1998 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
The construction and revision of knowledge through discourse comprehension
| Project/Area Number |
08837020
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Section | 一般 |
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| Research Field |
談話(ディスコース)
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| Research Institution | Tokyo Woman's Christian University |
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Principal Investigator |
KOJIMA Keiko Tokyo Woman's Christian University College of Arts and Sciences, Professor, 文理学部, 教授 (00050782)
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| Project Period (FY) |
1996 – 1998
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| Keywords | discourse couiprehension / construction of interpretations / revision of interpretations / detective stories / joint interpretation / prior knowledge / ambiguous words / kanj I |
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| Research Abstract |
To examine the construction and revision of knowledge through discourse comprehension, we run three series of experiments.
First, reading comprehension of a detective story was examined by four experiments. College students read a story, and at four points of the reading they were asked about their interpretations of the murderer, his/her motive, etc. The results were as follows : (1) The readers reached or approached to the correct conclusion as they read on the text. And when the readers read partly different texts, they made different interpretations. (2) The knowledge about the typical plot of the detective stories and conventional tricks sometimes helped readers generate the correct inferences, but other times misled them. (3) Once they constructed their own interpretation, they did not want to change it. (4) The readers were affected by their attempt to generate a joint interpretation : They might adopt their partner's interpretation or create a new interpretation.
Second, we examined comprehension processes of short oral discourse that involved a lexically ambiguous kanji word. The representation of the whole texts was revised by the latest information, but changing the interpretation of the ambiguous words was difficult, and the readers tried to solve the inconsistencies by making additional inferences.
Finally, we examined strategies coping with the lexical ambiguities in spoken Japanese. Japanese college students could readily recognize lexical ambiguity in speech and use effective strategies to reduce it.
In sum, readers construct knowledge using information in and out of the discourse.
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Research Products
(12 results)
