Should Typographic Signaling Be Included in Expository Spatial Texts?

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session 20
  In Roundtable Session: Considerations in Literacy Comprehension

Abstract

Typographic signaling, memory for word location and visual imagery are three visuospatial dimensions of a text the reader must attend to in order to achieve textual coherence. In this study, participants had to recall the location of italicized and non italicized words, after reading two texts, one with a spatial content and one with a non spatial content. Results indicate that memory for word location is improved by typographic signaling, but only for non spatial text. At a theoretical level, this interaction advocates for the implication of the visuospatial sketchpad in typographic signaling processing. On the practical side, it may suggest that expository texts writers should take into account the nature of the text content in their signaling choices.

Authors

• Frédéric MAILLET, Université Toulouse 2

• Julie Lemarié