10 Cognitive theories of communication

John O. Greene; Elizabeth Dorrance Hall

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10 Cognitive theories of communication

John O. Greene
John O. Greene

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Elizabeth Dorrance Hall

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John O. Greene and Elizabeth Dorrance Hall10 Cognitive theories of communicationAbstract:Over the last three decades cognitivism has remained among the domi-nant theoretical perspectives in the field of communication. In point of fact, how-ever, the domain of “cognitive theories of communication” encompasses a varietyof only-partially-overlapping approaches to theorizing. In an effort to impose someconceptual order on this broad and diverse set of theories, functionalism/humaninformation processing is employed as a reference point for characterizing othercognitive approaches, including: lay cognitivism, social cognition, and neurosci-ence. Exemplars of each sort of theory are examined, and promising areas forfuture theorizing are discussed.Keywords:Associative networks, cognitivism, embodied cognition, functionalism,human information processing, interpersonal transcendence, social cognition,neuroscience1 IntroductionThe essential warrant underlying the rise of cognitive theories of communicationis the simple notion that understanding communication processes can be advancedby examining the nature of the mind (and mental processes). This fundamentalassumption might appear to be incontrovertible (particularly at this point in thehistorical development of the communication discipline), but it is useful at theoutset to remind ourselves of the degree to which the realm of the mental interpen-etrates that of the social. Indeed, at the risk of belaboring the obvious, withoutcognition there is no communication. And, regardless of the particular communica-tion domain of interest, be it interpersonal communication, rhetoric, mass commu-nication, or what have you, always at the core one confronts issues of meaning(e.g., significance and sense-making), memory (e.g., information acquisition andskill development), and action (e.g., verbal and nonverbal message behavior, vot-ing and purchase decisions).It is quite natural, then, that in pursuit of their various research interests,communication scholars would seek the insights afforded by taking into accountthese foundational mental operations. Indeed, this “cognitive turn” can be seen inthe pioneering work of people like Lasswell, Hovland, and their contemporarieswhose analyses of mass media influences predate even the emergence of depart-ments of communication in American universities (see Carey 1996; Delia 1987;Schramm 1997). For these early researchers the fact that the mass media did notproduce uniform, pervasive effects necessitated a concern with individual informa-

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John O. Greene and Elizabeth Dorrance Hall10 Cognitive theories of communicationAbstract:Over the last three decades cognitivism has remained among the domi-nant theoretical perspectives in the field of communication. In point of fact, how-ever, the domain of “cognitive theories of communication” encompasses a varietyof only-partially-overlapping approaches to theorizing. In an effort to impose someconceptual order on this broad and diverse set of theories, functionalism/humaninformation processing is employed as a reference point for characterizing othercognitive approaches, including: lay cognitivism, social cognition, and neurosci-ence. Exemplars of each sort of theory are examined, and promising areas forfuture theorizing are discussed.Keywords:Associative networks, cognitivism, embodied cognition, functionalism,human information processing, interpersonal transcendence, social cognition,neuroscience1 IntroductionThe essential warrant underlying the rise of cognitive theories of communicationis the simple notion that understanding communication processes can be advancedby examining the nature of the mind (and mental processes). This fundamentalassumption might appear to be incontrovertible (particularly at this point in thehistorical development of the communication discipline), but it is useful at theoutset to remind ourselves of the degree to which the realm of the mental interpen-etrates that of the social. Indeed, at the risk of belaboring the obvious, withoutcognition there is no communication. And, regardless of the particular communica-tion domain of interest, be it interpersonal communication, rhetoric, mass commu-nication, or what have you, always at the core one confronts issues of meaning(e.g., significance and sense-making), memory (e.g., information acquisition andskill development), and action (e.g., verbal and nonverbal message behavior, vot-ing and purchase decisions).It is quite natural, then, that in pursuit of their various research interests,communication scholars would seek the insights afforded by taking into accountthese foundational mental operations. Indeed, this “cognitive turn” can be seen inthe pioneering work of people like Lasswell, Hovland, and their contemporarieswhose analyses of mass media influences predate even the emergence of depart-ments of communication in American universities (see Carey 1996; Delia 1987;Schramm 1997). For these early researchers the fact that the mass media did notproduce uniform, pervasive effects necessitated a concern with individual informa-

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