Inferring consequences in story comprehension

Abstract

The study asked whether readers infer the consequences of events described in stories. Forward and backward inferences were distinguished: only backward inferences contribute to the coherence of a message. The subjects read stories of 9 to 11 sentences and then answered eight questions. The time needed to answer forward inference questions was about the same as for questions paraphrasing the story, but over 0.2 seconds longer than for questions repeating part of the story and for backward inference questions. It was concluded that backward consequence inferences are more reliably drawn during the course of reading than are forward consequence inferences.