Chapter Coherent Cognitive Framework

The author in this thesis holds an opinion which is based on the review of some theories related to coherence research: the research on text coherence should accord to Psychological Frame Theory of Brown & Yule. Brown & Yule (1983) thought we should change the traditional focus of research on text coherence from the elements inside the text to those outside the text. They also stress the background knowledge of the text participants play a very important role on the interpretation of text coherence. In the meanwhile, they point out that the background knowledge actually exists in human mind as a certain cognitive model. The author takes Psychological Frame Theory as a base to study text structure, and apply Relevance Theory of Dan Sperber & Deirdre Wilson, the view of discourse analysis of Langacker and Schema Theory to study the text coherence in cognitive frame. In process of concrete analysis, the author classified the text coherence into two categories: the liner coherence and the macrostructure coherence. And the author analyses their cognitive model separately. After that, the author summarizes the general cognitive model of text coherence. The author discusses other elements which affect on text coherence as well, such as contextual assumptions, important principles and text implication and metaphors. In the end, the author points out this cognitive model will play a certain positive part on the language teaching.