MEANING EFFECTS OF CONTEXT

Context exerts effects in a broad range of domains. We assumed that th e element common to these effects has an impact on the input's meaning . Our purpose was to analyze the effects of context in terms of the me aning system (by Kreitler and Kreitler) that enables assessing meaning units, consisting of referent and meaning value, by means of four set s of meaning variables. [n the reported studies, we used only one of t he sets-meaning dimensions, which characterize the contents of the mea ning units in terms of general content categories. Study 1, with 240 h igh-school students and undergraduates as subjects, focused on compari ng the meanings of referents and meaning values presented separately a nd in context. The results revealed four kinds of effects of context o n meaning of the referent and/or the meaning value: constancy that inv olves no change in meanings. contraction that involves a narrowing dow n of the meanings, expansion that involves adding new meanings, and tr ansformation (mostly by metaphorization) that involves changing the me anings. The four effects differed in the number of meanings and in the meaning dimensions characterizing them. Study 2, with 126 undergradua tes as subjects, focused on identifying the conditions under which the meaning changes occurred. The results showed that the four kinds of c hanges differed in scores of novelty, conventionality, and interesting ness, and that the degree and kind of compatibility between the meanin g value and referent were responsible for the different effects.