Cognitive mechanisms of language comprehension and memory for text

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Language comprehension is central to most realms of human activity, from conversation to enjoying a novel to deciphering a technical manual. This research combines human experimentation and computer simulation to inspect the mental processes that permit adults to understand messages in their first language and to represent message meaning.Comprehension is largely inferential -- having read that the glass fell to the concrete, people generally understand that the glass BROKE. One focus of the research is how people infer the complex goal structures that underlie text. A newspaper article might describe two states disputing their rights to an ocean island, or fictional characters jointly trying to achieve an objective. Full understanding depends on people's use of their knowledge to deduce the goal structure that interrelates the participants' actions.Remembering a message and answering questions about it are basic criteria of understanding. This research examines people's strategies for remembering messages, from trying to recall the precise details to recollecting the general sense. It also distinguishes these strategies from more automatic memory influences.SIGNIFICANCE: The research bears on issues important to Canada and beyond: What are the factors that distinguish teenagers strong and weak in reading comprehension? Do older adults miss the implications of ordinary messages? What properties of an advertisement contribute to it misleading a reader? Are there differences among the understanding of scientific text, fiction, and other text genres? The research also bears on fundamental scientific questions ranging from false memory (text inferences are often "falsely" recognized) to representing the situation described in a message.