Author Helen Noble writes about psychological delving for authors.

 

'Mind your own business, unless you are a writer: Three psychological reasons to poke your nose into the hearts and minds of other people in the name of art.'

Goodreads recently posed me the question, ‘where do you find your inspiration to write?’

I didn’t have to think very long, or hard, about this as I am aware of many influences and situations which give rise, eventually, to a blog, short story or scene in a novel.

My reply stated that I am intrigued by psychological concepts, inspired by incidental imagery and often prompted into action by virtue of chance meetings or conversations.

However, after offering three blogs to CI fiction on my insight into the writing process, I found myself struggling to compose the third; the problem consisting mainly of narrowing the choice and framing an idea, or two, in a meaningful and helpful way.

This morning a chance conversation prompted me to write this blog.

Whilst talking with a friend, we stumbled over the tripping hazard of ‘what other people think of us’.

Ask any spiritual teacher about this and she will undoubtedly tell you to ‘mind your own business.’

Cognitive-behavioural psychology warns us away from living in other people’s minds, emphasising that we have ultimate control only over our own thoughts, feelings and actions and to believe otherwise leads us only to unhappiness.

However, from a  writer’s point of view, not only do we need to know what is in our characters’ minds, but we also need to authentically convey the dynamic of communication between them.

To enable us to create this crucial interplay, I think it’s useful to apply the psychological theory of ‘attribution.’ Essentially, we interpret our own actions through the medium of our surroundings and blame external events for the outcome. We seem to forget that our happiness, anger, sadness or grief informs our own behaviour. Yet we are looking out at the world through a filter than most of us cannot ignore. Our world is coloured by our emotions. However, when we observe the actions of others, we instantly judge them in the context of their intentions, even when we have no idea what is going on inside their head. In this situation we are on the outside, observing what is happening around us and attributing personality traits or strong emotions of others as being the cause of their actions.

Of course, social learning theorists will argue that we internalise what we learn about ourselves from others, that we are all essentially reflections of each other. I think we can all relate to the ‘parts ‘ of us formed  and moulded by parents, teachers, friends, lovers, enemies and friends.

As a writer, to produce a rounded character, someone who jumps off the page and into the imagination of the reader (if we want them to) I think it’s also useful to use the perspective of others to reveal the inner workings of our most complex creations. For example, a chance comment (the type usually loaded with inference) can be used to dramatic effect to reveal an aspect of a character not revealed by their own thoughts or actions, but seen clearly in the mind’s eye of another. Of course the ‘throwaway’ comment is also valuable in revealing a deeper aspect of the character from whom it emanates….Art reflecting life; life reflecting art.

Which leads me onto the final idea, the notion of ‘spontaneous trait transmission.’ When constructing dialogue, remember that when people talk about others, the words they use are often, if unconsciously, associated in the mind of the listener with the speaker themselves. For some reason the words, especially when conveyed in the context of gossip, tend not to colour the listener’s view of the person being talked about, but with the speaker themselves.

Again this is a great concept to play around with in a story.

Psychology is motivated by a desire to understand how and why we humans function as we appear to do. Would a car designer have no interest in the principles of aerodynamics? Or an architect pay no heed to the laws of gravity and momentum? I think a psychological insight, along with an eye for detail and a flair for language can serve to underpin a writer’s characters and so enable them to take a firm root in the imagination of the reader.'

 

The 49th Day, by Helen Noble:

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• eBook £4.99 || $7.99
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• Aug 29, 2014. 978-1-78279-592-6.
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• Paperback £9.99 || $16.95
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• Aug 29, 2014. 978-1-78279-593-3.
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