论谣言的“叙事家族”及其心理机制

On the“Narrative Family”of Rumors and Its Psychological Mechanism

如果以谣言“风候”为中心,基于在传播中具有近似的心理情态和功能,谣言、流言、当代传说与传统的传说可以被看成是相互关联的一个“谣言叙事家族”。在这些口头话语体裁的发展过程中,记忆、归因、添加和重复这些重要的心理机制在这个叙事家族中依次发生。而当它们所陈述的威胁在人们视野中逐渐清晰之后,这些口语体裁包含的叙事新奇性也就不再令人感兴趣,大部分谣言、流言会消失,有少部分会演变成为传说或当代传说这样的“好故事”。它们不但符合谣言传播的心理规律,而且也遵循了民间叙事律,最终反复流传。

If centering around rumor“climate”and taking the similar psychological factors and functions in the transmission into account,rumors,gossips,contemporary legends and traditional legends can be viewed as in one and the same interrelated narrative family of rumors.The development of these oral discourse genres involves some important psychological mechanisms like memorizing,attributing,adding and repeating.When the threats narrated in these genres are getting clearer in people’s vision,their narrative novelty will be no longer appealing.Therefore,most rumors and gossips will disappear,while a small part will evolve into“good stories”such as legends or contemporary legends,which will be handed down repeatedly as they conform to not only the psychological laws of transmitting rumors,but also the folk narrative laws.