In the course of sentence processing, comprehenders must identify relationships between sentence elements in accor- dance with the sentence’s syntactic structure. However, low- level associative processes, which may yield interpretations in- compatible with global sentence context, have also been sug- gested to be at play in the early moments of processing. In two experiments, we examine the influence of low-level associa- tive cues alongside combinatorial information in sentences of varying complexity. Verb-driven predictions are used as means to explore the use of these information sources in the earliest moments of processing. In addition, we explore effects of lis- tener age on processing, given past claims that older adults’ predictions are more shallow. However, results showed similar patterns across age groups, although we did find clear ways in which associative cues overshadowed combinatorial computa- tions when these cues occurred very close to the verb.

Research on referential communication has explored talkers’ ability to tailor descriptions for the current context. The present study examines this issue alongside talker adaptations for different addressees. Participants were asked to provide a child, adult, or computer with instructions to select and move objects on a display. Each target object was either unique or accompanied by a same-category competitor. Targets in the latter condition could be differentiated with either a modifier or subordinate term. In addition to examining speech onset latencies, we analyzed referential descriptions for informational adequacy (just enough, underinformative, overinformative), noun type (basic-level or subordinate), and incidence/type of modifiers. The most noticeable effects were observed when addressing children, with participants using more basic terms and more modifiers (particularly color). These results reveal the spontaneous adaptation of referential strategies according to audience type, providing evidence for models of language in which speakers actively consider addressees' needs and cognitive abilities.

Using real-time eye-movement measures, we asked how a fantastical discourse context competes with stored representations of semantic and world knowledge to influence children's and adults' moment-by-moment interpretation of a story. Seven-year- olds were less effective at bypassing stored semantic and world knowledge during real-time interpretation than adults. Nevertheless, an effect of discourse context on comprehension was still apparent.

Two eyetracking experiments were conducted to investigate how the domain of interpretation for referential expressions is constructed and coordinated during utterance processing. Of particular interest was how the uniqueness requirement for a definite noun phrase (e.g. 'the book') could be satisfied given a particular array of candidate referents. Experiment 1 demonstrated that the conceptual relation expressed by a preposition immediately limits attention to compatible referents and in turn facilitates definite reference to these objects. Experiment 2 showed that domains are further constrained by the judgment of which referents are compatible with an intended action, and that uniqueness can be established by such factors even when several objects compatible with the noun phrase are present in the perceptual field. The results demonstrate that domains of interpretation for referential expressions are constructed and updated dynamically as an utterance unfolds in time, taking both linguistic and nonlinguistic factors into account.