Analysis of Problem of Perceiving and Understanding Literary Texts by Philology Students

Abstract

Introduction. The article discloses the importance of conducting psycholinguistic analysis of perceiving and understanding voluminous literary texts by philology students; the issue is relevant as there is a lack of research that concerns revealing the essential aspects of these processes, as well as the influence of conducting psycholinguistic analysis on effective performance in philology students’ professional activities is highlighted. The goal of the article is to conduct a theoretical analysis of the problem of perceiving and understanding literary texts by philology students and identify the level of development of future teachers of language and literature individual practical skills on decoding the content of a large prose fictional text. Methods. To achieve the goal, the authors used theoretical and empirical research methods. Empirical methods included methodology for determining semantic kernels of a text and its probabilistic connection, and methodology for determining the subtext, motives of the author and characters. Results. Theoretical analysis of the problem led the authors to conclusion that the processes of perceiving and understanding large literary text by philology students are based on two main components: cognitive skills and personal emotional feelings. The process of a literary text perceiving includes such structural elements as the reader’s orientation and the type of student’s work with a literary text, depends on students’ personal professional neoformations (reading competence, speech-cognitive competence), and is also influenced with philology student’s psychological type. The results of empirical study conducted by the authors indicate that future teachers of language have following developed reproductive skills with voluminous literary texts: they at a high level reproduce factual information of a text, can accurately convey an emotional load of a literary work, determine its theme, main idea, etc. Conclusions. The productive types of voluminous literary texts understanding associated with the definition of subtext, motives of the author and characters are mastered by philological students in a rather limited degree and this fact necessitates following studying underlying mechanisms of these processes functioning and developing tools for its targeted progress.