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Context, Attention and Depth of Processing During Interpretation
Author(s) -
Sanford Anthony J.
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
mind and language
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.905
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1468-0017
pISSN - 0268-1064
DOI - 10.1111/1468-0017.00195
Subject(s) - argument (complex analysis) , meaning (existential) , interpretation (philosophy) , context (archaeology) , relevance (law) , sentence , focus (optics) , linguistics , word (group theory) , lexical definition , computer science , psychology , philosophy , history , archaeology , biochemistry , chemistry , physics , optics , political science , law , psychotherapist
The contribution that a word makes to the meaning and interpretation of a sentence depends upon access to its (lexical) meaning, and to general knowledge associated with the word. Evidence is presented to support the argument that accessing lexical meaning, as with general knowledge, is a graded affair. We argue that the contribution a word makes depends upon its relevance to the context, and to focus and related variables. Extensions of the argument are made to other aspects of language processing.