Narrative Rewriting and Reward Feedback

Abstract

Narrative Rewriting and Reward Feedback is a hypothesis model developed by András Kevereschán to describe how an initially conscious or partly conscious distortion of context may gradually become a narrative experienced as subjectively true. The model integrates self-image protection, cognitive dissonance, motivated reasoning, selective context reduction, social validation, moral justification, and hypothesized reward feedback. Its central proposed mechanisms include Narrative Pruning, the Deservingness Judgment, the Justification–Truth Bridge, the Narrative Dominance Reward Loop, Social Validation Feedback, and Retrospective Justification of the Original Act. A central hypothesis is that subjective justification may acquire epistemic weight:“what I feel / say / do is justified” → “if it is justified, it is just” → “if it is just, I am right” → “the supporting narrative is true.”The Deservingness Judgment (“they deserve it”) is treated as a separate model element rather than part of this bridge. In punitive or retaliatory pathways it may strengthen perceived justification and may later contribute to the retrospective reclassification of an earlier act as justified. Version 2.0 extends the model with a schema-therapy and developmental-psychology hypothesis, proposing that activation of vulnerable schema modes during narcissistic injury may increase the epistemic weight of current affect, while reward, validation, and reduction of aversive states may help stabilize the resulting narrative. Three illustrative examples demonstrate different pathways through the model. The third is compared retrospectively with DARVO (Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender). DARVO is not treated as a component of the model, but as an external descriptive framework for comparison. The model is intended as a conceptual and research-generating framework, not as a diagnostic instrument or a validated unified neurobiological mechanism.