Vers la prise en compte de la caractéristique multidimensionnelle des représentations mentales construites à partir des textes narratifs : apports théoriques, empiriques et questions

Abstract

Summary : Evidence for a multidimensional aspect of mental representations built from narrative texts : Theoretical framework, empirical contributions and issues. The main goal of this paper is to review the studies that investigated the multidimensional aspect of situational representation elaborated from narrative texts. After presenting the origins ofthe multidimensional approach, we describe two models, the « Structure Building Framework » (Gernsbacher, 1990) and the « Event Indexing Model » initially proposed by Zwaan, Langston and Graesser (1995) that underline the importance of multiple dimensions in reference with the notion of situational continuity. Then, we present empirical studies that confirm the validity ofthe theoretical principles ofthe event indexing model that account for the richness ofthe comprehension process. Finally, we raise some issues relative to the current multidimensional approach that concern, first, unanswered questions about the definition of the dimensions and their monitoring, and, second, whether the event indexing model can be applied to ail types oftext. Key words : text comprehension, multidimensional situation model, situational continuity, coherence.