Large-scale evidence for logarithmic effects of word predictability on reading time.

ABSTRACT: During real-time language comprehension, our minds rapidly decode complex meanings from sequences of words. The difficulty of doing so is known to be related to words' contextual predictability, but what cognitive processes do these predictability effects reflect? In one view, predictability effects reflect facilitation due to anticipatory processing of words that are predictable from context. This view predicts a linear effect of predictability on processing demand. In another view, predictability effects reflect the costs of probabilistic inference over sentence interpretations. This view predicts either a logarithmic or a superlogarithmic effect of predictability on processing demand, depending on whether it assumes pressures toward a uniform distribution of information over time. The e

SUBMITTER: Shain C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10927576 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature