A simile is (like) a metaphor: Comparing metaphor and simile processing across the familiarity spectrum.

One of Katz's significant contributions to the study of figurative language is his work highlighting the importance of familiarity in metaphor processing. In this study, we examined how metaphor and simile comprehension change as a function of familiarity. The Categorization model (Glucksberg, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2003, 7, 92) proposes that metaphor comprehension relies on an automatic process (categorization) regardless of familiarity.

Time to Throw in the Towel? No Evidence for Automatic Conceptual Metaphor Access in Idiom Processing.

The goal of the current research was to determine if conceptual metaphors are activated when people read idioms within a text. Participants read passages that included idioms that were consistent (blow your top) or inconsistent (bite his head off) with an underlying conceptual metaphor (ANGER IS HEATED FLUID IN A CONTAINER) followed by target words that were related (heat) or unrelated (lead) to the conceptual metaphor. Reading time (Experiment 1) or lexical decision time (Experiment 2) for the target words were measured.

A 25-year replication of Katz et al.'s (1988) metaphor norms.

Research in metaphor processing has made extensive use of the normed metaphor database created by Katz, Paivio, Marschark, & Clark (Metaphor and Symbolic Activity, 3, 191-214, 1988). Because of the plasticity of figurative language, we conducted a renorming of selected metaphors from the database on a new student population. Correlations between Katz et al.

Using eye movements to evaluate the cognitive processes involved in text comprehension.

The present article describes how to use eye tracking methodologies to study the cognitive processes involved in text comprehension. Measuring eye movements during reading is one of the most precise methods for measuring moment-by-moment (online) processing demands during text comprehension. Cognitive processing demands are reflected by several aspects of eye movement behavior, such as fixation duration, number of fixations, and number of regressions (returning to prior parts of a text).

Capturing the effect of a title on multiple levels of comprehension.

Researchers have manipulated text comprehension by creating texts that require a title to be understood, butthe source of the comprehension deficit has not been fully examined. We created comprehension quizzes for these texts that measure the surface form, textbase, and situation model. In three experiments, participants read passages with or without a title and then answered quiz questions.

A context-dependent representation model for explaining text repetition effects.

The purpose of this article is to review abstract and episodic models of text repetition effects, describe the research supporting these types of models, and propose a new model called the context-dependent representation model, which can explain both abstract-like and episodic-like repetition effects. The basic assumptions of the model are that the surface form and textbase are represented in a context-independent manner, and a coherent situation model binds together the surface features and the textbase and leads to context-dependent representation. When the situation model is well developed, it limits repetition benefits to semantically or contextually similar texts.