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This volume provides an excellent overview of the field of discourse processes, capturing both its breadth and its depth. World-renowned researchers present the latest theoretical developments and thought-provoking empirical data. In doing so, they cover a broad range of communicative activities, including text comprehension, conversational communication, argumentation, television or media viewing, and more. A central theme across all chapters concerns the notion that coherence determines the interpretation of the communication. The various chapters illustrate the many forms that coherence can take, and explore its role in different communicative settings.
Following Marshall Haith's seminal studies on early infant anticipation, this collection begins with a survey of current knowledge about the early development of expectations.
Providing a comprehensive overview of research into reading processes from word identification to the comprehension of multiple texts, acknowledged leaders in the field present the state of the art and current controversies in the field.
Traditional studies of literature have developed approaches ranging from historical, hermeneutic, critical, close reading and author studies perspectives. The present volume shows that there is much, much more to analysing literary texts, their readers, the literary system, movies, their structure and their effects. These diverse new ways of looking at literature are exemplified in this volume. The volume shows how these various approaches can be carried out in concrete projects in the area of literary studies. Twenty-three chapters encompass research on literary studies from perspectives of psychology, linguistics, anthroplogy, history, sociology, computer science. The contributors demonstrate in non-technical language the amplitude of detail and insight that can be gained from such a wider perspective on the study of literary texts. The interdisciplinary diversity of the study of literature may launch itself as a New Beginnings in Literary Studies indeed.
What is text understanding? It is the dynamic process of constructing coherent representations and inferences at multiple levels of text and context, within the bottleneck of a limited-capacity working memory. The field of text and discourse has advanced to the point where researchers have developed sophisticated models of comprehension, and identified the particular assumptions that underlie comprehension mechanisms in precise analytical or mathematical detail. The models offer a priori predictions about thought and behavior, not merely ad hoc descriptions of data. Indeed, the field has evolved to a mature science. The contributors to this volume collectively cover the major models of comprehension in the field of text and discourse. Other books are either narrow -- covering only a single theoretical framework -- or do not focus on systematic modeling efforts. In addition, this book focuses on deep levels of understanding rather than language codes, syntax, and other shallower levels of text analysis. As such, it provides readers with up-to-date information on current psychological models specified in quantitative or analytical detail.
First published in 1979. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
Varieties of Personal Theology starts from the premise that all human beings are folk theologians, active not only in constructing selves but also in constructing worlds and guiding philosophies of life.Through fascinating indepth interviews and surveys, David Gortner looks specifically at 'emerging adults' (aged 18-25) as young theologians who, regardless of religious background, wrestle with fundamental questions of place, purpose, ultimate cause, and ultimate aims in life. This book charts the subtle and significant influences of social class, family, school, work, peer relationships, religion, and intrinsic attitudes and dispositions on young adults' personal theologies, and traces the w...
The papers in this volume were originally presented at the Symposium on Conversation, held at the University of New Mexico in July 1995. The symposium brought together scholars who work on face-to-face communication from a variety of perspectives: social, cultural, cognitive and communicative. Our aim for both the symposium and this volume has been to challenge some of the prevailing dichotomies in discourse studies: First, the cleavage between the study of information flow and the study of social interaction. Second, the theoretical division between speech-situation models and cognitive models. Third, the methodological split between the study of spontaneous conversation in natural context ...
First published in 1975, A Cognitive Theory of Learning provides a history of hypothesis theory (H theory), along with the author’s research from the previous decade. The first part introduces the reader to contributions of some major learning theorists. It traces the history of H theory, reviewing the confrontation with conditioning theory, with the stress on the emergence of H theory which came to predominate. The second part describes the author’s work, presented as it emerged over time. It shows how the outcome of one experiment typically led to the next theoretical development or experiment. Originally part of The Experimental Psychology Series this reissue can now be read and enjoyed again in its historical context.
This volume presents in-depth investigations of the processes of meaning-making during reading at both local (discourse) and global (general knowledge) levels. It will be of theoretical and practical interest to cognitive scientists & reading researchers