelling as a research and/or an interventional tool in public health. Stage 2 will involve the careful selection of topics that will enter into later stages of the review. Topics will be selected based on certain criteria outlined in table 1 , but essentially, topics of interest will be public health issues with a strong preventative element that involve a personal cost in the immediate term but population-wide gain in the long term.

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Characteristic criteria of public health issues used to select topics for full text review (four examples are provided; the criteria used here will be applied to other public health issues found as part of the search and selection process)

This systematic narrative review proposes to explore storytelling as a means of sourcing data to uncover public KAB through gathering, analysing and critiquing, as well as to explore storytelling as an intervention used in the research context to effect change in KAB.

To synthesise studies that use storytelling as a research tool for understanding and/or influencing public opinion on public health/prevention issues.

This systematic narrative review aims to

Quantify the distribution of peer-reviewed, published studies that use storytelling as a research tool according to the public health issue.

Use narrative synthesis to report on studies that employ storytelling as (a) a research tool to gain insight into KAB, and/or (b) an intervention to effect change in KAB.

Determine the nature and value of storytelling by

Describing the nature of, and the value of information obtained via storytelling,

Determining to what extent storytelling can uncover the barriers and facilitators (mis/information, mis/beliefs, mis/understanding) that underlie perceptions and behaviours relating to certain public health issues, and to what extent storytelling as an intervention may effect change in these respects,

Determining the impact and validity of storytelling as a research tool to source information, and/or to engage and communicate public health messages to effect change,

Comparing data obtained via storytelling to other qualitative and quantitative methods, if these data are available.

To gain understanding of how to run effective storytelling workshops with a view to guiding future research.

Research question

In accordance with the aim and objectives, the following question will guide the project:

What evidence supports the use of storytelling as a research method: (a) to gain insight on public KAB, and (b) as an intervention to effect change in public KAB, in relation to issues of public health?

This systematic narrative review will follow a comprehensive process using rigorous methodological guidelines to synthesise the diverse forms of research evidence found (different public health issues; qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies). The recommendations by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocols (PRISMA-P) 2015 will be followed. 30

The study started in June 2019 and the anticipated completion date is January 2020.

Patient and public involvement

Patients or public were not involved in the development of this protocol.

Inclusion and exclusion criteria (eligibility of studies)

Study design.

Qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods peer-reviewed primary studies that use storytelling within the context of research will be included.

Studies should include storytelling used as a research tool to extract information on KAB relating to any chosen public health topic (part ‘a’ of the research question) whether or not they formally seek to measure the validity of storytelling; and/or studies that use storytelling as an intervention aimed at effecting change in KAB whether or not they formally evaluate the impact on these outcomes (part ‘b’ of the research question).

Studies should be included if the stories are told by individuals, for example, as a community participation project that seeks storytelling of personal experiences as opposed to stories related via the media (print, online, broadcast or other media including social media). Personal stories, as told by the individual or someone close to the individual who is central to the experience being related, are sought, rather than stories that are told in a journalistic or reporting setting.

Studies that formulate a story or stories based on an integration of the findings of numerous interviews will be excluded—such studies are not first-hand, direct, personal experiences. Also, any studies that discuss storytelling or take a review format will be excluded.

Studies will most likely include participants who are members of the general public, often belonging to a defined subgroup, and/or patients. Storytelling will be shared between participants and the researcher(s).

Subject matter

According to the WHO definition, public health comprises the ‘art and science of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts of society’. 31 In this review, any public health topic that satisfies this definition but that also satisfies most, if not all, criteria listed in table 1 will be selected for full-text review. In particular, studies should have an element of prevention, for example, prevention of AMR, prevention of HIV/AIDs, prevention of climate change, prevention of future cancers or prevention of vaccine-preventable diseases. Studies should also incur some personal cost, for example, forgoing the opportunity to shorten your illness through avoidance of antibiotics, risk of adverse consequences such as severe disease following a mild infection, screening-related harm, vaccine side effects, aversion to use of condoms or inconvenience of recycling.

Studies will be excluded if they are primarily clinical in nature rather than public health related, or if they do not relate to either enhanced understanding or seek to change KAB. They will also be excluded if the public health topic addressed does not have a preventative element nor incur some personal cost in the immediate or short term.

Studies will also be excluded if they apply to highly specific population subgroups, findings of which cannot reasonably be used to guide future research.

The systematic review will be restricted to English-language studies only. An unrestricted scoping review suggests no evidence that limiting to English language only would be associated with bias.

Dates will include studies from 1990 to the present, which is a deliberately wide period of time due to the anticipated limited number of peer-reviewed and relevant reported studies available. Also, storytelling as a research tool is a relatively emergent area of research, so most papers are likely to have been published since the year 2000.

Demographics

Again, due to the anticipated limited number of relevant studies in the emergent field of storytelling in public health, studies will include populations of all age ranges and demographic backgrounds.

Types of interventions

Storytelling or digital storytelling as a research tool to understand and/or effect change in KAB towards the public health issue of interest.

Climate change

Vaccination

Cancer screening

Sexual health

Mental health

Other public health topics as found on the search

Note that not all contexts will proceed to stage 2 of the selection process if the specified criteria are not met, at least in most part.

Outcome measures

Primary outcomes.

Within the context of the public health issues selected for review, the following outcomes will be explored:

Characteristics of the stories featured in the study, including

The protagonist: a personal story, a story about others or a collective community story;

The vehicle for storytelling: written, verbal, visual, audio-visual, other;

The narrator: first or third person;

Any other relevant characteristics.

Specific aims and methods used in the studies in relation to

Storytelling used as a research tool to extract information including information on KAB,

Storytelling used to effect change in KAB when used as an intervention.

Key insights, impacts and other evidence to support the use of storytelling to

Gain insight into KAB relating to the public health issue of interest,

Effect change in KAB relating to the public health issue of interest (eg, the dispelling of misinformation, knowledge acquisition or change, or change in beliefs, attitudes and practices).

Secondary outcomes

Evidence to support the ‘validity’ or, in broad terms, the ‘value’ and ‘appropriateness’ of storytelling as a means of drawing out nuanced information on the public’s experiences, and of effecting change or having an impact on KAB. 32

Information sources

Electronic searches.

To capture all relevant studies, the search will refer to the following databases. To maximise the return of relevant articles, numerous databases will be searched given the limited history of publication in the field of storytelling in public health.

Medline, Embase, PsycINFO, ERIC, Web of Science, Art and Humanities database (ProQuest), Scopus and Google Scholar will be searched. The reference lists of identified articles will be searched for additional studies, and forward citations of identified articles will be retrieved using University College London libraries. Ongoing or recently completed trials will be searched for using alerts from the above databases.

Grey literature was considered for inclusion but determined unsuitable for this specific review because it aims to focus on studies with well-reported methodologies and findings that have been subject to peer review. Based on the scoping search and given the breadth of topics covered, together with the wide extent of grey literature, as well as the process required to filter and validate the material, inclusion would require a substantially different approach that warrants a separate study.

Search strategy

This systematic narrative review will identify relevant articles by combining search terms for storytelling; context—comprising public health issues with a preventative element; change in KAB. The provisional search terms are listed in table 2 . English language and dates 1990–present will be the only filters.

Search terms composed of concepts and synonyms (broadly based on PICO)

Study records

Data management.

The search results will be uploaded into reference management software (EndNote) to remove duplicate records of the same report. The unique records will then be uploaded into web-based, systematic review management software (SUMARI; Joanna Briggs Institute, Australia). Using this software, the initial title and abstract screening, and the full-text review will be logged. Both reviewers will use this system. All standardised forms will be piloted and revised as needed by the reviewers before starting the review.

Screening and selection process

Initial review will be by title only, or title and abstract depending on the quantity of titles returned, and the relevance of information provided.

A scoping search conducted to provide an approximate indication and map of where storytelling has been used in public health research to date found the following quantities of published studies. The search was limited to three databases and five public health topics. Search terms used in the scoping search included storytelling or stories or story; public health; knowledge or attitude* or perception* or behavio*r*. Years 1990 to present were included because storytelling is an emergent research tool and it is unlikely that relevant studies would be published prior to this date.

Climate change (Scopus 19, Web of Science 8, Medline 3);

Vaccination (Scopus 9, Medline 8, Web of Science 5);

Cancer prevention and screening (Scopus 21, Web of Science 5, Medline 13);

HIV/AIDS (Scopus 31, Web of Science 16, Medline 16).

AMR (no studies were found on storytelling in AMR in this scoping search).

Following the search across public health generally (stage 1), the screening and selection procedure will involve the selection of public health topics as determined by their fit to specified criteria ( table 1 ). Relevant studies will be quantified and a decision made regarding which public health issues and studies (using storytelling as the research tool) to advance to stage 2 which will comprise a full-text review.

In determining the relevance of each of these topics according to the criteria listed in table 1 , vaccination and cancer screening were found to satisfy all listed criteria, followed by climate change and HIV/AIDs. Despite not fulfilling all criteria, the latter two topics would still be included because they fulfil more criteria than not, for example, the only criterion not fulfilled by climate change as a topic is the existence of studies relating to large populations (to date, the use of storytelling in climate change appears to refer to specific populations, eg, Inupuits). However, ultimately findings from this systematic review will inform primary research into the public health issue of AMR and there are enough parallels between the two issues that justify retaining climate change. 33 HIV/AIDs is an issue that has seen a large amount of community participation in terms of storytelling around the topic. Given the relative paucity of published data on the use of storytelling as a research method, it is proposed that HIV/AIDs is included as a topic of interest in the search. 34

The criteria in table 1 are addressed by the following questions to be asked of studies identified by stage 1:

Is there an individual, immediate cost but a long-term population gain? Does the issue involve an element of prevention?

Is there misunderstanding, misinformation or misperception associated with the issue?

Is there a need to change KAB associated with the issue?

Which populations are most relevant to this issue? (Ideally, a ‘healthy’ population in relation to a preventative public health measure).

Are there publications on storytelling used as a research method for this issue?

The criteria in table 1 were chosen after focusing on the public health issue of particular interest to the researchers, with a view to future research, namely, on the topic of AMR. Although inconclusive, the scoping search did not yield any peer-reviewed primary studies that use storytelling in the field of AMR. Consequently, this protocol proposes that an understanding of the use of storytelling as a tool to gain insight into public KAB might be obtained through focusing on other public health issues that have parallel dimensions to AMR. As such, criteria for the selection of public health issues will be based on characteristics of AMR as a public health issue (as considered in the light of public KAB), as well as volume of studies found.

The roots of AMR are multifold; however, of concern to public KAB in particular are reasons that include the misuse and overuse of antibiotics, whether due to over-prescribing by the clinician, over-demand or misuse by the patient, or over-availability of antibiotics to the public without control measures. Essentially, one means of potentially controlling this misuse might be to improve public perception and behaviours in relation to when and why an antibiotic is needed. Forgoing an antibiotic for a minor infection might entail some personal cost, including a slightly longer illness in the immediate term, but help to reduce the development of antibiotic resistance at a population level in the long term. 35

Another key feature related to public KAB around antibiotics is the misunderstanding and misinformation about how resistance arises, as well as how antibiotics should be used. 36 There is a need among the general public to improve understanding of when and why an antibiotic is needed and how resistance develops. Satisfying this need might involve a greater understanding of public KAB as well as more effective communication and message dissemination. 37 38

In light of this, key characteristics of interest include that a personal action and cost now will prevent a wide-scale, serious public health crisis in the future (eg, AMR or poor rates of cancer detection across a population). Effectively, public health issues with a strong leaning towards preventative health issues will be a preference. Likewise, there will be a preference for issues that, to some extent, rest on a premise of misuse, misconception and misunderstanding by the general public, precipitating a need for change in these elements. Evidence for the use of storytelling as a tool to both understand the issues of concern and effect change is also required.

Due to the scarcity of peer-reviewed and published primary studies on the use of storytelling in the public health issues of interest, studies will be selected if they meet most if not all of the listed criteria.

Each study report will be categorised according to status as ‘include’, ‘exclude’ or ‘unclear’. Reasons for exclusion of ineligible studies will be recorded, and any uncertainties will be resolved by correspondence with study investigators. Articles categorised as ‘include’ or ‘unclear’ will be retrieved, and each will be independently reviewed in full-text format. A second independent reviewer will repeat all stages of the review. In cases of unresolved discrepancy between the two reviewers, a third-party adjudicator will be consulted.

The study selection process will be recorded and presented in flow diagram format according to the recommendations of PRISMA.

Critical appraisal of study quality

Critical appraisal of included studies will use the 16-item QATSDD tool developed by Sirriyeh et al for qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies. 39

There is some debate about the value of critical appraisal of qualitative research due to uncertainty around which criteria should be used to assess a study. This stems from the inherent diversity of data found in qualitative studies, the subjective nature of the data as well as the many different qualitative research methods used. Selection of the most suitable assessment criteria is therefore problematic. 40 Some researchers argue that weak studies should be excluded, but given the lack of consensus around critical appraisal tools, and the limited range of studies in the field of storytelling in public health research, on full-text review encompassing the extent to which the storytelling method and public health topic are relevant, a decision will be made as to whether to include or exclude a study. If the study comprises low quality, then this will be stated.

The QATSDD tool is designed to provide a score for the body of evidence, which is expressed as a percentage of the maximum possible score. The application of this tool also enables comparisons to be drawn between the qualities of quantitative, qualitative or mixed-methods papers within the same field of research. 39

Data extraction form

A standard data extraction form will be customised to serve the purposes of extracting data from qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies.

Data will be extracted by two reviewers and independently entered into the customised form. Disagreement will be resolved by consulting a third review author and uncertainties by correspondence with study investigators.

Information extracted will include (non-exhaustive list)

Study participants: inclusion and exclusion criteria, method of recruitment/selection and study population characteristics;

Detail of how the storytelling research tool is applied in the study (either to extract information from participants, or as a tool to effect change in KAB);

Study quality and study biases (as per the critical appraisal specified below).

Insights (including quotations) gained via storytelling that provide information on KAB of study participants. These might be quantitative, qualitative or mixed data.

Insights (including quotations) on how storytelling can effect change in KAB of study participants. These might be quantitative, qualitative or mixed data.

Insights that support the validity (or appropriateness or value) of storytelling as a research tool in public health.

Study funding and conflicts of interest.

Data expected to be sourced from storytelling studies include quotations from stories captured as recounted by tellers of their personal experiences; explanations of digital stories; data on themes identified through analysis of story transcripts (the actual transcripts unlikely to be available); qualitative and quantitative data on changes in knowledge, attitudes and practices/behaviours relating to the storytelling intervention.

Assessment of bias in conducting the systematic review

The systematic review will be conducted following this pre-specified protocol and any differences will be reported between the methods outlined in this protocol and the complete review.

Data synthesis

Data synthesis will use the narrative synthesis approach developed by the Economic and Social Research Council, as described by Rodgers et al, 41 that is suitable for qualitative and/or quantitative data. The defining characteristic of narrative synthesis is that it adopts a textual approach to the process of synthesis to ‘tell the story’ of the findings from the included studies, while it may still include the manipulation of some statistical findings. It can also accommodate questions concerned with the implementation of interventions (ie, the storytelling method or tool), as well as with the effects of interventions in experimental settings (ie, impact of storytelling on KAB). 41

The narrative synthesis will address the two parts of the research question and effectively comprise two separate syntheses that apply to the use of storytelling: (a) as a tool to understand/gain insight into public KAB and (b) as an intervention to determine the impact (including effect) of storytelling as a tool on changing public KAB. Each respective synthesis will be categorised by the nature of the methodological storytelling approach used, the impact and the validity of storytelling as a research tool as it applies to qualitative data, 32 the insights obtained via storytelling and the impact in terms of the effectiveness if quantitative measures form part of the study. These categories apply to storytelling as both a tool for extracting information and as a tool to effect change.

Determining the validity of storytelling as a research tool, based on a mixture of qualitative and quantitative data, is challenging. The term ‘validity’ and its meaning in the context of qualitative research lacks consensus. It tends to mean appropriateness of the tool, processes or data. 32 One attempt at a definition suggests that validity refers to the integrity and application of the methods undertaken and the precision with which the findings accurately reflect the data. 42 Noble and Smith suggest an equivalent to the term ‘validity’ is the term ‘truth value’. This recognises that in qualitative data, multiple realities exist; and note that a researcher’s personal experiences and viewpoints can have an impact on methodological and outcome bias. 42 Rolfe argues for the recognition that each study is individual and unique, and that the task of producing frameworks and predetermined criteria for assessing the quality of research studies is futile. 43 In attempting to validate the storytelling studies identified, the findings might be compared with existing KAB/KAP (knowledge, attitude and practice) surveys to aid interpretation.

In conducting the narrative synthesis, studies might be viewed as providing data that are framed within the story format and by storytelling. In the context of clinical education, Bleakley 14 explains that stories can be treated as raw material for narrative inquiry (an analytical approach) or, alternatively, a story as the end product of narrative inquiry (a synthesis approach). The former emphasises the structure of a story by analysing content, and the latter approach emphasises the meaning and social context of a story nurturing a discourse around the meaning of the story.

Proposed value of the systematic review and use of findings

To gain an understanding based on the systematic review of available peer-reviewed, published studies on the use of storytelling as a research tool to extract information, as well as an intervention to effect change used in a research context in various public health settings that meet the criteria of most, if not all, criteria detailed in table 1 .

The findings of this systematic review will have value by potentially informing future research studies into different public health issues, in particular AMR, that employ storytelling as a method to source information or as an intervention to effect change with respect to public KAB.

• Merleau-Ponty M ,
• Hartling L ,
• Johnson DW , et al
• Paschen J-A ,
• Williams-Brown S ,
• Baldwin DM ,
• ↵ The challenges of being an insider in storytelling research . Available: www.nurseresearcher.co.uk [Accessed 12 Aug 2019 ].
• Lenette C ,
• Okalik L , et al
• Columbia University Irving Medical Center
• Kuhnley R ,
• Slatton J , et al
• Limaye NP ,
• Rivas-Nieto AC ,
• Carcamo CP , et al
• Duong HT , et al
• Rieger KL ,
• Kenny A , et al
• Dahlstrom MF
• Cherrington A ,
• Williams JH ,
• Foster PP , et al
• Brett-MacLean P ,
• Archibald M , et al
• Hinyard LJ ,
• ↵ Stemming the Superbug Tide—Just A Few Dollars More , 2018 . Available: https://doi.org/10.1787/9789264307599-en
• Hawkings NJ ,
• Van Hecke O ,
• Butler CC ,
• Wang K , et al
• Shamseer L ,
• Clarke M , et al
• Great Britain
• The Lancet Respiratory Medicine
• Treffry-Goatley A ,
• Lessells RJ ,
• Moletsane R , et al
• ↵ Exploring the consumer perspective on antimicrobial resistance , 2015 . Available: https://wellcome.ac.uk/sites/default/files/exploring-consumer-perspective-on-antimicrobial-resistance-jun15.pdf [Accessed 26 Nov 2018 ].
• Mcnulty CAM ,
• Nichols T ,
• Boyle PJ , et al
• McNulty CAM ,
• Nichols T , et al
• Sirriyeh R ,
• Gardner P , et al
• Dixon-Woods M ,
• Bonas S , et al
• Rodgers M ,
• Britten N , et al
• Smith DRM ,
• Pouwels KB , et al
• Trochez C ,
• Thomas R , et al
• Ness A , et al
• Thompson PL ,
• Spyridis N ,
• Sharland M , et al
• McGregor LM ,
• von Wagner C ,
• Vart G , et al
• Larkey LK ,
• Minnal A , et al
• Raithatha N ,
• Holland R ,
• Gerrard S , et al
• Kiang PN-chu , et al
• Capstick SB ,
• Visschers VHM ,
• Taylor AL ,
• Bruine de Bruin W
• Harper SL ,
• Cunsolo Willox A ,
• Willox AC , et al
• Edge VL , et al
• Sakakibara C

Contributors The study was conceived by BM. BM developed the eligibility criteria, search strategy, risk of bias assessment strategy and data extraction plan with guidance from AH, LS, CF and MW. BM wrote the manuscript, to which all authors contributed. All contributors meet the ICMJE criteria for authorship.

Funding This work is supported by the Medical Research Foundation (MRF) grant number MRF-145-0004-TPG-AVISO.

Disclaimer The funders played no role in the development of the protocol, in writing of the report or in the decision to submit the protocol for publication.

Competing interests None declared.

Patient consent for publication Not required.

Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

Author note Research question: What evidence supports the use of storytelling as a research tool: (a) to gain insight into public knowledge, attitudes and behaviour (KAB), and (b) as an intervention to effect change in public KAB, in relation to issues of public health?

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Exploring the relevance of scaled agile practices to agile portfolio management

by David Bradley, Inderscience

The business environment is constantly changing, and sometimes does so very rapidly. Research published in the International Journal of Agile Systems and Management discusses how agile portfolio management (APM) has emerged as a useful approach to allow companies to align their organizational strategies with the demands of this dynamic and complex environment.

Conventionally, portfolio management has relied on predictive methods that work across a range of project sizes and levels of complexity. However, as businesses increasingly adopt agile methodologies—originally designed for small, closely-knit teams—there has been a shift in portfolio management practices.

Indeed, this shift has become necessary for continued success. Agile methodologies emphasize flexibility and responsiveness and work well with small-scale projects, but they can be problematic when they are used for larger, more complex portfolios.

Kwete Mwana Nyandongo of the School of Consumer Intelligence and Information Systems at the University of Johannesburg in South Africa, has demonstrated that scaled agile frameworks, which have been developed to manage large-scale implementations, offer some value, but even these are often inadequate. He found that this is especially true in industries, such as information technology , where rapid technological change and complex project interdependencies are the stock-in-trade of the industry.

Nyandongo's study goes on to suggest that these frameworks, while useful for large solutions, do not fully address the challenges of managing an entire portfolio in a rapidly changing environment. He says that this shortfall may lead some organizations to struggle with effectively implementing their strategies or responding to new opportunities and facing up to emerging risks.

The answer lies, the study suggests, in taking an even more flexible approach to portfolio management . That approach needs to extend the capabilities of existing scaled agile frameworks and to bring together traditional and agile methods. Such a hybrid approach might better accommodate the deliberate strategies of long-term business plans, as well as exploit the short-term nature of emergent opportunities.

In other words, organizations need to recognize that the methods effective for managing individual projects or even large-scale solutions may not translate directly to managing an entire portfolio . Instead, they must be yet more adaptable than ever.

Provided by Inderscience

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• Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/fact-checking-warnings-from-democrats-about-project-2025-and-donald-trump

Fact-checking warnings from Democrats about Project 2025 and Donald Trump

This fact check originally appeared on PolitiFact .

Project 2025 has a starring role in this week’s Democratic National Convention.

And it was front and center on Night 1.

WATCH: Hauling large copy of Project 2025, Michigan state Sen. McMorrow speaks at 2024 DNC

“This is Project 2025,” Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, D-Royal Oak, said as she laid a hardbound copy of the 900-page document on the lectern. “Over the next four nights, you are going to hear a lot about what is in this 900-page document. Why? Because this is the Republican blueprint for a second Trump term.”

Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, has warned Americans about “Trump’s Project 2025” agenda — even though former President Donald Trump doesn’t claim the conservative presidential transition document.

“Donald Trump wants to take our country backward,” Harris said July 23 in Milwaukee. “He and his extreme Project 2025 agenda will weaken the middle class. Like, we know we got to take this seriously, and can you believe they put that thing in writing?”

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Harris’ running mate, has joined in on the talking point.

“Don’t believe (Trump) when he’s playing dumb about this Project 2025. He knows exactly what it’ll do,” Walz said Aug. 9 in Glendale, Arizona.

Trump’s campaign has worked to build distance from the project, which the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, led with contributions from dozens of conservative groups.

Much of the plan calls for extensive executive-branch overhauls and draws on both long-standing conservative principles, such as tax cuts, and more recent culture war issues. It lays out recommendations for disbanding the Commerce and Education departments, eliminating certain climate protections and consolidating more power to the president.

Project 2025 offers a sweeping vision for a Republican-led executive branch, and some of its policies mirror Trump’s 2024 agenda, But Harris and her presidential campaign have at times gone too far in describing what the project calls for and how closely the plans overlap with Trump’s campaign.

PolitiFact researched Harris’ warnings about how the plan would affect reproductive rights, federal entitlement programs and education, just as we did for President Joe Biden’s Project 2025 rhetoric. Here’s what the project does and doesn’t call for, and how it squares with Trump’s positions.

Are Trump and Project 2025 connected?

To distance himself from Project 2025 amid the Democratic attacks, Trump wrote on Truth Social that he “knows nothing” about it and has “no idea” who is in charge of it. (CNN identified at least 140 former advisers from the Trump administration who have been involved.)

The Heritage Foundation sought contributions from more than 100 conservative organizations for its policy vision for the next Republican presidency, which was published in 2023.

Project 2025 is now winding down some of its policy operations, and director Paul Dans, a former Trump administration official, is stepping down, The Washington Post reported July 30. Trump campaign managers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita denounced the document.

WATCH: A look at the Project 2025 plan to reshape government and Trump’s links to its authors

However, Project 2025 contributors include a number of high-ranking officials from Trump’s first administration, including former White House adviser Peter Navarro and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson.

A recently released recording of Russell Vought, a Project 2025 author and the former director of Trump’s Office of Management and Budget, showed Vought saying Trump’s “very supportive of what we do.” He said Trump was only distancing himself because Democrats were making a bogeyman out of the document.

Project 2025 wouldn’t ban abortion outright, but would curtail access

The Harris campaign shared a graphic on X that claimed “Trump’s Project 2025 plan for workers” would “go after birth control and ban abortion nationwide.”

The plan doesn’t call to ban abortion nationwide, though its recommendations could curtail some contraceptives and limit abortion access.

What’s known about Trump’s abortion agenda neither lines up with Harris’ description nor Project 2025’s wish list.

Project 2025 says the Department of Health and Human Services Department should “return to being known as the Department of Life by explicitly rejecting the notion that abortion is health care.”

It recommends that the Food and Drug Administration reverse its 2000 approval of mifepristone, the first pill taken in a two-drug regimen for a medication abortion. Medication is the most common form of abortion in the U.S. — accounting for around 63 percent in 2023.

If mifepristone were to remain approved, Project 2025 recommends new rules, such as cutting its use from 10 weeks into pregnancy to seven. It would have to be provided to patients in person — part of the group’s efforts to limit access to the drug by mail. In June, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a legal challenge to mifepristone’s FDA approval over procedural grounds.

WATCH: Trump’s plans for health care and reproductive rights if he returns to White House The manual also calls for the Justice Department to enforce the 1873 Comstock Act on mifepristone, which bans the mailing of “obscene” materials. Abortion access supporters fear that a strict interpretation of the law could go further to ban mailing the materials used in procedural abortions, such as surgical instruments and equipment.

The plan proposes withholding federal money from states that don’t report to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention how many abortions take place within their borders. The plan also would prohibit abortion providers, such as Planned Parenthood, from receiving Medicaid funds. It also calls for the Department of Health and Human Services to ensure that the training of medical professionals, including doctors and nurses, omits abortion training.

The document says some forms of emergency contraception — particularly Ella, a pill that can be taken within five days of unprotected sex to prevent pregnancy — should be excluded from no-cost coverage. The Affordable Care Act requires most private health insurers to cover recommended preventive services, which involves a range of birth control methods, including emergency contraception.

Trump has recently said states should decide abortion regulations and that he wouldn’t block access to contraceptives. Trump said during his June 27 debate with Biden that he wouldn’t ban mifepristone after the Supreme Court “approved” it. But the court rejected the lawsuit based on standing, not the case’s merits. He has not weighed in on the Comstock Act or said whether he supports it being used to block abortion medication, or other kinds of abortions.

Project 2025 doesn’t call for cutting Social Security, but proposes some changes to Medicare

“When you read (Project 2025),” Harris told a crowd July 23 in Wisconsin, “you will see, Donald Trump intends to cut Social Security and Medicare.”

The Project 2025 document does not call for Social Security cuts. None of its 10 references to Social Security addresses plans for cutting the program.

Harris also misleads about Trump’s Social Security views.

In his earlier campaigns and before he was a politician, Trump said about a half-dozen times that he’s open to major overhauls of Social Security, including cuts and privatization. More recently, in a March 2024 CNBC interview, Trump said of entitlement programs such as Social Security, “There’s a lot you can do in terms of entitlements, in terms of cutting.” However, he quickly walked that statement back, and his CNBC comment stands at odds with essentially everything else Trump has said during the 2024 presidential campaign.

Trump’s campaign website says that not “a single penny” should be cut from Social Security. We rated Harris’ claim that Trump intends to cut Social Security Mostly False.

Project 2025 does propose changes to Medicare, including making Medicare Advantage, the private insurance offering in Medicare, the “default” enrollment option. Unlike Original Medicare, Medicare Advantage plans have provider networks and can also require prior authorization, meaning that the plan can approve or deny certain services. Original Medicare plans don’t have prior authorization requirements.

The manual also calls for repealing health policies enacted under Biden, such as the Inflation Reduction Act. The law enabled Medicare to negotiate with drugmakers for the first time in history, and recently resulted in an agreement with drug companies to lower the prices of 10 expensive prescriptions for Medicare enrollees.

Trump, however, has said repeatedly during the 2024 presidential campaign that he will not cut Medicare.

Project 2025 would eliminate the Education Department, which Trump supports

The Harris campaign said Project 2025 would “eliminate the U.S. Department of Education” — and that’s accurate. Project 2025 says federal education policy “should be limited and, ultimately, the federal Department of Education should be eliminated.” The plan scales back the federal government’s role in education policy and devolves the functions that remain to other agencies.

Aside from eliminating the department, the project also proposes scrapping the Biden administration’s Title IX revision, which prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. It also would let states opt out of federal education programs and calls for passing a federal parents’ bill of rights similar to ones passed in some Republican-led state legislatures.

Republicans, including Trump, have pledged to close the department, which gained its status in 1979 within Democratic President Jimmy Carter’s presidential Cabinet.

In one of his Agenda 47 policy videos, Trump promised to close the department and “to send all education work and needs back to the states.” Eliminating the department would have to go through Congress.

What Project 2025, Trump would do on overtime pay

In the graphic, the Harris campaign says Project 2025 allows “employers to stop paying workers for overtime work.”

The plan doesn’t call for banning overtime wages. It recommends changes to some Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, regulations and to overtime rules. Some changes, if enacted, could result in some people losing overtime protections, experts told us.

The document proposes that the Labor Department maintain an overtime threshold “that does not punish businesses in lower-cost regions (e.g., the southeast United States).” This threshold is the amount of money executive, administrative or professional employees need to make for an employer to exempt them from overtime pay under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

In 2019, the Trump’s administration finalized a rule that expanded overtime pay eligibility to most salaried workers earning less than about $35,568, which it said made about 1.3 million more workers eligible for overtime pay. The Trump-era threshold is high enough to cover most line workers in lower-cost regions, Project 2025 said.

The Biden administration raised that threshold to $43,888 beginning July 1, and that will rise to $58,656 on Jan. 1, 2025. That would grant overtime eligibility to about 4 million workers, the Labor Department said.

It’s unclear how many workers Project 2025’s proposal to return to the Trump-era overtime threshold in some parts of the country would affect, but experts said some would presumably lose the right to overtime wages.

Other overtime proposals in Project 2025’s plan include allowing some workers to choose to accumulate paid time off instead of overtime pay, or to work more hours in one week and fewer in the next, rather than receive overtime.

Trump’s past with overtime pay is complicated. In 2016, the Obama administration said it would raise the overtime to salaried workers earning less than $47,476 a year, about double the exemption level set in 2004 of $23,660 a year.

But when a judge blocked the Obama rule, the Trump administration didn’t challenge the court ruling. Instead it set its own overtime threshold, which raised the amount, but by less than Obama.

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2021 Research Poster Presentation and Reception

SHERC holds successful event featuring current projects

For the first time since 2019, the Southwest Health Equity Research Collaborative (SHERC) displayed more than 15 pilot projects, research projects and supplements at their socially distanced, but still lively, Research Poster Presentation and Reception on Dec. 8 at the High Country Conference Center.

Northern Arizona University President José Luis Cruz Rivera was the guest speaker along with Catherine Propper , professor in the NAU Department of Biological Sciences and co-lead of the SHERC Research Infrastructure Core.

List of presenters

Sherc pilot and research projects.

Project: Testing the Utility of Biocrust Restoration to Stabilize Soils and Reduce Coccidioides Abundance

PI: Anita Antoninka , Assistant Research Professor, School of Forestry

Project: Physical Activity Among Women Incarcerated in Jail

PI: Ricky Camplain , Assistant Professor, Department of Health Sciences

Project: Opioid Use Recovery Help in an Online User Support Environment (OUR HOUSE)

PI: Emery Eaves , Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology

Project: Examining School Wellness in Underserved American Indian Communities

PI: Regina Eddie, Assistant Professor, School of Nursing

Project: Developing a Methodology for Exploring Health Inequities Tied to Wildfire Smoke

PI: Catrin Edgeley , Assistant Professor, School of Forestry

Project: Defining Microbiological Drivers of Early Childhood Caries in Preschoolers in Southern Arizon a

PI: Viacheslav Fofanov , Associate Professor, School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems

Project: Navajo Children with and without Speech Sound Disorders

PI: Davis Henderson , Assistant Professor, Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders

Project: Native Spirit: Development, Implementation, and Evaluation of a Culturally-Grounded After-School Progr

PI: Amanda Hunter , Postdoctoral Scholar, Center for Health Equity Research

Project: Parents Taking Action to Improve Autism Services Access for Navajo Families in Northern Arizona: Intervention and Pilot Trial

PI: Olivia Lindly , Assistant Professor, Department of Health Sciences

Project: Latino Fathers’ Stress and Their Children’s Obesity Risk

PI: Nanette “Gigi” Lopez , Assistant Professor, Department of Health Sciences

Project: Epidemiological Modeling to Predict Spatial Disparities in West Nile Virus Infection Risk in the Southwest

PI: Joseph Mihaljevic , Assistant Professor, School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems

Project: Do Pathogen Genotypes, Carriage, and Social Network Differences Lead to Health Disparities in MRSA/MSSA Infection

PI: Talima Pearson , Associate Research Professor, Department of Biological Sciences

SHERC administrative supplements

Project: Understanding Resilience and Mental Wellbeing: Southwest Indigenous Nations and the Impact of COVID-19

Investigators:

• Julie Baldwin , Regents’ Professor, Department of Health Sciences
• Karen Jarratt-Snider , Chair, Applied Indigenous Studies
• Manley Begay , Professor, Applied Indigenous Studies,
• Darold Joseph , Assistant Professor, College of Education
• Nicolette Teufel-Shone , Professor, Department of Health Sciences
• Alisse Ali-Joseph , Assistant Professor, Applied Indigenous Studies
• Chesleigh Keene , Assistant Professor, Educational Psychology
• Juliette Roddy , Professor, Criminology and Criminal Justice
• Amanda Hunter , Postdoctoral Scholar, Center for Health Equity Research
• Angelina Castagno , Professor, College of Education
• Marianne Nielsen , Professor, Criminology and Criminal Justice

Project: Rapid Assessment of Immediate and Potential long-term implications of changing telehealth regulations for substance use treatment in the context of COVID-19

• Emery Eaves , Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology
• Robert Trotter, Regents’ Professor, Department of Anthropology
• Eck Doerry, Professor, School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems

Project: Building Trust and Awareness to Increase AZ Native Nation Participation in the COVID-19 Vaccine Trials

• Samantha Sabo , Associate Professor, Department of Health Sciences
• Naomi Lee, Assistant Professor, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry

Project: Racial Differences in Transition of Care among Medicare Beneficiaries with Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Dementias after Hip Fracture

• Amit Kumar, Assistant Professor, Department of Physical Therapy and Athletic Training
• Julie Baldwin, Regents’ Professor, Department of Health Sciences
• Patricia Pohl, Chair, Department of Physical Therapy and Athletic Training
• Stefany Shaibi , Associate Clinical Professor, Department of Physical Therapy and Athletic Training
• Indrakshi Roy , Biostatistician, Center for Health Equity Research
• Amol Karmaker, Professor, Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine

Project: Defining Microbiological Drivers of Early Childhood Caries in Preschoolers of Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander Descent

• Viacheslav Fofanov, Associate Professor, School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems,
• Talima Pearson, Associate Research Professor, Department of Biological Sciences
• Misty Pacheco, Associate Professor, Department of Kinesiology & Exercise Science, University of Hawaii, Hilo
• President Jose Luis Cruz Rivera
• SHERC Research Poster Presentation and Reception
• Southwest Health Equity Research Collaborative

Eight HFA Research Projects Awarded 2024 Faculty Research Grants

Twelve projects led by UMass Amherst researchers—including eight projects from HFA faculty—have received Faculty Research Grants/Healey Endowment Grants (FRG) for 2024. Administered by the Office of Research Development (ORD), under the Vice Chancellor for Research and Engagement, the FRG program supports projects with high potential for future publication, the development of creative work, additional funding from outside of the university or recognition of excellence.

The program encourages proposals for projects involving research, scholarship and creative works in all disciplines from early career faculty members initiating new projects and mid-career faculty members in pursuit of new directions or seeking to revitalize an ongoing program after a gap in productivity due to a period of exceptional commitment to departmental, university, and professional service, heavy teaching loads in the last three to six years or personal or family circumstances.

Full-time UMass Amherst faculty members whose appointments extend beyond the current academic year are eligible to apply for up to $20,000 in FRG grants, provided they have not received two previous FRG awards, have yet to submit a final report for a previous FRG award, or have more than $40,000 in unrestricted, uncommitted funds.

2024 HFA Faculty Research Grants/Healey Endowment Grant Recipients

“linguistic ideologies in the standardization of minority languages”.

María Biezma , assistant professor in the Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures (PI) with co-PIs Patricia Gubitosi , professor in the department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures, and Ana Arregu , professor of linguistics, have received $19,937. With their FRG, they aim to make testable models to predict how social meaning comes out of minority languages. To achieve this, they will use standardized and vernacular Kichwa, part of the indigenous language family of Quechuan, spoken in Salasaka, Ecuador.

“New Songs from New England: A Debut Solo Recording Project for publication, featuring newly commissioned works for Jamie-Rose Guarrine, soprano”

Jamie-Rose Guarrine , associate professor of voice, has secured a national recording label (PARMA/Navona) to publish her new solo album on all streaming platforms, featuring new pieces by female composers and poets from New England. She will use her $19,997 award to support the recording, mastering and distribution of the work.

“Kea Archaeological Research Survey & Replication Studies”

Shannon LaFayette Hogue , assistant professor of Classics, will use the $19,952 award to conduct a surface survey in Northwest Kea, Greece, covering an area previously examined in 1983-1984. The goal is to test the reproducibility of results from pedestrian surface survey techniques that are commonly used but have not been validated.

“Running to Music: How Musical Meaning Shapes Marathoning”

Catrina Kim , assistant professor of music theory, has been awarded $20,000 to investigate how running playlists create a narrative of what an idealized runner looks like in terms of race, gender and class.

“The ‘You-Cube’ - a tiny, sustainable, temporary, outside performance space for our University and broader community”

With $20,000, Anya Klepikov (PI), associate professor of scenic design, and Harley Erdman , professor of theater, aim to create a tiny performing space that allows audiences to view short live shows by peeking through cracks in the walls.

“Commissioning and Recording New Music for Horn”

Joshua Michal , associate professor of horn, will use his $19,600 award to record two solo albums. The first is an anthology of works for horn by composer Daniel Baldwin, including a newly commissioned sonata. The second album will contain new music for horn, voice and piano in memory of all those who died during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Our Cause: A Climate Fiction”

Jeff Parker , associate professor of English, has been awarded $14,175 to research and draft a novel titled “Our Cause.” This novel will follow three characters, each representing a different approach to addressing climate change.

“Expanding the bassoon repertoire through the lens of identity and connection”

Rémy Taghavi , assistant professor of bassoon, has received $17,725 to record newly transcribed and commissioned works for bassoon by composers from France and Iran. The album will also highlight underrepresented voices with two works by women and two by BIPOC composers.

Learn more about the FRG program.  

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