The above discussion above has concentrated on the notion of schemata activation in connection with familiar situations and people, and has considered the usefulness of such theories in the analysis of fictional characters. As noted above, the role of the characters in fiction is now presumed to be as important as the plot; they do not merely move the plot along, but are interesting for their ‘personalities’. As result, we often talk about characters as if they have a life of their own, independent of the fiction, and are responsible for their own fate. Such a tendency is evident in my discussion of the actions of Marcia and Letty above, in which I implied that Marcia was less responsible for the outcomes of her actions that Letty was for the outcome of hers. When we interpret the actions of characters therefore we also map onto the story a perception of cause and effect. For example, I argued that Marcia’s illness was a cause of her behaviour, and that Letty’s desire to move was a result of the change in her tenancy arrangements. Interpretations such as these suggest the activation of causal schemata, a notion which is again associated with Kelley (1973).
In cases where information is incomplete, Kelley argues that we make causal attributions according to causal schemata which are based on our experience of cause and effect relationships. This is obviously relevant to the way in which we evaluate fictional characters according to the amount of information granted to us concerning their motives.
The mature individual has a repertoire of {such} abstract ideas about the operation and interaction of causal factors. These conceptions (enable him to make} economical and fast attributional analysis by providing a framework within which bits and pieces of relevant information can be fitted in order to draw reasonably good causal inferences
(Kelley, 1973:15 parentheses in original)
Such causal schemata are useful in that they enable us to make attributions from incomplete information; they are general conceptions about cause and effect, and
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provide us with a ‘causal shorthand’ for ‘carrying out complex inferences quickly and easily’ (Hewstone and Antaki, 1988:117-118). Kelley argues that the simplest schema is the ‘multiple sufficient cause’ schema (MSC), which accounts for those instances where ‘any of several causes can produce the same effect’ (Hewstone and Antaki,
1988:117). For example, poor educational achievement may be attributed to home, school, environment, or lack of effort, any one of which may result in an
underachieving student. Kelley also suggested a number of principles which come into effect whenever this causal schema is activated. Associated with the MSC schema are the ‘discounting principle’ and the ‘augmentation principle’. The discounting principle assumes that the ‘role of a given cause in producing the effect is discounted if other plausible causes are present’ (Hewstone and Antaki, 1988:117), whereas the ‘augmentation principle’ assumes that ‘the role of a given cause is augmented
(increased) if an effect occurs in the presence o f an inhibitory cause’ (ibid.). Thus the discounting principle would explain why, for example, in a case o f a student who was recently bereaved and failed an exam, we would be more likely to see the
bereavement as the cause of the failure, while other possible causes, such as lack of effort, would be discounted. The augmentation principle accounts for the reverse situation, where we would see success in the face of adverse conditions as an indication of greater effort or ability.
However, although the concept of causal schemata is plausible, it is still only a theoretical concept, due to the obvious difficulty of trying to relate responses to cognitive processes. As Hewstone and Antaki note, it is only apparent that ‘people act as //they use schemata’ (1988:118, their emphasis). In addition, the notion of causal schemata does not usefully explain differences in personal perception, and the question still remains as to why people can interpret the same event in different ways.
In addition, Hewstone and Antaki note that schemata are not only generalised conceptions about the relationship between cause and effect, but are influenced by cultural knowledge, for example, the responses of the white students in Duncan’s (1976) study, referred to above appeared to be based on a schema that assumes that black people are prone to violence (Hewstone and Antaki, 1988:118).
Thus, while attribution theory can help to explain the different ways in which readers make causal attributions, it is still apparent that readers might have different schemata which could account for individual differences. Another reader of Quartet in Autumn, for example, might argue that Letty’s landlady is the cause of her situation, or that the cause of Marcia’s behaviour is in fact her ‘personality’, and nothing to do with her illness. Such differences are the result of the activation and interaction of different causal, narrative and/or person schemata. Although theories of resisting reading can highlight obvious differences between readers arising from sex, age, race, class, and so on, less tangible, and harder to explore, is the role of the reader’s own personal experience, which is obviously highly variable. While we may have causal schemata relating to general concepts such as relationships between the sexes, for example, these will also be influenced by our individual experiences. Thus our response to a narrative is affected by our ability to identify with some aspect of the character’s personality, experiences, situation, and so on, an aspect which is explored by Seilman and Larsen in their ‘personal resonance’ study. Their contention that similarities between the character’s experiences and the reader’s own, allows the reader to ‘project’ her or himself into the character’s viewpoint, experience similar emotions, and attribute blame in a similar way to that of the character, may explain variations in readers’ responses. In such cases, we would expect that the similarity with some aspect of the reader’s experience is responsible for a response that is at
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least sympathetic, and may well be (also) empathetic. However, as has already been noted, it is also possible to resist either the views expressed by, or the behaviour of, a character, even when the reader is provided with information about their inner thoughts, motives and so on (i.e., internal point of view). In such an example, the reader’s response may be affected, perhaps resulting in a ‘person attribution’; the reader places the blame for events on the character or ‘actor’, as I have done in Letty’s case. In this last example, it is not the way in which point of view is presented which creates distance from the character, it is the reader who distances her or himself from the character, resulting in a reaction which is more similar to that o f ‘observer’. In addition, a reader who identifies with some aspect of the character’s portrayed
experience may be more inclined to respond empathetically even when no information is provided as to the character’s thoughts or motives, i.e., an external viewpoint, due to the ‘personal resonance’ factor. Sympathy may be aroused for similar reasons, and, presumably, there is the same scope for attributing blame to external situational factors in such instances. By extension, the potential for vicarious emotional identification may be seen in any narrative situation despite the type of viewpoint which is adopted. If such personal factors are present, it is possible for a reader to respond empathetically to characters, and if ‘understanding’ can lead to resistance to an internal point of view, then sympathy or empathy can also occur with an external point of view. Differences between responses may arise equally therefore from the reader’s own experience, not (only) as a result of insights provided by the text.
Such complex interactions between textual manipulations and readers’ experience, both personal and fictional, will be considered in my discussion of the results of the preliminary study in Chapter Five. Some difficulties arise from
the usefulness of the concepts they highlight, the focus of their attention is different, both from the concerns of this thesis, and from each other.