Contextual imagery in meaning and memory

Three hundred homonyms were selected, and sentence fragments were written to emphasize two meanings of each. The words were rated on image-arousing capacity both in and out of context and on frequency of occurrence in context. Imagery values for the words out of context were predicted quite well by an average of the contextual imagery ratings, weighted by their relative frequencies. The finding is consistent with the hypothesis that words presented in isolation are interpreted in specific senses according to a frequency bias, with imagery ratings reflecting those senses. In a memory experiment. words were selected to vary orthogonally on both contextual and out-of-context imagery. Recall of words in isolation was a function of out-of-context imagery, while recall of words presented in context was a function of contextual imagery, further supporting the hypothesis.