Processing and understanding inferential techniques in visual narratives

This project examined the processing of bridging inferences in visual narratives, i.e. when readers need to infer information missing in a previous panel in a comic sequence. Rather than omitting the key event, this study replaced the climax of the scene with a variety of five inferential techniques, which implicitly express the unseen event while each balancing several underlying features that describe their informativeness. The main question asked to what extent the processing of these techniques differed. Two self-paced reading experiments measured viewing times as well as comprehensibility ratings; experiment 1 directly compared the five types and experiment 2 explored the effect of combining techniques. Additionally, this project explored the underlying features as predictors for viewing times and ratings.