Schwarz, M. N. K., & Flammer, A. (1981). Text structure and title-effects on comprehension and recall. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 20(1), 61-66.

Schwarz, M.; Flammer, A.

1981

Schwarz, M. N. K., & Flammer, A. (1981). Text structure and title-effects on comprehension and recall. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 20(1), 61-66.

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A coherent text normally requires the reader to construct a sense of the total text. So we expected a thematic title to relieve the reader of most of this task. Experiment 1 confirmed this idea by showing that the thematic title significantly increased free recall if the text structure was regular or slightly disturbed, but did not affect recall of an unstructured text. Experiment 2 showed that prolonged reading time allowed the thematic title to raise free recall of a text with random structure. Furthermore, the two experiments demonstrated the comprehensibility ratings to be affected by the text structure and the reading time, but not by the title. Thus, comprehensibility ratings do not seem to be interchangeable with free recall.

Prolonging processing time allows the thematic title to raise free recall of the text that was presented in random sentence order. This may be interpreted as the title suggesting a relatively suitable hypothesis for the reorganization of the material. Furthermore the two experiments demonstrated the comprehensibility to be affected by the text structure and reading time, but not by the title.

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