When are implicit agents Encoded? Evidence from cross-modal naming.

A cross-modal naming task was used to investigate when readers access and use semantic argument information to integrate a verb into the representation of a sentence. Previous research has shown that readers include implicit agents as part of their understanding of short passive sentences like The door was shut but not in intransitive sentences like The door shut. We demonstrate that implicit agents are accessed immediately upon recognizing a passive verb. Additionally, our results suggest that cross-modal naming is sensitive to some types of lexically encoded semantic information. Copyright 1999 Academic Press.