Alan Garnham (1992) Minimalism Versus Constructionism: a False
. Psycoloquy: 3(63) Reading Inference 1 (1)
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Psycoloquy 3(63): Minimalism Versus Constructionism: a False
MINIMALISM VERSUS CONSTRUCTIONISM: A FALSE
DICHOTOMY IN THEORIES OF INFERENCE DURING READING
Target Article by Garnham on Reading-Inference-1
Alan Garnham
Laboratory of Experimental Psychology
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QG, UK
+44-273-678337
alang@epunix.sussex.ac.uk
Abstract
McKoon and Ratcliff (1992) argue for a "minimalist"
theory of inference in reading, contrasting it with
"constructionist" theories, including theories based on mental or
situation models. Minimal inferences are those required for local
(not global) coherence and those based on readily available
knowledge. This target article argues that minimalism is a hedged
and less testable version of an older theory. More important,
McKoon and Ratcliff mischaracterize constructionism, failing to
notice that local coherence often depends on constructionist
processes. When people do not have the knowledge required to
establish local coherence, they do not do so during reading. The
only unhedged prediction of the minimalist theory is hence
incorrect. Although a theory of inference making should be both
constructionist and approximately minimalist, a distinction must be
made between a computational theory of inference making and a
description of the mechanisms underlying our inferential
abilities.
Keywords
constructionism, inference, mental models, minimalism,
reading, text comprehension
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