Character Engagement

     Involving oneself with a narrative is a process that requires imagination. Without imagination, a viewer is unable to immerse themselves within the story, to associate with characters, or become emotionally influenced by the work at hand. Characters enable a viewer to become immersed within a story, typically through identification; being able to recognize traits within a character allows for the viewer to see themselves within the character. The means of engaging with the characters is typically divided between two distinct paths: empathic connection, and the structure of sympathy.

     Scholars and psychologists have further specified the type of imagination required to intake a narrative as falling under “central” and “acentral imagining.” Under the former qualifier, an individual must actively envision themselves within an imaginary circumstance. Even if you’ve never been to the Grand Canyon, you can imagine the wind upon your face, the red sand beneath your feet, and the ominous, echoing chasm beneath you. It requires a conscious effort for you to imagine yourself in the scenario, but it is possible nonetheless.  With acentral imagining one may hear a friend’s recollection of a visit to the Grand Canyon, and imagine the sense of awe and wonder that they may have been feeling at the time.  

    In relation to film, a viewer primarily partakes in acentral imagining -- even if they’re unable to imagine themselves blowing up the Death Star in a galaxy far, far away, they can still imagine the anticipation, dread, hope and revelry that our heroes experience. The ability to connect with the characters of a narrative in this regard falls within what is referred to as the “Structure of Sympathy,” a theory that further divides into three, distinct levels of engagement: recognition, alignment, and allegiance.

Recognition, perhaps the most obvious and apparent of these levels, simply refers to the audience’s abilities to discern just who the relevant characters are, within a given narrative -- such as the audience’s ability to recognize a character as a protagonist, antagonist, or foil. Alignment describes how a character’s perspective aligns with that of the audience’s, similar to point-of-view, this subjective access to their perspective allowing the audience to deduce that character’s relationship within the narrative. Lastly, allegiance determines how an audience’s morality and ethics align with the characters portrayed on screen -- if an audience member has similar morals to our protagonist, it is likely that they will find that protagonist to be both engaging and relatable.

It should not be assumed, however, that audiences are incapable of empathizing with a character within a narrative, and thus, beholden merely to acentral imagining. To imagine this, we need only watch any scene from any film in which a character accidentally stubs their toe. Inevitably, a number of audience members will react to this with a physical cringe or gasp of air.  Able to empathize with this superficial, yet memorable moment of pain, the audience is engaging within “emotional simulation.” Alternatively, any scene in which a character’s fear or anxiety is made plan upon their face is liable to cause anxiety and dread within the audience -- not because they know what it’s like to be chased through the woods by a chainsaw-wielding maniac, but nevertheless feel fear for the woman being chased on screen.

Alternatively, an audience member may merely be presented with a sequence of a character laughing -- even without any knowledge of what that character is laughing at, the audince will, regardless, begin to feel themselves smiling and, perhaps, even laughing, themselves. The process of adapting the emotion (or at least the facial expression associated therein) is known as “emotional mimicry.”


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