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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jun 23, 2026

Decomposing the Variance in Reading Comprehension to Reveal the Unique and Common Effects of Language and Decoding
06:33

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Published on: October 11, 2018

Segmentation in reading and film comprehension.

Jeffrey M Zacks1, Nicole K Speer, Jeremy R Reynolds

  • 1Department of Psychology, Washington University, Saint Louis, MO 63130, USA. jzacks@artsci.wustl.edu

Journal of Experimental Psychology. General
|April 29, 2009
PubMed
Summary

Readers segment stories and films by tracking changes in situational elements like character goals. This event segmentation influences reading speed and comprehension processing.

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Last Updated: Jun 23, 2026

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Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Psychology
  • Narrative Comprehension
  • Event Perception

Background:

  • Discourse comprehension theories posit that readers update representations at activity boundaries.
  • Perceptual event segmentation theory suggests monitoring situational features guides understanding.
  • Previous research had not directly tested the convergence of these theories on event segmentation.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate how changes in situational features influence event segmentation during narrative and film comprehension.
  • To determine if event boundary detection affects reading speed and processing control.

Main Methods:

  • Four studies were conducted, analyzing event segmentation in narrative texts and films.
  • Methods included examining changes in characters, locations, object interactions, and character goals.
  • Reading times for clauses with event boundaries were measured and analyzed for mediation by situational changes.

Main Results:

  • Evidence suggests situational feature changes correlate with event segmentation in both texts and films.
  • Clauses containing event boundaries were read more slowly, with situational changes partially mediating this effect.
  • Information predictability may influence reading rate and event segmentation.

Conclusions:

  • Processing situational changes is crucial for segmenting ongoing activities into distinct events.
  • Event segmentation is linked to the cognitive control of processing during reading.
  • Findings support the integration of situational monitoring into discourse and perceptual event segmentation theories.