Distance Effects in Surface Structures and Situation Models

Rinck, Mike; Bower, Gordon H.; Wolf, Karin

doi:10.1207/s1532799xssr0203_3

Cited by 13 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…The present study showed some evidence of facilitated processing for information in the location room, but the patterns for the other conditions did not show the standard pattern. Importantly, we saw no clear spatial gradient effect, as is typically observed in narrative memory (Bower & Rinck, 2001;Curiel & Radvansky, 2002;Dutke, 2003;Dutke et al, 2003;Dutke & Rinck, 2006;Morrow et al, 1989Morrow et al, , 1987Rapp et al, 2006;Rinck & Bower, 1995;Rinck, Bower, & Wolf, 1998;Rinck et al, 1997). This is inconsistent with the more traditional fadingforeground account.…”

Section: Discussioncontrasting

confidence: 91%

Event memory and moving in a well-known environment

et al. 2013

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Research in narrative comprehension has repeatedly shown that when people read about characters moving in well-known environments, the accessibility of object information follows a spatial gradient. That is, the accessibility of objects is best when they are in the same room as the protagonist, and it becomes worse the farther away they are see, e.g., Morrow, Greenspan, & Bower, (Journal of Memory and Language, 26, 165-187, 1987). In the present study, we assessed this finding using an interactive environment in which we had people memorize a map and navigate a virtual simulation of the area. During navigation, people were probed with pairs of object names and indicated whether both objects were in the same room. In contrast to the narrative studies described above, several experiments showed no evidence of a clear spatial gradient. Instead, memory for objects in currently occupied locations (e.g., the location room) was more accessible, especially after a small delay, but no clear decline was evident in the accessibility of information in memory with increased distance. Also, memory for objects along the pathway of movement (i.e., rooms that a person only passed through) showed a transitory suppression effect that was present immediately after movement, but attenuated over time. These results were interpreted in light of the event horizon model of event cognition.

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Section: Discussioncontrasting

confidence: 91%

Event memory and moving in a well-known environment

et al. 2013

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“…For instance, objects in the location room are known to be highly accessible, perhaps maximally so; therefore, a short duration of discourse time or story time might not be able to increase their accessibility even further. Such an interactive relation was observed by Rinck, Bower, and Wolf (1998) when they independently varied spatial distance and distance in the surface structure of the text. To investigate the additivity of effects here, spatial distance, story time distance, and discourse time distance were varied independently of each other in Experiment 2.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 83%

“…Despite the multidimensionality of situation models, most experimental studies have addressed only single dimensions. Exceptions are the studies by Bower and Rinck (1999a) and Rinck et al (1998) mentioned above, as well as the study by Haenggi, Gernsbacher, and Bolliger (1994), who manipulated both emotional and spatial inconsistencies contained in short narratives. The most comprehensive multidimensional studies were reported by Zwaan and his colleagues (Zwaan, Langston, & Graesser, 1995;Zwaan, Magliano, & Graesser, 1995;Zwaan et aI., 1998) in support of the event-indexing model of'narrative comprehension.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Temporal and spatial distance in situation models

Rinck

Bower

2000

Memory & Cognition

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In two experiments, we investigated how readers use information about temporal and spatial distance to focus attention on the more important parts ofthe situation model that they create during narrative comprehension. Effects of spatial distance were measured by testing the accessibility in memory of objects and rooms located at differing distances from the protagonist's current location. Before the test probe, an intervening episode was inserted in the narrative. Story time distance was manipulated by stating that the intervening episode lasted for either minutes or hours. Discourse time-that is, time spent reading from prime to test-was manipulated by describing the intervening episode either briefly or at length. Clear effects of story time distance and spatial distance on accessibility were found, whereas discourse time distance did not affect accessibility. The results are interpreted as supporting constructionist theories of text comprehension.During the comprehension of narrative texts, comprehenders build multilevel representations of the information that the texts convey (see, e.g., Gernsbacher, 1990;Glenberg & Langston, 1992;Johnson-Laird, 1983;Kintsch, 1988Kintsch, , 1998 van Dijk & Kintsch, 1983;Zwaan, Langston, & Graesser, 1995). Here, we will investigate one such level of representation: the situation model or mental model of the text. Situation models are the level oftext representation associated with "deep" understanding, and they serve to integrate the information stated in a text with the reader's world knowledge. In short, situation models "represent what the text is about, not the text itself" (Glenberg, Meyer, & Lindem, 1987, p. 70).Situation models are presumed to be multidimensional; in them, many different aspects ofa situation are hypothesized to be represented. These include temporal, spatial, and causal relations, as well as protagonists' goals and emotions (Zwaan, Langston, & Graesser, 1995;Zwaan, Magliano, & Graesser, 1995;Zwaan, Radvansky, Hilliard, & Curiel, 1998). Yet despite this multidimensionality ofsituation models, most experimental studies have addressed only single dimensions. Among these, spatial relations are the type ofinformation Preparation ofthis paper was supported by Grant Ri 600/3-3 from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft to M,R" and by NIMH Grant IR37-MH-47575 to G.H.B. We thank Daniel Morrow for supplying primary versions ofthe experimental narratives. He also made helpful comments on an earlier version ofthis paper, as did Rolf Zwaan and Tom Trabasso. The assistance of James Reybauld and Saskia Traill in conducting the experiments is gratefully acknowledged. We are also grateful to Bruno Lecoutre for helpful suggestions regarding the computation of effect sizes in repeated-measures designs. Correspondence should be addressed to M. Rinck, TV Dresden, Dept. of General Psychology, D-01062 Dresden, Germany (e-mail: rinck@rcs.urz.tu-dresden.de). G. H. Bower may be reached at gordon@psych.stanford.edu. examined most often (see Bower & Morrow, 1990;Graesser, Millis, ...

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“…If mentioning the name of the target room in the motion sentence had primed the accessibility of the target object mentioned in the subsequent target sentence, this priming effect should have been equally strong in all target sentences. As the target object itself was only mentioned in the target sentence, and not in any preceding sentence, surface distance (Rinck, Bower, & Wolf, 1998) could not have affected reading times.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%