The scope of this research deals with how texts are comprehended. For the purposes of my work, a text can be defined as:
Text: A set of written sentences and phrases which are connected in a meaningful way to a common theme (or set of related themes). A text describes a set of scenes and events ( scenarios) which are ordered temporally as well as causally. This ordering may be partial and implicit.
Notice that this definition limits the scope of the research to the written word. As will be seen in later chapters, many of the aspects of the reading theory I have developed can apply to other communicative channels; for example, there is much overlap in the process of reading a written text and comprehending it and listening to an oral presentation and comprehending it. The current work, however, focuses on the use of the written word. This allows certain benefits which would not exist in the case of oral communication; for instance, it is possible to reread a sentence which is incomprehensible at first.
The goal of the reading process is to comprehend the text in question. It is necessary, then, to define comprehension:
Comprehension: The process by which a representation (usually tied to an external object) is transformed into an internal representation (which is usually some abstraction of the original) within a cognitive agent; while different from the original representation, the new one captures the salient features of the originally represented object. By ``salient,'' I mean that successful comprehension will result in a representation which embody those features which allow correct or plausible explanation, abduction, and prediction to occur. Additionally, the representation should have a high degree of internal consistency. Thus, comprehension relates both to interpreting what has been read and to anticipating what is forthcoming.
With the above terms, the formal definition of reading can be simplified:
Reading: The cognitive task of comprehending a text in order to produce an internal representation of it.
The above definitions would be sufficient for most research dealing with reading; however, since I am dealing with the creative aspects of the process, some additional description is needed. The text being read may contain concepts which are novel to the reader; this is what provides the need for a theory of creative reading. It is rare that all the elements of a text and their organization will be familiar to a reader. But, exactly what does the term ``novel'' indicate? What is novel to one reasoner may be familiar to another. Also, different concepts will be at different ``levels'' of novelty--some concepts will be more novel than others. To judge this ``degree of novelty'' I have identified four broad ways in which a concept (M) may be novel with respect to a given function (F):
If a text is to be comprehended successfully, the novel concepts which it contains have to be understood by the reader. The term ``understanding'' is another overloaded word, with respect to the numerous definitions and connotations which are carried on it. For this research, understanding can be viewed as follows:
Understanding: The process by which a reasoner can explain a concept (describe how it accomplishes its functional role), predict future events which rely on a concept, or abduce past events which involved the concept. Note that these three elements of understanding support one another--if one can explain a concept, it is often possible to predict and abduce based on it; similarly, if one can predict based on a concept, this can lead to a better explanation.
Comprehension is achieved, in part, by understanding the set of concepts being presented to the reasoner and making connections between them. Understanding, then, is the task of explaining a single concept. For example, consider the light saber example from the introductory chapter. With respect to a medieval longsword, the light saber represents an R-Novel concept. I have understood the concept of light saber when I know its function and when I can explain how it accomplishes that function. This explanation does not have to be extremely technical nor does it have to be wholly correct--within the domain of reading, I need to understand concepts only to the point which enables me to continue the reading episode. If I am reading a story set in the Star Wars world, knowing that a light saber is an extremely effective cutting weapon is sufficient for most of the comprehension process. If I need to explain why Darth Vader's saber is a different color than Luke's, I will need to add to my explanation that the light saber is the traditional weapon of the Jedi Knights and that the blade color signifies one's allegiance to either the Light Side or the Dark Side. I still do not need to understand how one is constructed or how it works. If I can explain the light saber, I can predict how it may be used; for example, it makes a much better cutting tool than a traditional sword as the blade does not dull. I may also predict that its energy source can become depleted, something one would not predict about a longsword. Understanding also enables me to abduce why it was created, although in this case this requires going beyond the simple function of it and realizing that it does represent the Jedi Knights--thus, it has a symbolic function as well as a practical one.
The work presented in this dissertation spans aspects of both reading and understanding. However, I do not claim to have solved the reading problem; nor do I claim to have mastered the understanding problem. In fact, the research does not even attempt to cover these two areas completely; to do so with even one area would take decades. Instead, the work should be viewed in light of a diagram such as Figure 2. There is a realm of reading behavior which involves both issues which I address and issues which I do not. For example, understanding eye movement is a crucial aspect of building a ``complete'' theory of reading. Yet, this research does not mention eye movements, since that element of reading research falls outside the scope of my work. Similarly, by restricting the scope of understanding to that which occurs during reading, I am able to constrain the theory more so than if I were dealing with unrestricted understanding. Thus, the scope of my research is solidly within the intersection of understanding and reading, focusing on the high-level cognitive aspects of reading.