Memory for literary metaphors

Abstract

Three studies used a forced-choice recognition task to compare memory for metaphorical and nonmetaphorical sentences expressing the same idea. Materials were quotations from Shakespeare and adaptations thereof. Results, using both sentence lists and play synopses with quoted excerpts, found that metaphors were correctly recognized more frequently than nonmetaphors and that false alarms tended in a more, rather than less, metaphorical direction. This finding differed both from a naive theory, predicting metaphors to be more difficult, and from results of studies of nonliterary metaphors finding no metaphor-nonmetaphor differences.