Deconstructing Rhetoric

The Path to the Ph.D.

Flower & Hayes: A Cognitive Process Theory

of Writing
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Flower, Linda and John R. Hayes. “A Cognitive Process Theory of Writing.” College
Composition and Communication 32.4(December 1981): 365-87. Available through
JSTOR

A Cognitive Process Model

• The act of writing involves three major elements (discussed below in much more
detail)
o task environment
 all things outside the writer, starting with the rhetorical problem
and including the text itself
o writer’s long-term memory
 knowledge of the topic, audience, and various writing plans
o writing processes
 specifically planning, translating, and reviewing (also discussed
below)

Overview of the Model

The Rhetorical Problem

• The rhetorical problem includes the rhetorical situation, the audience and the
writer’s goals.
o Writers frequently reduce this collection to a simplified problem (such as
“write a paper for English class).
• People can only sovle problems they define for themselves. If the writer’s
representation of the rhetorical problem is inaccurate or underdeveloped she
won’t solve the missing portions.
o This explains why students “connect” with certain 1013 assignments
(e.g. Community Writing) and fail to connect as well with others

The Written Text

 • Incoherent writing either indicates that the text exerted too little influence or the
writer failed to consolidate new ideas with previously written statements
• One of the characteristics of a basic writer is the concern for extending a previous
sentence and a reluctance to move from sentence level issues to global issues
• The text itself is also competing with the knowledge in the writer’s long-term
memory and the writer’s plans for dealing with the rhetorical problem

Long-Term Memory

Two problems with long term memory:

1. Finding the right cue to recall information

2. Reorganizing the information to fit the rhetorical situation

Planning

Writers form an internal representation of the knoweldge for the text.

Contains three sub-processes:

1. generating ideas
o includes retrieving information from long-term memory
o this information may be either pre-formed in Standard English or
fragmentary
2. organizing
o allows the writer to identify categories
o search for subordinate and superordinate ideas
o plans for reaching the audience
o often guided by major goals established in the next sub-process
3. goal setting
o procedural (“I want to start with energy”)
o substantive (“I have to relate A to B”
o generated by the writer
o created, developed and revised by the same processes that generate and
organize new ideas
o occurs in all points of the writing process

Translating

• concept of putting ideas into words

• requires the writer to juggle all demands of English language
• this may be overwhelming for the inexperienced writer because it burdens the
short term memory with demands on grammar and spelling, which leads to
frustration for the writer

Reviewing
 • Depends on two sub-processes: evaluating and revising
• may be a conscious process when the writer choose to reread for new ideas or to
evaluate and revise the physical text
• may be an unconscious action triggered by an evaluation of the text or planning

Monitor

• functions as a writing strategist hwich determines when the writer moves to a new
process
• determined by the writer’s goals as well as individual habits and process styles

Implications of a Cognitive Process Model

• Much more common for writers to call on processes as needed
• Demonstrates a hierarchical process to writing that is more flexible
• Goal direction is the keystone to the process
• content goals have been demonstrated to grow into elaborate networks through
the act of composing
• Networks have three important features
1. Created as the writer composes and do not emerge completely in pre-
writing
2. Take many forms and include describing the starting point, laying out the
plan for the goal, and evaluating success
3. Writers continually return to their higher level goals as a touchstone for
keeping the sub-goals in check

Goals, Topic, and Text

• “the writer’s abstract plan (representation) of his goals, his knowledge of the
topic, and his current text are all actively competing for the writer’s attention”
• processes of generate and evaluate can interrupt the writer’s process at any time
and this interruption often leads to a revision of a goal
• “writing it out” and “editing it later” are characteristic of experienced writers with
flexible goals
• sub-goals give meaning and direction to the overall goals
• Three patterns of goals
1. Explore and Consolidate
2. State and Develop
3. Write and Regenerate

Explore and Consolidate

• Exploration often occurs at the beginning of the process

• Consolidation produces a more complex idea by drawing inferences and creating
concepts
 o experienced writers are better at these processes and can readily return to
them to make sense of their writing, goals, and ideas

State and Develop

• The writer starts with high-level goals and then fleshes out the sub-goals
• As the goals become more concrete, the writer has a connection between ideas
and intentions for the actual text

Write and Regenerate

• The writer begins creating prose in this section and returns to the previous steps as
needed

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