Comprehension of Metaphor in Literature

Abstract

In Chapter 3, metaphor comprehension was defined as ‘the immediate moment-by-moment process of creating meanings for utterances’ (Gibbs, 1994, p. 116). This is not the kind of leisurely interpretation that readers of literature may indulge in as they ponder the meaning potential of a metaphor or pattern of metaphors in a literary text. Instead, it is processing of a relatively superficial kind, and research methods reflect this with their emphasis on speed. To investigate comprehension, highly sensitive measurements of reading or response times (RTs) are a key tool: Eye movements are tracked to find out whether readers slow down or speed up at relevant points in a text; readers are asked to press a computer key to show that they have finished reading a word or sequence of words, and the computer records their time in milliseconds; after reading a metaphor like My lawyer is a shark, probe words such as swim or vicious are flashed onto the screen to find out which probe draws the most rapid responses. Response times to these words may reveal something about meanings that become salient when the word shark is used in a metaphorical sense. Research designs will normally take the form of a comparison between responses to words used in literal and metaphorical ways. Thus, if responses to probe words like swim or vicious are different after a literal usage such as The hammerhead is a shark than after a metaphor like My lawyer is a shark, then this can be indirectly revealing of aspects of the metaphor comprehension process.