When Narrative Transportation Narrows Attention: Changes in Attentional Focus During Suspenseful Film Viewing

The construct of narrative transportation captures the psychological processes that occur when people experience an engaging narrative. Attention is an essential component of this construct: People often report feeling that they have focused attention into a narrative world, and disengaged attention from the physical environment. The goal of our research was to test if people’s attention is captured in a dynamic fashion over the course of narrative experiences. To achieve this goal, we used excerpts from narrative films. One way in which filmmakers command viewers’ attention is by generating suspense, which arises when viewers confront potential negative outcomes. In our experiments, we tested the hypothesis that hot spots, moments at which potential negative outcomes are emphasized, will narrow the viewer’s attentional focus compared to cold spots, moments that do not emphasize negative outcomes. We measured attentional tuning through latencies in reaction time to audio probes as participants viewed suspenseful film excerpts. We also administered post-viewing recognition memory tests for still images taken from hot and cold spots. Across three experiments, participants missed more probes and exhibited slower reaction times during suspenseful hot spots than cold spots. These findings provide evidence for changes in attentional tuning as people view film narratives.