Oldal 163 [163]
162 | Digital Media and Storytelling in Higher Education
elements of a pitch, and the speaker sustained eye contact with the viewer.
Other students created animations and one video included dialogue recorded
in an elevator (Vieira Vasconcelos & Balula, 2021).
Macroeconomic processes must also be taken into account when designing
new products and services. Narrative economics is a new interdisciplinary
sub-discipline of economics which is concerned with the narrative structures
that influence the rational decisions of economic agents. Historical and
economic processes are explained and framed by narratives from each era.
The Nobel Prize-winning economist Robert J. Shiller (2019) compiled a list
of basic narratives whose mutations are reiterated in narratives reflecting
the spirit of the times and the economic, political, and cultural challenges
of different eras. One such narrative which is popular today is the bitcoin
narrative, which involves the triumph of youthful, innovative and anarchist
thinking over bureaucracy and state control. The mysterious origins and value
of bitcoin also imbue bitcoin with an aura of mystery. In reality, however,
cryptocurrency is not valuable in itself until people en masse believe that it is.
Another popular narrative of our time, since the Luddites of the 19 century,
is that the spread of technology is causing unemployment. In particular, the
development of robotization and artificial intelligence reinforces pessimistic
visions of the labor market and, thus, existential angst.
According to Shiller, knowledge of narratives are just as helpful to
economic analysts as statistical analysis. Analysts can more accurately
identify relationships and predict future changes by taking into account
the causal structure of events as well as the values and motivations of
actors. In their analysis, researchers can draw on the research and analytical
conventions of fields such as history, neurolinguistics, political science,
sociology, psychology, anthropology, and literary studies. Since narratives
have an impact on economic processes, Shiller believes that economic analysis
should also include an analysis of narrative impacts (i.e., how they have
influenced decisions in the economic world). According to Shiller, the spread
of narratives should also be taken into account in research, and therefore an
epidemiological research approach can also be useful for economists. Shiller
draws an analogy between the spread of viruses and narratives. The economic
narratives on the Internet initially attract intense interest, which dies down
after a while; then, the same basic story reappears but in a different narrative
(e.g., narratives explaining market booms and busts). Narratives can also take
the form of different representations, ranging from songs, jokes, theories,
or other narrative structures. Another interesting suggestion from Shiller
is that narratives that cluster around a basic concept reinforce each other,
linking their narrative elements into what he calls a narrative constellation.
This means that the narrative context should always be taken into account
when analyzing a narrative, as such constellations have considerable effects.
According to Shiller, current economic narratives should be collected annually
by policy makers through focus group interviews with people from different