Section 9: Comprehension

Question 1

What is comprehension?

Answer 1

• Making meaning from language AND events
• Not just decoding but building a meaningful mental representation

Question 2

What is the purpose of using eye tracking for comprehension?

Answer 2

• Your eyes stop where your mind is working (real time cognitive processing!)
• Saccades = jumps (no information gathered)
• Fixations = pauses (information intake)
• Gaze duration is key… longer = more processing difficulty

Question 3

What are the two main assumptions of using eye tracking for comprehension?

Answer 3

• Eye-mind assumption (fixation duration reflect mental effort)
• Immediacy assumption (you interpret the word the moment you see it without waiting for context)

Question 4

What is the moving window task (perceptual span)?

Answer 4

• Researchers replace letters outside of the visual fixation zone with Xs and see how it affects reading
• Perceptual span = area of useful vision in reading (for english, 3-4 letters to left & 14-15 letters to right bc we read left to right; language differences)

Question 5

What is the preview benefit in reading?

Answer 5

• When you fixate on Word 1, you get a preview of Word 2 in your peripheral vision
• If valid, you process next word faster (fixation time shorter)
• If invalid, fixation time increases

Question 6

How do we decide on WHERE to move our eyes?

Answer 6

• Spacing matters (removing spaces slows reading)
• Words often skipped are short, predictable, function words
• Eyes tend to land around first half of a word

Question 7

How do we decide on WHEN to move our eyes?

Answer 7

• Word frequency (common words = faster)
• Predictability
• Number of meanings
• Age of acquisition

Question 8

What is a mental lexicon?

Answer 8

internal dictionary

Question 9

What is the dual-route cascaded model?

Answer 9

1. Sublexical route = print –> sound –> meaning (good for regular spelling rules, pseudowords)
2. Lexical route = print –> meaning (good for irregular words, high frequency words)

Question 10

What are the three levels of text comprehension?

Answer 10

1. Surface-level representation
2. Textbase
3. Situational model

Question 11

What is surface-level representation?

Answer 11

• Memory for the exact wording of a sentence
• Very short lived (disappears within seconds to minutes)… we care more about the meaning rather than exactly what it said

Question 12

What is the textbase (propositional representation)?

Answer 12

• Meaning of text broken down into propositions (like bullet point summary)
• Held longer than exact wording
• Reading time determined by # of propositions
• Evidence from priming

Question 13

What is a situation model?

Answer 13

• Representation of real-word situation described in text (mental simulation
• Like building a tiny movie in your head of what is going on… goes beyond wording and meaning but actually remembering the situation itself
• Includes spatial layout, causation, goals, time, emotion, etc.

Question 14

What does comprehension as construction mean?

Answer 14

• We remember what text means not what is said
• We fill in gaps and then sometimes make false memories that match our constructed understanding
• E.g., Read “three turtles are sitting on a log.” “a fish swam under them.” –> more likely to falsely recognize “a fish swam under the log” bc you have created a meaning structure in your head

Question 15

What is metacomprehension?

Answer 15

• Knowing how well you understand something
• Measured using Judgments of Learning (JOLs)

Question 16

What are judgments of learning (JOLs)?

Answer 16

• After studying, people rate how well they’ll remember something
• Immediate JOLs = inaccurate
• Delayed JOLs = more accurate
• Basically you are bad at knowing what you know, unless you give it time

Question 17

What is metacognition?

Answer 17

Knowledge about how learning works, your own memories abilities, what strategies are effective, what you know vs. don’t

Question 18

What is metamemory?

Answer 18

• Knowledge about memory and your estimates about what you’ll remember
• Children have poor metamemory bc they know less about it and haven’t learned effective strategies yet (expertise beats age though!)