This deliverable explores the use of storytelling and affective communication within the DUST project, highlighting how these approaches are employed to engage communities, reflect on positionality, and enhance communication and dissemination activities. Storytelling is integrated across multiple contexts, including the presentation of case study region activities on the project website, parallel sessions in the Regional Futures Literacy Labs, reflective workshops within the consortium, and visual and digital outputs for communication and dissemination.

The deliverable also presents the Affective Communication Handbook, developed as a capacity-building resource to consolidate lessons learned and provide guidance for engaging diverse stakeholders in ways that foreground emotions, values, and meaning. Across these activities, DUST demonstrates that storytelling, when embedded within an affective communication framework, supports more accessible, inclusive, and contextually grounded engagement while encouraging reflection among both researchers and participants. Lessons learned highlight the benefits of visual richness, participatory approaches, and reflexivity, as well as the challenges of representation, inclusivity, and the ethical use of regional materials.

Overall, the deliverable underscores the value of combining storytelling with affective communication to foster meaningful interaction, understanding, and co-creation in applied research on just sustainability transitions.