Influence of text cohesion on the persuasive power of expository text

The present study examined how global text cohesion affects persuasion and memory for message arguments presented in expository text. Sixty-nine participants who held a neutral prior attitude towards NATO read a persuasive text about NATO that was either high or low in global cohesion. After reading, participants voted whether Finland should seek NATO membership and filled in an attitude questionnaire. After a 1-week delay they returned for a surprise recall task. The results showed that the high cohesion text was more persuasive than the low cohesion text. Moreover, attitude after reading but not text cohesion predicted later recall of the message arguments. The results show that global text cohesion increases text's persuasive power and that readers who form a positive attitude have better memory of the persuasive arguments after a delay than readers who are less persuaded.     

The processing of cohesion devices in text comprehension

Summary The cognitive operations involved in the processing of surface-cohesion devices for the construction of a coherent mental representation is a major issue in text comprehension. An experiment was carried out with two narratives presented in two versions: a high-cohesion version and a low-cohesion version derived from the high version with the use of several devices — two anaphoric markers, changes in the temporal connective and word order, omission of the thematic sentence - without modification of the text content. The subjects read and immediately recalled a high-cohesion text and a low-cohesion text. The results showed that lowering cohesion produced an insignificant increase (8%) in reading time, but a highly significant decrease (25%) in recall performance. It appears that the subjects did not execute the processing required by the cohesion devices. The results are discussed with respect to models of sentence comprehension in comparison with text comprehension and metacognitive aspects of reading comprehension.     

Coh-Metrix: Analysis of text on cohesion and language

Advances in computational linguistics and discourse processing have made it possible to automate many language- and text-processing mechanisms. We have developed a computer tool called Coh-Metrix, which analyzes texts on over 200 measures of cohesion, language, and readability. Its modules use lexicons, part-of-speech classifiers, syntactic parsers, templates, corpora, latent semantic analysis, and other components that are widely used in computational linguistics. After the user enters an English text, Coh-Metrix returns measures requested by the user. In addition, a facility allows the user to store the results of these analyses in data files (such as Text, Excel, and SPSS). Standard text readability formulas scale texts on difficulty by relying on word length and sentence length, whereas Coh-Metrix is sensitive to cohesion relations, world knowledge, and language and discourse characteristics.     

Coh-metrix: analysis of text on cohesion and language.

Advances in computational linguistics and discourse processing have made it possible to automate many language- and text-processing mechanisms. We have developed a computer tool called Coh-Metrix, which analyzes texts on over 200 measures of cohesion, language, and readability. Its modules use lexicons, part-of-speech classifiers, syntactic parsers, templates, corpora, latent semantic analysis, and other components that are widely used in computational linguistics. After the user enters an English text, CohMetrix returns measures requested by the user. In addition, a facility allows the user to store the results of these analyses in data files (such as Text, Excel, and SPSS). Standard text readability formulas scale texts on difficulty by relying on word length and sentence length, whereas Coh-Metrix is sensitive to cohesion relations, world knowledge, and language and discourse characteristics.     

Family adaptability,cohesion, and creativity

With the awareness of the role stress plays in our lives, it is vital to gain a better insight into the family and assess its adaptability and cohesion. This study was conducted to examine the association between perceived family adaptability and cohesion levels and creativity. Eighty college students from interior design and hotel and restaurant administration classes received the How Do You Think Instrument and the Adaptability and Cohesion Evaluation Scales. Results indicated that the highest creativity scores characterized highly adaptable families. The lowest creativity scores were characteristic of rigid families (low adaptability). Adaptability within the family was a significant contributor in predicting creativity scores, but family cohesion was not.     

Personality in teams: Its relationship to social cohesion,task cohesion,and team performance

This study continued past research on the relationship between personality composition in teams and social cohesion and team performance (Barrick, Stewart, Neubert, & Mount, 1998). Results from the Barrick et al. sample (N = 50) were compared with data from two new samples, one comprising drilling teams in the US (N = 24), and the other comprising student teams in The Netherlands (N = 25). Furthermore, this study examined the relationship between personality composition and task cohesion, usually considered to be a stronger predictor of team performance than social cohesion. Results partly confirmed the relationships between personality composition, cohesion, and team performance that were found previously. Minimum levels of conscientiousness and agreeableness contributed positively to both task cohesion and team performance. High mean levels of extraversion and emotional stability contributed positively to social cohesion. Some results differed across the three samples, stressing the importance of task characteristics as a factor influencing relationships between team personality, team processes, and team performance. Although significant relationships were found between social cohesion, task cohesion, and performance, cohesion measures did not mediate relationships between personality composition and team performance.     

Simple,applied text parsing

Text parsing for use in linguistic or artificial intelligence research can often be ill-suited for use in other lines of investigation in which simple, problem-specific parsing techniques may be used. This paper describes the development of a simple text parser for use in a specific research setting. The resulting parsing programs are compact enough for easy use on most available m inland microcomputers, while still providing adequate results for some applications such as chunking text into small units for later presentation.     

Coloured overlays, text, and texture

In four studies children were asked to read aloud a passage of randomly ordered common words with and without a coloured sheet of plastic (overlay) placed upon the page. The children's rate of reading increased with the overlay, for some children more than for others. The children were also asked to undertake a test of texture segmentation in which targets consisting of a structured texture had to be distinguished from within a random background texture. The texture segmentation was improved when the overlay was used, again for some children more than for others. The improvement in texture segmentation was, in general, correlated with the improvement in rate of reading. Slower readers were generally poorer at texture segmentation. The implications for reading, for texture segmentation, and for clinical tests of vision are discussed.     

Internal cohesion psychotherapy: The nature,principles and application

Psychotherapy is widely used to treat different mental health disorders and emotional difficulties. The main objective of psychotherapy is to help clients become aware of and have control over their thoughts, moods, feelings and behaviours, as well as create healthy strategies to respond to challenging situations. Since the existing psychotherapy approaches and other methods of treatment are not always effective in treating mental health disorders, there is still space for new approaches to fill this gap. In this paper, we provide information about internal cohesion psychotherapy, which is a new integrative approach. This paper presents a new approach to eclectic psychotherapy, focussing on four detrimental aspects of human functioning through different time perspectives.     

Parent-to-child physical aggression,neighborhood cohesion,and development of children's internalizing and externalizing

Taking a risk and resilience approach, this study examined (1) whether child age moderates the association between exposure to parent–child physical aggression (PCPA) and initial levels and growth in internalizing and externalizing problems, and (2) whether neighborhood social cohesion is a protective factor for children who experience PCPA. Data came from 2810 caregivers of children aged 3–15 who participated in the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN). Multilevel growth models showed that age moderated PCPA's association with internalizing problems, such that the association was stronger in older children than in younger children. Age also moderated PCPA's association with externalizing problems, such that the association was stronger in younger children than in older children. Neighborhood cohesion partially attenuated the association between PCPA and internalizing but only for older children; living in a neighborhood characterized by high cohesion mitigated levels of internalizing for maltreated children aged 11 years and older.     

Rhetorics of truth,justice and secrecy in Pascal's text

Beginning from a definition of philosophical discourse which states the necessity of rhetoric meant as the whole of the linguistic devices aiming to persuade the interlocutor of truth and justice, the author points out that Pascal's text would be an outstanding example of such a discourse, while showing, nevertheless, the specificity of the rhetoric he employs. Such a specificity would aim to carry out a complex logic of the secret, concerning chiefly the ackowledgement and identification procedures of the subject of the discourse-enunciation, and its pronominal and nominal markers.The author studies this logic on one hand by starting from the pragmatic patterns developed by the linguistics of enunciation, and on the other taking into account the philosophical, ethical and religious themes of the Jansenist thought in the XVIIth century. The distinction between concealment and secret leads the author to set up the forms of political rhetoric against the actual Pascalian aspects of philosophical rhetoric. Such a logic of the secret, which is the projection of the hidden God teologema into the field of philosophical discourse, would enable us to position as absent the subject producing this discourse and thus to transform what he states into a discourse of truth and justice. The very careful examination of the anonymity strategies and mostly of the writing tactics concerning the author's real name (anagram) would seem to confirm this conception of the rhetoric of Pascal's philosophical discourse.     

Comparison of group cohesion,class participation,and exam performance in live and online classes

Though class participation and group cohesion have shown some potential to promote student performance in conventional classrooms, their efficacy has not yet been demonstrated in an online-class setting. Group cohesion, defined as member attraction to and self-identification with a group, is thought to promote positive interdependence and the success of the group’s members. The current study sought to determine if group cohesion is significantly affected by the change of course setting from a live classroom to an asynchronous online-hybrid class in which students met in person only for course exams and otherwise interacted with each other through an online discussion board. Because peer interaction appears vital for the development of cohesion, we examined the relationship between participation in class discussion and students’ self-reported group cohesion and exam performance. With one exception, course requirements and materials were identical between the two class sections: students in the online-hybrid course completed homework assignments, whereas students in the live section were simply encouraged to do the same. Despite the advantage conferred by mandatory homework assignments, the findings heavily favored the conventional live classroom with respect to exam performance and self-reported group cohesion. Participation in class discussion was high in both class sections. The results indicated that both student performance and group cohesion were significantly lower in the hybrid classes.