Albrecht, J. E., & Myers, J. L. (1998). Accessing distant text information during reading: Effects of contextual cues. Discourse Processes, 26(2), 87-107.

Albrecht, J.; Myers, J.

1998

Albrecht, J. E., & Myers, J. L. (1998). Accessing distant text information during reading: Effects of contextual cues. Discourse Processes, 26(2), 87-107.

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In 5 experiments, we investigated conditions under which readers access distant information. Participants read texts containing 2 episodes; the first of which described a goal that was satisfied or unsatisfied. Following the 2nd episode, participants read a statement that reinstated some part of the goal context. Experiments 1 through 3 demonstrated that reactivation of unsatisfied goal information depended on the type of original goal context and whether it was fully reinstated. Experiments 4 and 5 demonstrated that, when the context was associated with both episodes, reinstatement of goal information from the distant target episode was successful only when the context was fully reinstated (Experiment 4). The results are consistent with models of comprehension that assume reactivation of relevant backgrounded information is achieved via a resonance process.

Associating a cue with more than one episode reduced its effectiveness as a retrieval cue for the backgrounded goal episode; however, this apparently depends on the cue because there was no inconsistency effect in experiment 3, in which the noun alone served as the retrieval cue, but there was a significant effect in experiment 3, in which the adjective and noun served as the retrieval cue. The results of the current experiments not only supplement our previous findings, but more importantly, they begin to specify some of the factores that influence access to relevant discourse information during reading.

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