私立大專院校經營困境與因應策略
A Cognitive Linguistics View on
Reading Comprehension
Frances Liao
Associate Professor, Chienkuo Technology University
Abstract
This paper adopts the viewpoint of cognitive linguistics on the nature of language, and hence
on second/foreign language learning. In cognitive linguistics, it is claimed that the structure and
functioning of language are closely associated with our general cognitive abilities in that
language system is shaped by our perception and conceptualization of the world. In particular,
categorization is identified as a prime example of the connection between our perceptual
experience and cognitive reasoning, given that it is a way of organizing our experience by
grouping similar entities into categories. It is proposed that categorization can be taken as an
alternative approach to second/foreign language reading instruction. That is, while reading
comprehension is defined in terms of the ability to recognize the inclusion and membership
properties of contextually determined semantic categories in a text, the learner needs to arrange
the events, actions, or concepts into a structured unit, both horizontally and vertically.
Categorization theory will be introduced in relation to Rosch famous studies (1973, 1975), along
with a comparison of its application and schema theory, which has been employed in
second/foreign language reading instruction and proved to be efficient. Examples taken from a
graded reader will be illustrated as how to identify items with category structure, and finally
issues that are not addressed in this paper will be discussed.
Keywords: cognitive linguistics, categorization, schema theory, reading comprehension, graded
readers
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I. INTRODUCTION
This paper adopts the view of cognitive linguistics on the nature of language, and hence on
language learning. Cognitive linguistics is a study of language, which explores the association of
general cognitive abilities with linguistic abilities.
It is famously claimed that, in order to make
sense of our environment, our conceptual knowledge is derived from our real-world experience.
This includes linguistic knowledge. It is thus argued that language is experientially determined
(Lakoff, 1987).
This experiential view (Ungerer & Schmid, 1996), termed by Lakoff “experiential
realism” (1987, p. xv), is firmly grounded in experience of the world.
Differing from the
autonomous view of generative linguistics, the study of language cannot be separated from general
cognitive abilities, such as perception, emotion, categorization and reasoning, in that linguistic
knowledge is shaped by our unique experience (Rudzka-Ostyn, 1993; Taylor, 1995).
This paper is intended to reveal the likelihood that conceptual categorization can be used to
understand a text by reconstructing the semantic categories through which the author’s meaning is
conveyed, and proposes an alternative way to look into reading comprehension. The argumentation
covers a brief introduction to categorization theory, the application of which can shed light on
comprehension process, and to the notion of contextually determined semantic categories, the
formation of which not only depends on the information contained in a text, but also stems from the
conceptual organization of the reader. We here define reading comprehension in terms of the ability
to recognize the internal structure of these categories, including the properties of inclusion and
membership.
Justification of this application will indisputably recognize the outstanding
achievement of schema theory in second/foreign language reading instruction and then a comparison
of these two approaches be made with regard to their potentials to arrange received information as a
structured unit by activating existing conceptual structure so as to understand and retain the
information more efficiently.
Tasks or activities inquiring the inclusion and membership properties
can be utilized in language classroom practice as an essential component of reading instruction to help
the learner organize the information or knowledge. It is important to bear in mind that this paper is
not so much arguing the superiority of categorization over any other methods as providing an
alternative and justifiable approach to second/foreign language reading instruction.
II. LITERATURE REVIEW
This section will first introduce categorization theory with special reference to Rosch’s famous
studies so as to illuminate the principles of categorization, and to the notion of contextually
determined semantic categories in order to build up requisite concepts for the proposed method; and
secondly, the cognitive linguistics view on second/foreign language reading via categorization will be
argued and compared with the renowned schema theory to reveal the promise of this approach.
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A. Categorization Theory
In her ground-breaking research into perceptual domains, Eleanor Rosch earlier revealed new
insights regarding the structure of categories (Rosch, 1973). One of her earliest and best known
experiments was conducted on Dani people whose language contained only two color terms.
people were trained to learn colors, which were paired with Dani clan names.
Dani
These names were
chosen because they constituted a recognizable set of words unassociated with perceptual phenomena.
Focal colors, i.e. the perceptually salient colors, were learned faster, even when hues with longer or
shorter wavelengths were centrally placed by the researchers. It was demonstrated that the focal
colors, or the prototypes of the category color, were more salient in our perception.
Research of this kind extended to semantic categories (Rosch, 1975). Fifty to sixty items for
each category were chosen for the experiment. American subjects were required to rate each item
within its category and were specifically asked to think about how good an example of a category
these items could be. A scale of 7-point was used, in which 1 indicated that an item could be a very
good example of a category, while 7 meant that this item was considered a very poor example.
For
instance, in the category furniture, items such as chair, sofa, bed, end table, cabinet, lamp, piano,
telephone, and so on, were presented and the subjects needed to make a judgment as to the goodness
of each item as a member of the category furniture. The results were surprisingly consistent in that a
high degree of agreement among the subjects was found regarding the very good example(s) of a
category and this effect of “best examples” (Rosch, 1975, p. 193) existed across all ten categories.
An experiment was also conducted to reveal that category members present various degrees of
membership (Rosh, 1973).
Subjects were asked to make a true/false judgment on sentences
constructed with the formula “A is a B” when A was a member and B was a category name.
Twelve
categories were chosen, and both typical and peripheral members were selected for each category.
For example, in the category vegetable, spinach (more typical vegetable) and mushroom (more
peripheral member) was paired with the category name vegetable and subjects were required to verify
the sentences “A spinach is a vegetable” and “A mushroom is a vegetable”. The reaction times to
these sentences were measured and recorded.
It was found that the reaction time was faster when A
was a central or prototypical member than when it was a peripheral member and thus confirmed the
researcher’s prediction. This research proved that members of a category do not have an equal status
in cognition. Rather, some members are more typical and others are less good members with a
peripheral status within the category.
Furthermore, studies demonstrated the characteristics of each level of categories.
A most
prominent study presented reliable evidence that subjects behaved differently toward different levels
of categories (Rosch, Mervis, Gray, Johnson, & Boyes-Braem, 1976). First, when asked to list
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attributes for all three levels of categories, the subjects listed significantly more properties of basic
level categories. Superordinate categories had few attributes in common; subordinate categories had
more properties (but not significantly more) than basic level categories. The conclusion was arrived
that the basic level was said to be more informative, while superordinate categories are distinct but
not informative because of their generalities, and subordinate categories are said to be informative but
not distinct because of their specificity.
Simply put, the principles of categorization are manifest both in horizontal and vertical aspects
(Rosch, 1978). Horizontally, the internal structure of categories displays prototypical members in
the center of the category surrounded by other members of decreasing similarity.
Vertically,
categories occur at different “levels of abstraction” or generality (Rosch, 1978, p. 30).
Class
inclusion is most readily perceived as a relation among three levels: superordinate, basic and
subordinate. The superordinate level is said to be the most general abstraction, while the subordinate
level contains items denoting the most particular meanings. The conceptual hierarchy representing
categorical relations is arranged in such a way that, when we encounter an instance, it enables us to
access a concept and retrieve related properties of the instance.
The inclusion properties of
categories allow us to transit the properties or features of a higher level to a lower level, and category
membership enables us to determine the relationship between parallel concepts.
B. Contextually Determined Semantic Categories
As usual practice, a text may contain events, actions, or concepts, especially when a text is more
extended.
This type of categories including events, actions, or concepts, will be termed
“contextually determined semantic categories” because their category structure is highly dependent on
a particular context, and accordingly need to be differentiated from object categories investigated in
experimental psychology. They are text-specific and instantial as they exist in the instances in a
particular text. They are constructed by the author in his mind and require retrieval in the conceptual
system of the reader. For example, for the category “the life of the river” (Harmer, 1999, p. 22), it is
not the surrounding of any common river that concerns the author, but the river in a particular area
and at a particular time.
In other words, the author created instantial categories, which were
supposed to be appropriate in the fictional world; and the reader of the text then had to evoke an
appropriate context in his/her mind according to his/her understanding of this world.
An appeal to the internal structure of this type of categories presented in a text can provide a
principled definition of context.
By defining the notion of reading comprehension in terms of the
ability to recognize the contextually determined semantic categories occurring in a text, context is
characterized in terms of the inclusion and membership properties of these categories, the
understanding of which depends on the relations between the concepts being evoked.
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superordinate categories need to be recognized, and category members need to be understood as
included as more or less prototypical members under this superordinate name present in or inferred
from the text. Undoubtedly, these relations vary with different contexts.
Moreover, it is also assumed that the concept activated by a category name can call up personal
experience of prior categorization judgments and, as a result, affect the recognition of both inclusion
and membership properties presented in a text.
Take the previous example, the category name “the
life of the river” can remind the reader of something along a creek in his/her hometown full of sweet
memory, or of something more remote and exotic when they read about the Yangtze River of China in
geography course. This means that personal experience and encyclopedic knowledge also have a
role in instantial categorization. A broader view of context should take into account not only the
content of a reading text, but also the existing conceptual structure shaped by personal experience.
In the literature of experimental psychology, it has been demonstrated that this type of categories
is psychologically real and presents the characteristics as object categories. In Barsalou’s research
into ad hoc categories, the category “ways to escape being killed by the Mafia”, for instance, was
provided with six 6 possible actions as instances, and the subjects were asked to rank them (Barsalou,
1983, p. 215). The rankings of these exemplars achieved a high level of agreement among subjects,
and proved that graded structure also exists in ad hoc or instantial categories. It seems reasonable to
say that, although the categories in Barsalou’s study and those proposed in this paper are not as well
established as object categories in our concept, they behave like object categories by having graded
structures and unclear cases.
C. Second/Foreign Language Reading
Reading was long ago compared to a “psycholinguistic guessing game” (Goodman, 1976, p. 260),
during which the reader makes an effort to understand what is conveying and creates meaning out of a
text in light of his/her world experience. In line with this model, schema theory has caught a
substantial amount of attention in recent development of second/foreign language reading instruction.
Derived from the research into L1 reading, schema theory is postulated that texts do not contain any
meaning by themselves; rather, it is the reader that constructs text meanings from their existing
knowledge, the structure of which is called “schema” (Anderson & Pearson, 1984; Carrell, 1984).
While reading, the reader receives information contained in a text and simultaneously searches for an
appropriate slot in his/her concept to accommodate the newly acquired knowledge so as to understand
the text information.
Reading, as a matter of fact, is an interaction between the information
presented in a text and prior knowledge growing out of the world experience of the reader. To put it
another way, it requires the ability to relate the information or knowledge to one’s own existing
knowledge for successful comprehension. By emphasizing the active role of the reader, schema
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theory has won popularity for the last two decades; and moreover, provided valuable guidelines for
reading instruction in second/foreign language classroom.
Empirically, positive results were found
and widely recognized for second/foreign language reading if the learner was previously instructed to
build an appropriate knowledge framework relating to the topic via explicit or implicit teaching (e.g.
Pearson & Johnson, 1978; Langer, 1981; Stevens, 1982; Carrell & Eisterhold, 1983).
Echoing the psycholinguistic model of reading, it was also suggested that the process of reading
comprehension could be viewed from the perspective of categorization, and represent an attempt to
“make sense” of a text (Gerhard, 1981, p. 141). The process first involved the abilities to perceive
the similarities and differences between events, actions, or concepts presented in a text, then revealed
the relationship among items, either hierarchical or parallel, and finally created a structured unit.
The structuration of piecemeal information would subsequently increase the ease with which to
understand and, furthermore, to remember a disordered collection of knowledge.
Research into the
application of categorization in reading demonstrated that this strategy efficiently increased readers’
performance in locating the topic sentences, understanding the main ideas and recalling the reading
texts (Gerhard, 1975).
Cognitive linguistics justifies this application in its account of the commonalities of our
conceptual organization. Lakoff’s theory of Idealized Cognitive Models (ICMs) (1987) is able to
underlie both the structure of conventionalized categories as those in Rosch’s studies and those that
are termed “contextually determined semantic categories” or “instantial categories”.
Idealized
Cognitive Models are considered as a kind of knowledge base in which our conceptual knowledge is
structured and which is “embodied” (Lakoff, 1987, p. 154), or motivated by our experience. They
function to make our conceptual understanding more coherent and facilitate our cognitive functioning,
including categorization and reasoning. Cognitive categories are elements in the models and linked
to each other so that category concepts are organized and structured out of our experience.
Nevertheless, a major difference lies in the conventionalized categories and those emphasized in this
paper. Conventionalized categories such as fruit or furniture are well-established in our conceptual
system, whereas instantial categories are highly context-dependent. While the investigation of the
former type of categories abounds in experimental psychology and, in particular, in Rosch’s famous
studies (1973, 1975), and is seen a special kind of idealized cognitive model, very few studies focus
on the latter type of categories. In spite of this fact, ICMs are regarded as the mental schemata that
contain these two types of categories and are capable of accounting for both types. They are a
higher level of conceptual context derived from our prior experience, and subsequently used to
explain our new experiences and make sense of the world as we encounter it.
Categorization theory has characteristics in common with schema theory. First, as explained by
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the forerunners of schema theory, a schema is both “abstract” and “structured” (Anderson & Pearson,
1984, p. 259). It is abstract in that it outlines the general configuration of our conceptual knowledge;
it is structured in that the relationship among items is clearly explicated. Likewise, categorization
describes how our conceptual knowledge is organized and how the components of our knowledge are
related to each other and arranged in a hierarchical and parallel manner. Second, just as schema
theory emphasizes the role of the reader in various interpretations of a text on the basis of his/her prior
knowledge and experience, categorization theory depends on the context, which embraces the
physical text environment and the reader’s conceptual knowledge shaped by his/her world experience.
In reading a text, the mechanism of categorization helps make sense of the world both as created by
the author and as comprehended by the reader.
The process is assumed to operate in the way that the
information contained in a text call up related categories in memory, which in turn call upon
corresponding ICMs against which the meaning of a text is defined. All this amounts to say that
both theories make use of existing conceptual structure in the reader’s mind to create meaning out of a
text. Granted with these similarities, the application of categorization in reading instruction will be
as beneficial as schema theory.
It is not wasting space to reiterate that the purpose of this approach is provide an alternative way
to second/foreign language reading instruction, rather than to replace any other approaches, especially
those theoretically well founded and empirically proved efficient.
III. THE METHOD
In this section, the proposed method will be described by illustrating a number of real examples
adopted from a graded reader.
Three essential characteristics of categorization are taken into
account: inclusion properties, membership properties, and the degree of membership. Inclusion
refers to the ability of hierarchically higher-level categories to contain lower-level categories, what
Rosch terms “the vertical structure of categories” (Rosch, 1978, p. 30). Membership, on the other
hand, is horizontally presented by the set of more or less prototypical members which constitute the
internal structure of a category, and accordingly the notion of degree of membership implies that
members of a category do not share an equal status within the category but are differentiated on such
a basis as the degree of similarity to the prototype/s or measured weight and significance in the
category.
(Theoretical statements debate about the basis of such a differentiation, but which is
beside the point in this paper.)
Whether the learner can recognize these properties when they
encounter them in a text is an empirically intriguing issue.
In practice, the ability to recognize the inclusion properties of these categories means that the
learner can adequately put events, actions, or concepts under their appropriate category names
whether or not these names are indicated, whereas the ability to recognize the membership properties
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of these categories refers to the ability to group instances as members of a category, with or without
the presence of the category name.
The appearance of category names was found to be able to ease
the task of recognition of category members and needs to be taken as an important variable. In one
study, children were presented with two pictures of objects, one taxonomically related to a standard
object shown previously, the other thematically related to it, and were required to choose the one
belonging to the same category as the standard one (Markman, 1987).
The group which was
provided with a label was found to choose categorically related pictures significantly more frequently
than the other group which was not. Therefore, the appearance of category names needs to be held
constant.
Besides, it was demonstrated that multiple instances provided a context of comparison,
which enabled the subjects to infer the structure of a category (Gentner & Namy, 1999). In light of
this finding, it was necessary to identify sequences of two or more members of a single category as
suitable items.
To construct reading tasks or activities according to the proposed method, it is first involved to
identify useable items in a text; that is, the items which display transparent category structure. In
effect, the terms of category names and category members are main concerns.
In a language
classroom, it is highly recommended that, before any instruction, the concept of category need to be
made aware by providing simple object categories. A normal human being is able to categorize
entities of all kinds, but most of the time may conduct the behavior unconsciously.
For this reason,
the concept of category, including category names and category members, should be aroused in
advance for easier understanding of subsequent tasks or activities.
Following items are selected from a graded reader, Trumpet Voluntary (Harmer, 1999). This
reader tells a sad story between a violinist husband and his beloved wife, who ran away with her
former lover and brought herself a miserable death. After he found that his wife was gone without
any notice, the husband tried every possible way to search for his wife but unfortunately, what he
found at the last stage was a dead body.
This reader is chosen because it contains enormously rich
category structure.
A. Items for Inclusion Properties
The following examples are used to stimulate the ability to recognize the inclusion properties of
contextually determined semantic categories occurring in a text.
Example 1
It was quiet too. Occasionally a snatch of conversation from one of the houses came to us on
the light wind, or the sound of a car in the distance. (Harmer, 1999, p. 66).
The preceding passage of this item describes the view of the husband (Derek) standing on a slop
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toward an inland sea.
The peaceful scenery made a strong contrast to the agitated mood of the
husband, who was on the verge of finding his lost wife in an exotic place. In this example, the
category name is It was quiet in that, in this particular context, a trace amount of noise makes the
quietness more outstanding. We can say that two situations, Occasionally a snatch of conversation
from one of the houses came to us on the light wind and the sound of a car in the distance, constitute
the category.
Example 2
Ken, a Nigerian, wasn’t very keen on the music we played but he was a magician with the hat.
He almost ran around the crowds that were listening to us, smiling at them, laughing and
joking, telling them we were poor refugees, anything to make them put their hands in their
pockets. (Harmer, 1999, p. 22).
The paragraph where this example is embedded depicts the scene where the unmarried violinist
protagonist (Derek) and his musician friends were busking on the street in one summer with
unexpected help from his roommate.
Actually, this may activate a schema as how a magician
usually acts in our concept and probably interacts with the present context describing what the
buskers seek for while performing in the street.
So it can be understood that the category name is, he
was a magician with the hat, and the category members under this name are: He almost ran around the
crowds that were listening to us, smiling at them, laughing and joking, and telling them we were poor
refugees. All these instances are ordinary actions or behaviors for magicians and buskers.
A suggested way to use these two items in a real classroom is to explicitly indicate the category
name and direct the learner to think about the casual links of event as in example 1 and about the
characteristics of two professions as in example 2, and then ask him/her to point out their members
according to the particular context. It needs to be emphasized that the indication of the category
names is indispensable because the purpose of these exercises is to understand whether or not an
instance can be included in a specific category.
B. Items for Membership Properties
The following items are intended to foster the ability to recognize the membership properties of
contextually determined semantic categories. Note that category names are not present because they
are able to provide clues for inclusion properties, based on which correct members still can be spotted,
and consequently confuse this type of items with previous one.
This type of items requires the
learner to make a judgement purely on the basis of the similarities of candidate members within a text.
That is to say, this type of items requires the learner to identify parallel concepts.
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Example 3
Anja started up a low terrible moaning which seemed to go on and on. I wished she would
just stop. Even when her father made me go with him into the kitchen we could still hear it,
the inhuman noise of someone who was going to feel guilty for ever. (Harmer, 1999, p. 78).
This item occurs in the situation that the only sister of Derek’s wife (i.e. Anja) nearly broke down
as soon as she heard the news of her dear sister’s death.
Remember that categorization is a
behaviour that groups similar instances within the same class. As can be seen, two instances, a low
terrible moaning which seemed to go on and on and the inhuman noise of someone who was going to
feel guilty for ever, portray some kind of miserable voice or sound and have more semantic
components in common.
These two instances, therefore, are members of a category though the
category name is not stated.
Example 4
It took a bit of time for his words to sink in. It took me time to realise that Malgosia couldn’t
hear me in there. It took me time to realise that after all my journeying I had finally found her
and it wouldn’t do me any good at all. (Harmer, 1999, p. 76).
This item appears when Derek watched the dead body of his wife and his father-in-law was
wrongly accusing him of his ignorance about the loss. Similarly, category members are parallel
concepts and possess stronger semantic similarities.
Three instances, 1) for his words to sink in, 2)
to realise that Malgosia couldn't hear me in there, and 3) to realise that after all my journeying I had
finally found her, all express a kind of mental functioning, and hence these three instances belong to
the same category. In addition, a structural parallel can be detected in these instances since they are
constructed with the same pattern.
During classroom instruction, membership or parallel concepts should be fully explained to the
learner, as opposed to inclusion properties.
The absence of category names is intentional, and
without the aid of category names, semantic similarities are always appealed to as a key to locate
category members; but sometimes a structural parallel can also be helpful as in example 4.
C. Degrees of Membership
The purpose of this type of items is to make a distinction between more prototypical members
from peripheral ones.
Put it plainly, the learner is required to make a judgement about which
instance is more consequential for a certain situation.
Nevertheless, since the degree of
prototypicality of category members may vary in different contexts, the responses to this type of items
can be varied to a greater extent. As has been mentioned, the notion of context needs to include the
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content of a text and the schemata existing in the learner’s concept.
Example 5
｀I feel terrible, all right?’ I replied angrily. ‘My wife’s run off with someone else, I’ve been
questioned by the police, I’ve travelled halfway round the world, I’ve been shot at and
nearly killed. Now my wife’s supposed to be very ill and I don’t know why, or where she is,
but I know it’s pretty damn serious. (Harmer, 1999, p. 74).
Derek travelled a long way to his parents-in-law’s house but annoyed by the insane question of
his sister-in-law when he arrived. This category actually centers on the reasons why the Derek felt
terrible. Accordingly, the category name is, ‘I feel terrible, all right?’ and all the five reasons are
category members, including 1) ‘My wife’s run off with someone else, 2) I’ve been questioned by the
police, 3) I’ve travelled halfway round the world, 4) I’ve been shot at and nearly killed, and 5) Now
my wife’s supposed to be very ill and I don’t know why, or where she is, but I know it’s pretty damn
serious. To make a decision about which is more prototypical needs to consider both local context
and cultural background.
Local context refers to the text in which the factors that cause Derek’s
miserable situation and need to be inferred, and cultural background refers to the knowledge that
brings forth the learner’s understanding. It is very likely that he/she will draw on his/her own
cultural background knowledge so as to consider 1), 2) or others as more responsible for the terrible
feeling.
This type of items is able to lead classroom tasks or activities to a vigorous discussion, during
which cultural or even personal variations can be revealed and in fact, no fixed answer should be
expected. With clear indication of the category name and members, a reading task or activity can be
constructed so as to require the learner to find the most prototypical member, which represents the
most influential event within the category, or to rank these members according to their understanding
of the causes and consequences of the whole matter.
One pedagogic motivation of this type of tasks
or activities is that, while making such a decision, the learner needs to reflect the whole context where
the category names and their members appear. This can be considered as a good practice for
reviewing the content of the text.
IIII. CONCLUSION
Up to this point, a number of problematic issues need to be addressed. First and foremost, the
nature of a text may affect the liabilities to find useable items in terms of the ability to recognize
category structure.
For one thing, the length of a text may be a critical factor because a short text has
inherent difficulties and more contextual constraints so that it is not easy to identity items with
category structure; for another, the genres of a text may also be able to influence the likelihood of
finding potential items.
Although this paper reveals the capability of one genre to contain category
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structure, it is still necessary to experience with more types of text materials. A third factor, the
readability of a text, including the aspects of linguistic complexity and vocabulary difficulty, has been
found responsible for the understanding of a text (e.g. Gilliland, 1972, Nation & Coady, 1988). It is
also presumed that it may affect the recognizability of category structure in suitable items.
These
characteristics of text nature require a consideration on the part of the language teacher before
implementing the proposed method.
Second, the construction of certain kinds of reading comprehension tasks or activities, such as
the kind of reading comprehension checks, cannot be considered, in a strict sense, as a kind of
assessments to test the ability to recognize the inclusion and membership properties of semantic
categories in a text because assessments always require absolute answers for evaluation (Nuttall,
1996).
Rather, they should be taken as useful exercises or trainings to help the learner organize the
information his/her encounter in a more structured way and enhance the understanding and absorption
of reading texts.
In so doing, comprehension checks can be considered as a special kind of tasks that
will attract the learner in reading instruction.
Despite the above issues, the author still regards the proposed method a useful approach as to
provide an opportunity for the language teacher to look into the understanding of reading texts for
her/his learners, and meanwhile offer more dynamic discussion in language classroom.
Last but not
least, empirical research is desperately needed to prove the effect of this method.
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人 文 社 會 學 報 2005‧ 3‧ 1 期 ， 91-122
以認知語言學為觀點
來看第二語言／外語閱讀
廖妃絢
建國科技大學副教授
摘
要
本文將以認知語言學的觀點來看語言的本質和語言學習。 認知語言學認為語言的架構
和功能性和我們的認知能力息息相關因為語言系統是人類對周遭環境感知並概念化所形
成。 尤其是，歸類機制被認為是聯繫人類感官經驗和認知推理的重要管道，因為歸類機制
是我們用來將相似的事物歸為一類，以組織感官經驗。 本文將假設，歸類機制可以用來指
導第二語言／外語閱讀。 亦即是，閱讀能力將被定義為是對文中情境構成的語意類別內部
組織的包含性和同階性的理解程度，而學習者必須將其中的事件、動作、或概念組織成完
整的單一訊息。 本文首先將介紹心理學家 Rosch 所提出的歸類理論，闡釋其在閱讀上的應
用，並和基模理論比較。 後者已經被廣泛運用在第二語言／外語閱讀指導上且證明為有效
方法。 從英語小讀本所摘錄的句子將用來說明如何辨認具類別組織的範例。最後也將討論
本文所未能顧及的問題。
關鍵詞：認知語言學、歸類機制、基模理論、閱讀指導、英語小讀本
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