The effects of causal cohesion on comprehension and memory

Abstract

Two experiments are reported in which sentence-by-sentence reading times were collected on two-sentence paragraphs, where the first sentence specified a cause for the event in the second sentence. Each paragraph had four versions. All versions had the same second sentence and were referentially coherent; they differed, however, in the causal relatedness of the two sentences. Despite referential coherence, reading times for second sentences were shown to steadily increase as causal relatedness decreased. Recognition and recall memory for the causes was poorest for the most and least related causes and best for causes of intermediate levels of relatedness.