A theory of the way working memory capacity constrains comprehension is proposed. The theory proposes that both processing and storage are mediated by activation and that the total amount of activation available in working memory varies among individuals. Individual differences in working memory capacity for language can account for qualitative and quantitative differences among college-age adults in several aspects of language comprehension. One aspect is syntactic modularity: The larger capacity of some individuals permits interaction among syntactic and pragmatic information, so that their syntactic processes are not informationally encapsulated. Another aspect is syntactic ambiguity: The larger capacity of some individuals permits them to maintain multiple interpretations. The theory is instantiated as a production system model in which the amount of activation available to the model affects how it adapts to the transient computational and storage demands that occur in comprehension.

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A capacity theory of comprehension: individual differences in working memory.

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the theoretical and empirical literature that addresses aging and discourse comprehension. A series of five studies guided by a particular working memory viewpoint regarding the formation of inferences during discourse processing is described in the chapter. Compensatory strategies may be used with different degrees of likelihood across the life span largely as a function of efficiency with which inhibitory mechanisms function because these largely determine the facility with which memory can be searched. The consequences for discourse comprehension in particular may be profound because the establishment of a coherent representation of a message hinges on the timely retrieval of information necessary to establish coreference among certain critical ideas. Discourse comprehension is an ideal domain for assessing limited capacity frameworks because most models of discourse processing assume that multiple components, demanding substantially different levels of cognitive resources, are involved. For example, access to a lexical representation from either a visual array or an auditory message is virtually capacity free.

Working Memory, Comprehension, and Aging: A Review and a New View

This article reviews research on the use of situation models in language comprehension and memory retrieval over the past 15 years. Situation models are integrated mental representations of a described state of affairs. Significant progress has been made in the scientific understanding of how situation models are involved in language comprehension and memory retrieval. Much of this research focuses on establishing the existence of situation models, often by using tasks that assess one dimension of a situation model. However, the authors argue that the time has now come for researchers to begin to take the multidimensionality of situation models seriously. The authors offer a theoretical framework and some methodological observations that may help researchers to tackle this issue.

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Situation Models in Language Comprehension and Memory

The authors describe a constructionist theory that accounts for the knowledge-based inferences that are constructed when readers comprehend narrative text. Readers potentially generate a rich variety of inferences when they construct a referential situation model of what the text is about. The proposed constructionist theory specifies that some, but not all, of this information is constructed under most conditions of comprehension. The distinctive assumptions of the constructionist theory embrace a principle of search (or effort) after meaning. According to this principle, readers attempt to construct a meaning representation that addresses the reader's goals, that is coherent at both local and global levels, and that explains why actions, events, and states are mentioned in the text. This study reviews empirical evidence that addresses this theory and contrasts it with alternative theoretical frameworks.

Constructing inferences during narrative text comprehension.

M. A. Just and P. A. Carpenter’s (1992) capacity theory of comprehension posits a linguistic working memory functionally separated from the representation of linguistic knowledge. G. S. Waters and D. Caplan’s (1996) critique of this approach retained the notion of a separate working memory. In this article, the authors present an alternative account motivated by a connectionist approach to language comprehension. In their view, processing capacity emerges from network architecture and experience and is not a primitive that can vary independently. Individual differences in comprehension do not stem from variations in a separate working memory capacity; instead they emerge from an interaction of biological factors and language experience. This alternative is argued to provide a superior account of comprehension results previously attributed to a separate working memory capacity. The concept of a working memory resource or capacity for temporary storage and manipulation of information has played an important role in many theories of cognition, particularly theories of language processing (e.g., Baddeley, 1986; Engle, Cantor, & Carullo, 1992; Just & Carpenter, 1992). The particular approach advocated by Just and Carpenter (1992) is one in which linguistic working memory capacity directly constrains the operation of language comprehension processes, and that variation in the capacity of linguistic working memory within the normal population is a primary source of individual differences in language comprehension. Just and Carpenter further suggest that reductions in working memory capacity in aging can explain reduced language comprehension and production abilities among normal elderly adults and that aphasic patients’ language comprehension deficits following brain injury may be explained by a deficit in working memory capacity rather than by a loss of linguistic knowledge (Miyake, Carpenter, & Just, 1994). Just and Carpenter’s work has been extremely successful in emphasizing the importance of individual differences in language research, but their approach is not without controversy. Criticisms of their claims have taken several forms. Waters and Caplan (1996) suggested that there are at least two different working memory capacities that subserve language use, and they have sharply criticized the data that Just and Carpenter interpreted in support of a single working memory capacity (see also Caplan & Waters, 1999b; cf. Just, Carpenter, & Keller, 1996). Similarly, several aphasia researchers have suggested that a reduction of working memory capacity is not an adequate description of these

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Edward Finegan

Papers

Understanding written language: Explorations of comprehension beyond the sentence