The representation and processing of coreference in discourse

A model is presented that addresses both the distribution and comprehension of different forms of referring expressions in language. This model is exp ressed in a formalism (Kamp & Reyle, 1993) that uses interpretive rules to map syntactic representations onto representations of discourse. Basic inte rpretive rules are developed for names, pronouns, definite descriptions, an d quantified descriptions. These rules are triggered by syntactic input and interact dynamically with representations of discourse to establish refere nce and coreference. This interaction determines the ease with which corefe rence can be established for different linguistic forms given the existing discourse context. The performance of the model approximates that observed in studies of intuitive judgments of grammaticality and studies using onlin e measures of language comprehension. The model uses the same basic interpr etive mechanisms for coreference within and between sentences, thereby link ing the domain traditionally studied by generative linguists to domains tha t have been of concern primarily to psychologists and computational linguis ts.