Making the connection: Generalized knowledge structures in story understanding

Abstract

Six experiments examined the connections in memory between two stories describing the same action sequence. The action sequences represented script-like MOP structures such as eating at a restaurant, like those proposed by Schank (1982. Dynamic memory: A theory of reminding and learning in computers and people. New York: Cambridge University Press). In the experimental procedure, subjects read a long list of stories, and then, after reading all the stories, they were presented with a list of phrases for which they were required to make old/new recognition judgments. Connections among the stories in memory were examined with pairs of phrases placed in the test list such that a priming phrase immediately preceded a target phrase. When a priming phrase was from the same story as its target phrase, responses to the target were facilitated. When a priming phrase was from another story of the same MOP as the target, responses were facilitated only if the test phrases were related to the MOP; there was no significant facilitation if the test phrases were not related to the MOP. In the case where the phrases were related to the MOP, there was as much facilitation when the phrases were from different stories as when they were from the same story. These results are shown to contradict previously proposed models of memory for script-like sequences, and a new, limited encoding, model is proposed.