Flower and Hayes: Cognitive Process Theory of writing

1. Flower and Hayes: A Cognitive Theory of Writing (December 1981).
Introduction:
Guiding Question: What guides the decisions of writers as they write?
Summary of Scholarship:
Lloyd Bitzer, “Speech is always in response to a rhetorical situation” which Flower and Hayes
contrast with Richard Vatz “[R]hetorical situation is shaped by the imagination and art of the
speaker.” Finally, James Britton who states, “[S]yntactic and lexical choices guide the process.”
(Flower and Hayes 365).
Flower and Hayes: “To most of us it may seem reasonable that all of these forces…have a hand in the
writing process, but it is not clear how they do so or how they interact” (366).
The Cognitive Theory of Writing:
1.) Based upon a 5-year protocol analysis, and meant as a “springboard” for further research, is
defined by four key points:
A.) A set of distinct processes...that writers orchestrate and organize while composing.
B.) Processes are hierarchical, which is to say they are not linear and possess an embedded
organization in which any process can be embedded in any other.
C.) Goal-oriented, guided by the writer's own growing network of goals.
D.) Writer's create goals in key ways: generating high goals and supporting sub goals which
embody a developing sense of purpose, revising goals or establishing new goals based on what is
learned through writing.
Transition: Flower and Hayes identify quote Nancy Sommers who has previously proposed a theory
that both revision and writing happen in unity. They also acknowledge that their model is a departure
from the more strict structured writing models previously theorized (more standardized, linear
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2. models). They validate the necessity of a model by appropriating theories borrowed from psychology
and linguistics, that composition needs to build a schema, or model, that is able to explain what we
observe as the process of writing. Flower and Hayes argue that the best way to do this is to observe
writers in action and because previous work focused in introspective analysis, which is “notoriously
inaccurate” (366-368). *Note from the author: Flower and Hayes do not clarify this point, but from
my own background in psychology, I imagine it is because studies have shown that our memory is
unreliable because it is: a.) Inaccurate recalling an abundance of specifics and b.) It is vulnerable to
suggestion.
2.) The act of writing involves three major elements:
A.) Task environment: considers all things outside the writer, starting with the rhetorical problem and
including the text itself.
B.) Writer’s long-term memory: knowledge of the topic, audience, and various writing plans.
C.) Writing processes: specifically planning, translating, and reviewing. This process occurs under the
control of a monitor. *Note: These will be more clearly defined later.
Overview of the Model:
1.) The Rhetorical Problem:
The rhetorical problem is complex and includes the rhetorical situation, the audience, and the writer’s
goals. There is usually wide variation in these goals. It is important to note (for those of us who make
writing prompts) that, “people can only solve problems they define for themselves.” Also, if the
writer’s representation of the rhetorical problem is underdeveloped, then she or he will not solve the
missing portions.
2.) The Written Text:
A.) Incoherent writing either indicates that the text exerted too little influence, or the writer failed to
consolidate new ideas with previously written statements.
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3. B.) The writing usually reflects the writer’s own discovery process.
C.) Basic writers write locally, that is to say that a basic writer is rarely concerned for extending a
previous sentence or reluctance to move from sentence level issues to global issues (focusing on local
problems like grammar, instead of global issues such as the overall thesis).
D.) The text itself is also either symbiotic or competing with the knowledge in both the writer’s long-
term memory and the writer’s plans for dealing with the rhetorical problem. This phenomenon is
largely dependent of task environment and the writer’s proficiency.
3.) Long-Term Memory: A person’s storehouse of knowledge. There are two potential issues;
A.) Finding the right cue to recall information and
B.) Reorganizing the information to fit the rhetorical situation
*Note In cognitive psychology, researchers have identified that cues are used to recall memories.
This is why acronyms work as a way to recall long strings of information.
4.) Planning: Often involves forming an internal representation of knowledge that will be used in
writing. This is likely to be very abstract (*Note Are they referring to Semiotics? Or Tobin and
Lakoff’s cognitive metaphors?).
A.) Generating ideas: This includes retrieving information from long-term memory. This
information may be either pre-formed in Standard English or fragmentary (Or perhaps in a
persons own language?).
B.) Organizing: This allows the writer to identify categories, groups together ideas and form
new concepts, devise plans for reaching the audience. This process is often guided by major
goals established in the next sub-process.
5.) Goal setting:
A.) Procedural (“I want to start with energy”)
B.) Substantive (“I have to relate A to B”)
C.) Generated by the writer.
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4. D.) Integrates content and purpose.
E.) Created, developed and revised by the same processes that generate and organize new ideas.
F.) Non-Linear. Occurs in all points of the writing process.
6.) Translating: The act of putting ideas into visible language.
A.) Requires the writer to juggle all demands of the English language.
B.) This may be overwhelming for the inexperienced (childlike?) writer because it burdens the short-
term with demands of grammar and spelling, potentially leading to frustration for the writer
C.) The structure can also alter the writers ideas (plan to include A, B, C, but only A and B fit
linearly).
Transition: Scardamalia and Bereiter, “Children have to devote conscious attention to a variety of
individual thinking tasks that adults can perform quickly and automatically.”
7.) Reviewing: Can be an unplanned action triggered by an evaluation of one’s own text or
planning.
A.) Contingent on two sub-processes: evaluating and revising.
B.) May be a conscious process when the writer choose to reread for new ideas or to evaluate
and revise the physical text.
C.) May be an unconscious action triggered by an evaluation of the text or planning.
8.) Monitor: Functions as a strategist, moving from one process to the next. Again from
Scardamalia and Bereiter, a child’s difficulty with tasks is usually the result of the lack of an
executive routine (like the poor or inexperienced writer?).
A.) Functions as a writing strategist which determines when the writer moves to a new process.
B.) Determined by the writer’s goals as well as individual habits and process styles.
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5. Implications of a Cognitive Process Model:
A.) Writers DO NOT go through a linear process when they are writing. It is much more
common for writers to call on processes as needed.
B.) Demonstrates a hierarchical process to writing that is more flexible.
C.) Goal direction and invention is the keystone to the process.
D.) Content goals have been demonstrated to grow into elaborate networks through the act of
composing.
2.) Writing is an embedded process:
A.) Writers go through a brief sequence of planning, translating and reviewing in the service of
vexing sentences.
B.) Ideas can be changed in order to fit the paragraph structure.
3.) Writing is a goal-oriented process:
A.) Paradox is that people begin without knowing where they will end, but profess to have a
purpose for writing (Ex. I will write a two-page paper on Eagles).
B.) Writers move freely between a network of goals and sub goals. Refining between the
abstract goals and the more definitive sub-goals. (Some writers use their high goals to keep their
sub-goals in check). Goals lead to sub goals, which embody purpose and times, by changing or
regenerating top-level goals in light of what they have learned through writing.
C.) Take many forms and include describing the starting point, laying out the plan for the goal,
and evaluating success.
D.) Goals can be defined by final product (a two-page essay) or by a starting point (plan) or by
evaluating one's success ("that's banal"). They can be implicit (don't be banal).
E.) Numerous factors influence goals (exploratory or narrow, sensitive to the audience or
chained to the topic, based on rhetorical savvy or focused on correct prose).
F.) Good writers' goals are more abundant and are better than poor writers.
G.) The linear format of writing often changes the goals.
H.) Generate and evaluate interrupt the writing process at any time. (casting doubt on revision
as a final process).
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6. I.) Goals help us with purposefulness
3.) Goals, Topic, and Text
A.) “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.”
B.) 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
C.) “writing it out” and “editing it later” are characteristic of experienced writers with flexible
goals.
4.) Sub-goals give meaning and direction to the overall goals, there are three patterns of sub-
goals.
A.) Explore and Consolidate: High level goal is often to plan or explore. Exploring is then
replaced with the new goal of composing (and perhaps back again). Experienced writers are
better at the processes and readily return to them to make sense of writing, goals and ideas.
B.) State and Develop: Writer begins with high-level goals and then develops sub-goals based
upon high-level goals. As goals become more concrete, the writer draws connections between
ideas and intentions for the actual text.
C.) Write and regenerate: The writer begins prose in this section and returns to the previous
steps as needed. The explicit plan is applied to the detailed task of writing itself.
Conclusion: “[T]his process of setting and developing sub-goals and—at times—regenerating those
past goals is a powerful creative process…By placing emphasis on the inventive power of the writer,
who is able to explore ideas, to develop, act on, test, and regenerate his or her own goals, we are
putting an important part of creativity where it belongs—in the hands of the working , thinking
writer.
Thank you to smartykatt for her contributions to this summary.
http://prelimsandbeyond.wordpress.com/2009/01/11/flower-hayes/
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