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Text comprehension involves the ability to understand how texts relate to the situation they describe and to each other (i.e., a Document model). Research into Document models has emphasized the role of information sources in structuring readers' mental models of situations. The present article reviews research on source comprehension and examines new hypotheses regarding source encoding during text comprehension. Two experiments examined college students' evaluation and recognition of two embedded sources as a function of the consistency of their statements (Experiments 1 and 2) and the demands of the reading task (Experiment 2). Sources were introduced either with a knowledge feature (e.g., how the source knew what they knew) or a control feature. Readers were more likely to select the knowledgeable source as more competent and to justify their selection by referring to the knowledge feature (Experiment 1). Experiment 2 found that readers' preference for knowledgeable sources was stronger when the content statements were discrepant. Preference for knowledgeable sources was also stronger when the task focused on source knowledge, as compared to a control evaluation task or a baseline reading task. The source knowledge evaluation task distinctively enhanced participants' integration of the source designations with their respective statements, as compared to the control and baseline conditions. Results are discussed in light of current theories of single and multiple document comprehension.

The authors examined how information relevance affects readers' understanding of conflicting information in multiple documents and how relevance affects the processing of conflicting information on a moment-by-moment level. Sixty-four undergraduate students read a set of documents about a medical topic containing three intertextual conflicts addressing subtopics that were either highly relevant or irrelevant to the readers' task. Eye movements were recorded during reading, and afterward, readers' memory for conflicting information and their ability to apply their knowledge about the conflicting information was assessed. Relevance had a powerful influence on readers' understanding of conflicts between multiple documents: Readers for whom the intertextual conflicts were relevant remembered conflicting information better and reported conflicts more frequently than readers for whom the conflicts were irrelevant. The time course of this effect revealed that relevance exerts its influence only during a later stage of processing. Readers appear to initially detect conflicts regardless of their relevance, but only readers for whom conflicts are relevant invest the additional regulatory effort needed to include them in their mental representation.

In two experiments, undergraduate students read short texts containing two embedded sources that could either agree or disagree with each other. Participants' memory for the sources' identity (i.e., occupation) and features (i.e., the source's access to knowledge and the source's physical appearance) was examined as a function of the consistency of their assertions. In Experiment 1 (n = 64), sources were described with only one feature (knowledge or appearance), whereas in Experiment 2 (n = 62), each source was described with both features. Experiment 1 additionally tested the influence of two different tasks during reading (an evaluation of sources' knowledgeability vs. an evaluation of sources' age). Consistent with our predictions, knowledge evaluations (Experiment 1) and discrepant claims (Experiments 1 and 2) enhanced memory for sources and their features. Experiment 2 also showed that when both types of features were available, discrepant claims selectively benefited memory for a source's knowledgeability over appearance.

Well-educated laypeople tend to rely on their own ability to evaluate scientific claims when they obtain information from texts with high comprehensibility. The present study investigated whether controversial content reduces this facilitating effect of high text comprehensibility on readers' self-reliance and whether the influence of comprehensibility and controversiality is mediated by perceived epistemic topic complexity. Eighty-eight students of non medical subjects read medical texts of varying comprehensibility and controversiality and indicated their willingness to rely on their own judgment. Participants' reliance on their own judgment was indicated by persuasion and confidence in claim agreement. The results showed that recipients' reliance was stronger after reading comprehensible rather than incomprehensible texts, but this difference was larger if texts were uncontroversial rather than controversial. These effects, however, were not mediated by perceived epistemic topic complexity. Implications for the communication of scientific knowledge to the lay public are discussed.

Past research has shown that readers often fail to notice conflicts in text. In our present study we investigated whether accessing information from multiple documents instead of a single document might alleviate this problem by motivating readers to integrate information. We further tested whether this effect would be moderated by source expertise. One hundred undergraduates read the same medical information purportedly written by either medical experts or laypeople, which was presented as one document or spread across four documents. Results revealed partial support for our hypotheses. Readers of multiple documents exhibited superior memory for conflicts and provided a more balanced description of conflicting information in essays they wrote. Variation of author expertise moderated the effect of presentation format in the essay task but not on the memory test. The results extend previous research by showing that multiple documents reading also stimulates the integration of "conflicting" information. (Contains 2 tables and 1 footnote.)

The present study investigated how dealing with conflicting versus consistent medical information on the Web impacts on topic-specific and medicine-related epistemic beliefs as well as aspects of health decision making. One hundred mostly female university students were randomly assigned to three groups. Two intervention groups searched the Web for information on cholesterol to advise a fictitious friend about treatment. Pre-selected websites for these groups provided either conflicting or consistent information. The third group, the control group, did not conduct Web search. Results showed that the intervention groups differed in topic-specific epistemic beliefs. After the Web search, their medicine-related epistemic beliefs were more advanced while remaining unchanged in controls. The intervention groups also differed in some aspects of decision making. (Contains 4 tables.)