The effects of narrative framing of own broken love on understanding the past and imagining the future in close relationships

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dc.abstract.enThe project aimed to assess the effects of narrative framing applied to one’s past romantic relationship. It was expected that the activation of self-story on broken love would lead to more beneficial thinking about the personal past and possible future in close relationships. Women after the romantic relationship breakup (N = 422, 18–30 years old) took part in a two-stage naturalistic experiment in which they were randomly assigned to two sets. The narrative set participants wrote a story of broken love, while the control set participants answered questions about the past relationship. After seven days, participants declared their current thoughts and breakup understanding and provided open responses on the breakup reasons and thoughts about the future in close relationships. Self-story activation led to higher reflection elaboration and greater focus on causal connections, actions, and appropriate time perspectives. Women with activated self-stories provided more coherent descriptions of breakup reasons, declared a higher understanding of breakup, and experienced more future-oriented thoughts. The presence of the reported effects differed with the mode of exploration of the self-story activation level, and most of them were positively related to the level of narrative organization (plot structuring) of the narrative set participants’ self-stories. These results underscore the impact of narrative thinking on cognition, and suggest that self-story writing interventions could help manage challenging interpersonal experiences.
dc.affiliationWydział Psychologii w Warszawie
dc.affiliationInstytut Psychologii
dc.contributor.authorCzarnecka, Jolanta
dc.contributor.authorTrzebiński, Jerzy
dc.contributor.editorLaura Hannah Kelly
dc.date.access2025-11-25
dc.date.accessioned2025-12-02T15:35:24Z
dc.date.available2025-12-02T15:35:24Z
dc.date.created2025-10-03
dc.date.issued2025-11-25
dc.description.abstract<jats:p>The project aimed to assess the effects of narrative framing applied to one’s past romantic relationship. It was expected that the activation of self-story on broken love would lead to more beneficial thinking about the personal past and possible future in close relationships. Women after the romantic relationship breakup (N = 422, 18–30 years old) took part in a two-stage naturalistic experiment in which they were randomly assigned to two sets. The narrative set participants wrote a story of broken love, while the control set participants answered questions about the past relationship. After seven days, participants declared their current thoughts and breakup understanding and provided open responses on the breakup reasons and thoughts about the future in close relationships. Self-story activation led to higher reflection elaboration and greater focus on causal connections, actions, and appropriate time perspectives. Women with activated self-stories provided more coherent descriptions of breakup reasons, declared a higher understanding of breakup, and experienced more future-oriented thoughts. The presence of the reported effects differed with the mode of exploration of the self-story activation level, and most of them were positively related to the level of narrative organization (plot structuring) of the narrative set participants’ self-stories. These results underscore the impact of narrative thinking on cognition, and suggest that self-story writing interventions could help manage challenging interpersonal experiences.</jats:p>
dc.description.accesstimeat_publication
dc.description.grantnumberSUB/IPsy/2022/11
dc.description.grantnumberDofinansowanie z Wydziału Psychologii w Warszawie dla publikacji w open access
dc.description.granttitleWpływu narratyzacji rozpadu bliskiego związku na sposób poznawczego i motywacyjnego radzenia sobie z tym zdarzeniem.
dc.description.issue11
dc.description.physical1-38
dc.description.sdgNoSDGsAreRelevantForThisPublication
dc.description.versionfinal_published
dc.description.volume20
dc.identifier.doi10.1371/journal.pone.0334973
dc.identifier.issn1932-6203
dc.identifier.urihttps://share.swps.edu.pl/handle/swps/2061
dc.identifier.weblinkhttps://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0334973
dc.languageen
dc.pbn.affiliationpsychologia
dc.relation.dataset0e3ea0bf-a78c-497c-bc7a-dbca8949f44a
dc.rightsCC-BY
dc.rights.explanationPublikacja jest dostępna w wersji open access na stronie journalu.
dc.rights.questionYes_rights
dc.share.articleOPEN_JOURNAL
dc.subject.ennarrative framing
dc.subject.enself-story
dc.subject.enromantic relationship breakup
dc.subject.enautobiographical reasoning
dc.subject.enemerging adulthood
dc.subject.enself-story activation
dc.subject.ennarrative action control
dc.subject.plnarratyzacja
dc.subject.plosobista historia
dc.subject.plrozpad związku romantycznego
dc.subject.plwschodząca dorosłość
dc.subject.plaktywizacja osobistej historii
dc.subject.plnarracyjna kontrola zachowania
dc.swps.sciencecloudsend
dc.titleThe effects of narrative framing of own broken love on understanding the past and imagining the future in close relationships
dc.title.journalPLOS One
dc.typeJournalArticle
dspace.entity.typeArticle