Schema-instantiation: Toward a New Text Development Pattern

The current study, based on the schema theory in Cognitive Psychology and the notion of schema-instance in Cognitive Grammar, proposes a new text development pattern named “schema-instantiation". Within the framework of the pattern, a text is composed of two parts, schematic information and instance information; the development pattern of the text is the mapping of the schema-instance cognitive routine onto the organization and progress of the text; and the text develops in the pattern of schema-instantiation. The mechanism of the development goes as follows: from top (schema) to bottom (instance), the top dominates the bottom, the bottom elaborates the top, top and bottom are coherent. It turns out that the pattern of schema-instantiation is of greater explanatory power for narrative and expository texts.