When Anaphor Resolution Fails

Implicit in the study of anaphors has been the assumption that anaphoric inferences must be resolved for a text to be coherent. In six experiments we examined this assumption. Using recognition and reading time measures, we found that antecedents (e.g., “tart”) were not accessed when an anaphor (e.g., “dessert”) was read if the antecedent was well backgrounded and if a highly salient same-category distractor (e.g., “cake”) intervened between the anaphor and its antecedent. We conclude that when an antecedent is difficult to retrieve, and when the failure to connect an anaphor to its antecedent does not create a coherence break, readers may simply read on rather than devoting additional time and attention to identifying the antecedent.