Image Flow. The flow of Cognitive Image composition is punctuated by terminal contours in the intonation of the speech signal. The segments of the signal demarcated by terminal contours fall into the following functional types:

• predications, in which a change indicated by a finite verb occurs with the terminal contour;
• fragments, which fill in "holes" in the Image or represent afterthoughts;
• social signals, which include conversational openers and terminators, signals of social status, and calls of alarm;
• emotives, which indicate the speaker's emotional state.