Conceptual metaphors are not automatically accessed during idiom comprehension.

Do conceptual analogies motivate idiom use and comprehension in discourse? For example, a story in which a person is described as fuming would be analogically consistent with an idiom such as blew her top, but inconsistent with an idiom such as bite his head off. Earlier work by Nayak and Gibbs (1990) had suggested that people use such analogical information during idiom comprehension. We replicated their findings in an idiom choice task, suggesting that people can indeed make use of such knowledge. However, when reading times were used to assess idiom comprehensibility, no effects of analogical consistency were found. We conclude that conceptual analogies play little, if any, role in idiom comprehension unless people have the time (and motivation) to make considered judgments.