Towards a Psychological Understanding of Character Design in Screenwriting: How Character Values, Viewer Values, and Film Narratives' Value Messages Shape Mainstream Film Popularity

Creating psychologically 'deep' characters is considered central to mainstream fiction films' popularity and a very challenging aspect of character design for screenwriters. However, there appear to be few effective training and problem-solving tools due to a lack of systematic and evidence-based understanding of character psychology. Seeking to address this gap, the thesis develops an interdisciplinary model drawing, amongst others, from the Schwartz Value Theory. The model defines film characters’ Wants and Needs and their value-driven motivations to address two research questions: how characters' value change and stability communicates film narratives' value messages, and how the alignment between film and viewer values affects film popularity.

As hypothesised, an online experiment revealed that main characters often seem to follow one of two paths: either shifting from pan-culturally less preferred values to their preferred counterparts in the Schwartz value circle – when these derive from a basic human need described by Self-Determination Theory – or maintaining such need-derived values throughout a film. Particularly important in film value communication appear to be the final values of changing and the stable values of non-changing characters, as they correlated most consistently with film value perceptions. The initial values of changing characters seem to be perceived as either opposed or unrelated to a film's value message.

Contrary to predictions, neither an online experiment (examining individuals’ film interest) nor an archival study (examining box office revenues and audience ratings of 1,200 films) supported the proposed alignment effect of film and viewer values. As endorsement of pan-culturally preferred values appears highly prevalent in films, it likely does not serve as a selection criterion. Moreover, the more strongly films express pan-culturally preferred values, the lower seem to be their audience ratings, potentially as they become too predictable. The thesis contributes to the scientific study of character psychology and the development of evidence-based screenwriting tools.