This volume critically evaluates the present state of research in the domain of inferences in text processing and indicates new areas of research.The book is structured around the following theoretical aspects: - The representational aspect is concerned with the cognitive structure produced by the processed text, e.g. the social, spatial, and motor characteristics of world knowledge. - The procedural aspect investigates the time relationships on forming inferences, e.g. the point of time at which referential relations are constructed. - The contextual aspect reflects the dependence of inferences on the communicative embedding of text processing, e.g. on factors of modality and instruction.

This book presents work on bridging inferences in discourse interpretation. It develops a formalization that permits integrating indirect anaphora in the construction of a structured discourse representation. From a broader perspective, it provides a suitable dynamic-logic framework which can account for underspecifications in cohesion and coherence of discourses by either inferentially resolving or contextually constraining them. Special attention is given to the resolution of bridging anaphora by means of integrating encyclopedic knowledge encoded in FrameNet into a formal theory of discourse structure as provided by Segmented Discourse Representation Theory. A second focus lies on the discourse effects of Clitic Left Dislocation in Spanish. In addition, the book provides a synopsis of the problems, methods, approaches, and desiderata of research on text, context, and discourse interpretation from formal, computational, cognitive, and psychological points of view. Central topics include pragmatic inferences and defeasible reasoning, the Common Ground, cohesion and anaphora resolution, coherence and discourse structure, and discourse interpretation. The volume may thus also serve as a reference book on text meaning and context.

First Published in 2007. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

A study of inferencing from a wide variety of theoretical and disciplinary perspectives, as well as different levels of processing.

Abstract: Five experiments explored inferencing in young and elderly subjects. Experiments 1 and 2 used the contradiction reading paradigm, a frequently used paradigm to study the formation of elaborative inferences. Subjects read short passages followed by a continuation sentence that either contradicted or was neutral to the elaboration. In Experiment 1, 1-2 sentences separated the predicting context and the contradiction sentence. In Experiment 2, 5-6 sentences separated the predicting context and the contradiction sentence. Overall, elderly subjects were slower than young subjects. Both young and elderly subjects read the contradiction sentence more slowly than the neutral sentence in Experiment 1. In Experiment 2 the effect was seen on the sentence following the contradiction sentence. Experiments 3, 4 and 5 explored the possibility that the results in Experiment 1 and 2 arose not because subjects formed elaborative inferences on-line but only because bridging inferences were formed upon presentation of the contradiction sentence. Only young subjects were tested in these experiments. Experiments 3 and 4 were replications of experiments 1 and 2 with the use of a different paradigm--a probe-word naming paradigm. In this paradigm, a probe word that was either related to the elaborative inference or was neutral was presented either 1-2 sentences or 5-6 sentences after the predicting context. In this paradigm faster naming times for the related than the neutral word are expected if subjects form elaborative inferences (i.e., facilitation). Results in both experiments were unexpected and showed a marginally significant inhibition effect (i.e., longer naming times in the related compared to the neutral condition). These results raise questions about whether elaborative inferences are formed on-line. In Experiment 5, the stimuli from Experiment 3 were altered to include a sentence that would encourage the formation of bridging inferences. In this experiment, there was no significant difference between the related and neutral conditions. Overall, the results call into question the hypothesis that elaborative inferences are formed on-line.

One of the most lively and contentious issues in contemporary linguistic theory concerns the elusive boundary between semantics and pragmatics, and Professor Laurence R. Horn of Yale University has been at the center of that debate ever since his groundbreaking 1972 UCLA dissertation. This festvolume in honor of Horn brings together the best of current work at the semantics/pragmatics boundary from a neo-Gricean perspective. Featuring the contributions of 22 leading researchers, it includes papers on implicature (Kent Bach), inference (Betty Birner), presupposition (Barbara Abbott), lexical semantics (Georgia Green, Sally McConnell-Ginet, Steve Kleinedler & Randall Eggert), negation (Pauline Jacobson, Frederick Newmeyer, Scott Schwenter), polarity (Donka Farkas, Anastasia Giannakidou, Michael Israel), implicit variables (Greg Carlson & Gianluca Storto), definiteness (Barbara Partee), reference (Ellen Prince, Andrew Kehler & Gregory Ward), and logic (Jerrold Sadock, Francis Jeffry Pelletier & Andrew Hartline). These original papers represent not only a fitting homage to Larry Horn, but also an important contribution to semantic and pragmatic theory.

This book constitutes the reviewed proceedings of the Third International Conference on Modeling and Using Context, CONTEXT 2001, held in Dundee, UK in July 2001. The 30 full papers and 15 short papers presented were carefully reviewed, selected, and revised for inclusion in the proceedings. The papers presented deal with the interdisciplinary topic of modeling and using contextual information from various points of view, ranging through cognitive science, formal logic, artificial intelligence and information processing. Highly general philosophical and logical theories are complemented by specific applications in a variety of fields.

First published in 1987. The first thing the reader of this volume needs to know is: What is executive control in reading, exactly? Executive control processes coordinate the functioning of the human cognitive system. This book seeks to examine how mature, skilled readers use information about the difficulty and importance of text, and of their comprehension tasks in allocating their reading time and effort.

The aim of the European Cognitive Science Conference is the presentation of empirical, theoretical, and analytic work from all areas of interest in cognitive science, such as artificial intelligence, education, linguistics, neuroscience, philosophy, psychology, and anthropology. The focus is on interdisciplinary work that is either of interest for more than one of the research areas mentioned or integrates research methods from different fields. With contributions by cognitive scientists from 20 different countries, the papers in this volume reflect the origins of this conference, as well as its international scope.