ABSTRACT
Good-Enough Processing accounts posit a two-stream mechanism by which an algorithmic, bottom-up parse is simultaneously built alongside a heuristic, top-down parse that is prone, in real-time, to influences from real-world expectations, which sometimes leads to misinterpretations of implausible events. Post-interpretive accounts suggest the offline findings often used as evidence introduce interference due to the memory they require, favouring instead an algorithmic-only account of parsing. The current study uses self-paced reading, question answering, and sentence completions to provide converging evidence for these misinterpretations, using nonce-nouns as a baseline for increased working memory burden against which event plausibility can be compared. The findings reveal a pattern where implausible sentences rarely cause online processing difficulty compared to plausible sentences while at the same time resulting in higher rates of misinterpretation. The data favour a Good-Enough processing account and highlight the issues with relying solely on online methods for psycholinguistic inquiry.
Data availability statement
The data that support the findings of this study are openly available on OSF at https://osf.io/24ta7/. Identifier: doi:10.17605/OSF.IO/24TA7.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).