Narrative Fallacy

What is the narrative fallacy?

The narrative fallacy is treating a coherent story as sufficient evidence for an explanation. A story can connect events neatly while leaving out facts that do not fit, or adding causal links the evidence never established.

The problem is not storytelling itself. A good story can be true, memorable, and useful. The question is whether the evidence supports the connections it makes.

An example of the narrative fallacy

Suppose a company grows after appointing a new chief executive. An account that credits the leader’s vision alone may sound convincing while ignoring a growing market, earlier investments or chance. The sequence makes a story possible; it does not establish which explanation is right.

Related primary evidence comes from Pennington and Hastie (1992): changing how easily mock jurors could construct a story affected their judgments. This supports a role for narrative organization in decisions, not a conclusion that all storytelling is irrational or that every narrative-fallacy claim has been tested.