Stories depend on the artful manipulation of what Loewenstein calls information gaps. In McKeeβs words, βCuriosity is the intellectual need to answer questions and close open patterns. Story plays to this universal desire by doing the opposite, posing questions and opening situations.β The storyteller plays a cat and mouse game with the viewer (or reader, or listener), opening and closing information gaps as the narrative unfolds, unspooling the viewerβs curiosity.
Excerpt from: Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It by Ian Leslie