Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-vdxz6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-26T12:19:04.906Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

5 - Identifying Cognitive Depth

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2020

Thora Tenbrink
Affiliation:
Bangor University
Get access

Summary

Chapter 5 turns to cognitive depth, another aspect of our thinking that is regularly reflected in the way we formulate our thoughts. On the one hand, we can think things through, and formulate them in language, in much detail, or we can remain on the surface, sticking to the mere essentials. A focus on granularity patterns in linguistic analysis therefore provides insights into the speaker’s conceptualisations relative to a situation context, aspects attended to in depth, and diversity between individuals and types of situations. On the other hand, we can be more or less certain about what we describe, reflecting our expertise or the uncertainty of the subject matter itself. Variability in certainty adds a dimension of reliability to the speaker’s contribution, which is decisive for assessing the status of relevant concepts. Both aspects, granularity and certainty, work together, as experts will often be able to look into things in much more depth than novices – but on the other hand they don’t always need to, as they quickly recognise patterns that they’ve come across before.

Type
Chapter
Information
Cognitive Discourse Analysis
An Introduction
, pp. 117 - 141
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×