ABSTRACT
Models of memory need not be restricted to list learning studies but can be extended to account for how people comprehend and remember text The basic memory processes appear to be the same in both cases, but what is considerably more complex in the case of texts are the comprehension and encoding processes involved. Later we briefly sketch a model of discourse comprehension and memory for text that has evolved over a number of years. In particular, we focus on the question how the information in a text is combined with and integrated into the reader's knowledge and personal store of experience. We use this model to account for two results that have been reported in the literature on priming. First, we analyze a study that explores the differences in the accessibility of the first- and second-mentioned actors in a sentence, as measured by priming methods. Secondly, we consider a study demonstrating that not the words of a sentence by themselves, but the whole discourse context determines knowledge activation, and hence the degree of priming that is obtained experimentally. Our purpose in presenting these analyses is to show that the model is able to account for these phenomena in a simple and consistent way, without complex auxiliary assumptions, though it was in no way designed to do so.
