The empirical structure of narrative identity: The initial Big Three

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Narrative Identity
• Well-being Research

Background:

• Existing research links life narrative features to psychological well-being.
• A limitation is the lack of a unified structure for analyzing narrative features.
• Overarching dimensions of narrative identity require further investigation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To uncover a reliable structure for commonly studied life narrative features.
• To identify latent factors underlying narrative identity.
• To examine the relationship between narrative factors and psychological well-being.

Main Methods:

• Large-scale, multi-university collaborative study.
• Analyzed 2,565 life narratives from 855 emerging and midlife adults across three samples.
• Utilized various narrative prompts and statistical modeling to identify narrative factors.

Main Results:

• Identified three robust factors of life narratives: motivational and affective themes, autobiographical reasoning, and structural aspects.
• Developed a functional model simplifying narrative features for each factor.
• Motivational and affective themes showed the strongest association with psychological well-being.

Conclusions:

• A comprehensive model for understanding the empirical structure of narrative identity and its relation to well-being has been established.
• The findings offer theoretical contributions and practical guidance for researchers quantifying life narratives.
• Motivational and affective themes emerge as a key component of narrative identity linked to psychological health.