Meaning rules and systems of inference for verbs of transfer and possession

A theory of comprehension in verification tasks is developed from a general conception of language comprehension in which the meanings of words are represented as meaning rules, which are programs that perform inferences. A control process is proposed that solves verification problems by using meaning rules as difference reducing operators. Three models are developed for a task involving the transfer verbs borrow and loan and the possession verb have . The response time data from an experiment supported one of the models. A second experiment indicated that when instructed to do so subjects were able to use only one of the other two models. The models and theoretical framework are shown to be superior in some respects to constituent comparison and conversion models.