The distinction proposed by Walter Kintsch and colleagues between textbase and situation model representations has had a profound influence on theory and research in discourse processing over the past four decades. However, this distinction also has implications for education that have been less widely recognized. We describe a number of practical applications that can be adopted by college instructors and students alike to enhance learning outcomes. We describe how these two levels of mental representation relate to college and university instruction, studying, and assessment. We also consider how certain topics and study strategies that align with this distinction are easier for students to grasp if this framework is already in place.

Background It is important to understand the factors that influence belief formation and belief change. Objective We test the hypothesis that following belief change about contentious topics, verifying a past belief will influence current beliefs. Methods In Experiment 1, participants reported initial beliefs about television violence in a prescreening, then read a belief-inconsistent text in the experiment. Participants either verified or did not verify their initial beliefs before reporting current beliefs. In Experiment 2, participants were randomly assigned to verify their initial belief (about gun control effectiveness), a false belief that was the opposite of their initial belief or did not verify a belief. Results Participants changed their beliefs after reading a belief-inconsistent text. If participants first verified the beliefs they held several weeks prior to the experiment, they reported their post-reading beliefs as closer to those initial beliefs. In Experiment 2, although 80% of participants in the false belief condition verified that belief as accurate, it did not influence their post-reading beliefs. Conclusion Results show that beliefs were moderated when participants verified their initial beliefs. Results are consistent with the belief fluency hypothesis, which contends that salient information is used in constructing our current beliefs.

The content of argumentative essays is determined by multiple factors, but belief influences are understudied compared to topic knowledge and argument schema. We investigate how beliefs influence the inclusion of basic components in argumentative writing. A pre-screening survey identified believers and disbelievers in gun control effectiveness. In a subsequent laboratory session, subjects (N = 324) read a one-sided text that was either consistent or inconsistent with their beliefs. Subjects then reported their beliefs and wrote a 250-word argumentative essay explaining them. These essays were coded for the presence or absence of a claim, the number of reasons supporting the claim, the presence of a counterargument, text content, and other factors. 682 supplementary subjects provided approximately 10 ratings for each essay on several factors, including position, clarity, and consideration of both sides. Subjects who read a belief consistent text wrote essays that were more likely to contain a claim, more reasons, and text content. Subjects who read a belief inconsistent text were more likely to include an evaluative statement about the text and to consider both sides of the issue. Individual differences in belief change were related to the likelihood of stating a claim, the number of reasons, and likelihood of mentioning text content. Results suggest that beliefs influence the basic components of argumentation that are included in argumentative essays. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

OBJECTIVE:Patients' ability to judge health change over time has important clinical implications for treatment, but is understudied in longitudinal contexts with meaningful health change. We assess patients' awareness of health change for 5 years following bariatric surgery, and its association with weight loss.METHOD:Participants were part of the Longitudinal Assessment of Bariatric Surgery (N = 2,027). Perceived health change for each year was assessed by comparing it to self-reports of health on the SF-36 health survey. Participants were categorized as concordant when perceived and actual self-reported health change corresponded, and as discordant when they did not correspond.RESULTS:Year-to-year concordance between perceived and actual self-reported health change occurred less than 50% of the time. Discordance between perceived and actual health was associated with weight loss following surgery. Discordant-positive participants who perceived their health change as more positive than was warranted lost more weight post-surgery and thus had lower body mass index scores than concordant participants. Conversely, discordant-negative participants who perceived their health as worse than what was warranted lost less weight post-surgery and thus had higher body mass index scores.CONCLUSIONS:These results suggest that recollection of past health is generally poor and can be biased by salient factors during recall. Clinicians are advised to use caution when retrospective judgments of health are utilized. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

When people change beliefs as a result of reading a text, are they aware of these changes? This question was examined for beliefs about spanking as an effective means of discipline. In two experiments, subjects reported beliefs about spanking effectiveness during a prescreening session. In a subsequent experimental session, subjects read a one-sided text that advocated a belief consistent or inconsistent position on the topic. After reading, subjects reported their current beliefs and attempted to recollect their initial beliefs. Subjects reading a belief inconsistent text were more likely to change their beliefs than those who read a belief consistent text. Recollections of initial beliefs tended to be biased in the direction of subjects' current beliefs. In addition, the relationship between the belief consistency of the text read and accuracy of belief recollections was mediated by belief change. This belief memory bias was independent of on-line text processing and comprehension measures, and indicates poor metacognitive awareness of belief change.

We examined the influence of reading a one-sided text on informal argument evaluation. After reporting initial beliefs in a separate online prescreening, subjects with polarized beliefs read a belief-consistent or -inconsistent text about the benefits of spanking children as a means of discipline. After reading, subjects reported their beliefs and judged the soundness of a series of one-sentence informal arguments that made belief-consistent or -inconsistent claims. Subjects were more likely to accept arguments as sound when the claims were consistent with the position of the text they read and reject them as unsound when the claims were inconsistent with the text position. Process mediation modeling revealed that text position (pro vs. con) influenced reasoning biases both directly and indirectly via the extent to which they experienced belief change. These findings suggest that informal reasoning biases can be malleable and are influenced by both text content and by subjects' beliefs at the time of reasoning.

We examined subjects' ability to judge the soundness of informal arguments. The argument claims matched or did not match subject beliefs. In all experiments subjects indicated beliefs about spanking and television violence in a prescreening. Subjects read one-sentence arguments consisting of a claim followed by a reason and then judged the soundness of the argument. Signal detection theory analyses were used to examine discrimination performance and response bias. In Experiment 1 discrimination was not predicted by beliefs, but subjects were biased in favor of rejecting arguments as unsound when the claim was inconsistent with their beliefs compared with when it was consistent. In Experiments 2 and 3 we replicated these effects and examined neutral subjects and reasoning ability as factors. The results suggest that belief or disbelief in an argument claim biases students' judgments of the argument's soundness.

This investigation applies two approaches for representing and comparing text structures as undirected network graphs to describe the influence of narrative and expository lesson texts on readers’ knowledge structure elicited as free recall. Narrative and expository lesson texts and undergraduate participants’ free recall essays (n = 90) from a study by Wolfe and Mienko (Br J Educ Psychol 77, 541–564, 2007) were reanalyzed for lexical proximity as sequential occurrence of selected important terms in the text and as actual minimum distances between these terms. The proximity data were then rendered as Pathfinder networks for analysis. Compared to human-rater benchmark measures, the convergent validity of the sequential approach (range of r = .53 to .83, median r = .70) was a little better than that of the minimum distance approach (.51 to .80, median r = .67). Further, we anticipated that the lesson text structure would be reflected in the text structure of the free recall essays, but this was not observed. On average, the essays in all three lesson conditions tended to converge on a sequential expository structure. Further, compared to the expository lesson texts, the narrative lesson text had a distinctly different influence on posttest recall essay text structures. Overall then, the sequential occurrence approach appears to provide a reasonably good, automatically derived method for representing and comparing lesson texts and participants’ essays as network graphs. If further confirmed and fully automated, there is a wide range of application of such measurement approaches for learning and research.

We examine students' processing and representation of arguments and counterarguments in one-sided scientific texts. In Experiment 1, students read texts about evolution and TV violence. Sentence reading times indicated that subjects slowed down reading to the extent that arguments were both more consistent, and inconsistent, with the text position. We refer to this processing pattern as argument-focused processing. We also examined whether students hold their beliefs for evidence- or affect-based reasons (belief basis). For the evolution texts, belief basis moderated argument-focused processing. In Experiment 2, subjects read a one-sided text, then a neutral text, and then wrote a summary of the neutral text. Compared to affect-based subjects, evidence-based subjects wrote summaries that were more neutral. Beliefs predicted few differences in processing or representation. We conclude that subjects engage in argument-focused processing when reading one-sided scientific texts. We tentatively conclude that argument-focused processing is moderated by belief basis, but not subject beliefs.

Background. Previous research suggests that narrative and expository texts differ in the extent to which they prompt students to integrate to-be-learned content with relevant prior knowledge during comprehension.Aims. We expand on previous research by examining on-line processing and representation in memory of to-be-learned content that is embedded in narrative or expository texts. We are particularly interested in how differences in the use of relevant prior knowledge leads to differences in terms of levels of discourse representation (textbase vs. situation model).Samples. A total of 61 university undergraduates in Expt 1, and 160 in Expt 2.Methods. In Expt 1, subjects thought out loud while comprehending circulatory system content embedded in a narrative or expository text, followed by free recall of text content. In Expt 2, subjects read silently and completed a sentence recognition task to assess memory.Results. In Expt 1, subjects made more associations to prior knowledge while reading the expository text, and recalled more content. Content recall was also correlated with amount of relevant prior knowledge for subjects who read the expository text but not the narrative text. In Expt 2, subjects reading the expository text (compared to the narrative text) had a weaker textbase representation of the to-be-learned content, but a marginally stronger situation model.Conclusions. Results suggest that in terms of to-be-learned content, expository texts trigger students to utilize relevant prior knowledge more than narrative texts.

Background. Previous research suggests that narrative and expositor yt exts differ in the extent to which they prompt students to integrate to-be-learned content with relevant prior knowledge during comprehension. Aims. We expand on previous research by examining on-line processing and representation in memor yo ft o-be-learned content that is embedded in narrative or expositor yt exts. We ar ep articularly intereste di nh ow differences in the use of relevant prior knowledge leads to differences in terms of levels of discourse representation (textbase vs. situation model). Samples. At otal of 61 university undergraduates in Expt 1, and 160 in Expt 2. Methods. In Expt 1, subjects thought out loud while comprehending circulator y system content embedded in an arrative or expositor yt ext, followed by free recall of text content. In Expt 2, subjects read silently and completed as entence recognition task to assess memory. Results. In Expt 1, subjects made more associations to prior knowledge while reading the expositor yt ext, and recalled more content. Content recall was also correlated with amount of relevant prior knowledge for subjects who read the expositor yt ext but not the narrative text. In Expt 2, subjects reading the expositor y text (compared to the narrative text) had aw eaker textbase representation of the to-be-learned content, but am arginally stronger situation model. Conclusions. Results suggest that in terms of to-be-learned content, expositor y texts trigger students to utilize relevant prior knowledge more than narrative texts. Ac ontinuing question in comprehension researc hi nvolves the extent to which reader s vary their comprehensio ns trategie su nder differen tc ircumstances ,a nd what consequence st hese strategies have in terms of how information is remembered and used. Previous researc hs uggests that one of the factors that influences comprehension strategies is the genr ei nw hich information is presented (Alvermann, Hynd, Q Hartley, 1986; McDaniel E Wolfe, 2005; Wolf e& Mienko, 2007). Much of this researc hs uggests that narrative processing tend st ob em ore focused on

Those with differing levels of religious fundamentalism (RF) may be selective in their memory for religious information. In Study 1, participants read a text about money or sex, with a judgmental or not‐judgmental message. Higher RF was associated with more accurate recall and fewer intrusions. In Study 2, participants high or low in RF read texts about sex. High‐RF participants had more accurate recall and fewer intrusions. However, high‐RF participants had more recognition false alarms to sentences that were not presented. High RF may aid memory for religious information, but also increase familiarity of related but not presented information. Exposure to not‐judgmental messages decreased RF scores, suggesting that textual messages can impact responses to fundamentalism scales.

Subtitle: Open lines of communication are critical to a well-oiled supply chain. New technologies, such as Electronic Freight Management (EFM), enhance data accuracy and availability, making it easier to maintain that communication, or visibility. This article describes these technologies, outlines results from an independent assessment of an EFM test deployment, adds broader industry research results, and reports the impacts on performance and economic metrics.