Revealing the Brain’s Secrets to Storytelling

Revealing the brain’s secrets to storytelling?

Every night, my daughter asks for a story.?Sometimes it’s a fiction book that she chooses, wanting to get her mind lost in the imaginary adventures of some interesting character. Sometimes, it’s non-fiction that she wants to read (at the moment, she is into oceans). But even if the book doesn’t have a narrative, she still wants us to talk through it together. And one thing that I notice is the effect that a good book has on her. It soothes her.?Resets her mind from the busy day.?

Storytelling became a high priority for many organisations for a while. We had requests for workshops left, right and centre. Within organisations, I saw many great (and not so great!) examples of storytelling being put into practice.??

These days, it seems to have tailed off slightly. Instead, demands have soared over the last 18 months for resilience training, mental health support, and working remotely. However, I still think that not enough people have truly grasped the power that storytelling offers.??

So have we missed an opportunity???

Stories in the brain?

There are a range of studies we could draw from to help understand more about the powerful tool that is storytelling...here is a great recent one that looks at the link between our neurochemical systems and storytelling.??

The article reminds us that storytelling is a unique skill, but one that we still don’t know much about from a biological perspective. We don’t understand how the brain processes stories or why they are quite so special. So, in this study, the researchers sought to try and provide answers to these unknowns. To do this, they looked at the neurochemical changes that happened during story listening and the general mood changes in children who had been admitted to an intensive care unit.??

And what they found was fascinating.??

Namely, a single storytelling session given to these hospitalised children led to an increase in their oxytocin levels (think positive social bonding) and a reduction in their cortisol levels (think reduced stress). They also reported lower feelings of pain and other positive emotional shifts, likely due to these neurochemical changes.??

And this was all in comparison to a control group who solved riddles with another person instead of hearing a story — so still with an interpersonal element. The changes were, therefore, due to the immersive nature of stories.??

But what does this mean for you? We see managers and leaders as ‘custodians of people’s attention. By this, we suggest that they have a lot of power to influence people’s attention, and subsequently, their internal environment. We talk a lot about creating a High Performing Neural Environment - where people can access the neural resources that will best serve them. Storytelling is an epic tool that can help with this.??

So, returning to my nightly story sessions with my daughter, we can see that soothing is just one of the many impacts stories can have.??

What next??

Have you ever done a story audit? If not, we’d invite you to do one. Consider the last seven days; note down all the times you’ve used a story to communicate with someone or ones. Also, think about how you could build more in storytelling over the next seven days???

We highly recommend ‘Lead with a Story’ by Paul Smith. He has a Linked In learning course too.?

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