A Simile is (Like) a Metaphor: Comparing Metaphor and Simile Processing Across the Familiarity Spectrum

One of Katz's significant contributions to the study of figurative language is his work highlighting the importance of familiarity in metaphor processing. In this study, we examined how metaphor and simile comprehension change as a function of familiarity. The Categorization model (Glucksberg, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2003, 7, 92) proposes that metaphor comprehension relies on an automatic process (categorization) regardless of familiarity. By contrast, the Career of Metaphor model (Bowdle & Gentner, Psychological Review, 2005, 112, 193) proposes that as conventionality or familiarity declines, comprehension shifts from categorization to comparison, a controlled, effortful process. Both models assume that similes, regardless of familiarity, are understood through controlled, comparison processes. The present study used a resource depletion manipulation to investigate the processes recruited in metaphor and simile comprehension. Because resource depletion negatively impacts controlled, effortful processes but does not affect automatic processes (Schmeichel et al., Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2003, 85, 33), comparing the effects of resource depletion on comprehension of familiar and unfamiliar metaphors and similes may shed light on the comprehension processes (controlled or automatic) being used. Across two experiments, we induced resource depletion using a Stroop task and tested the impact of depletion on metaphor and simile comprehension. Metaphor stimuli were drawn from Katz et al. (Metaphor and Symbolic Activity, 1988, 3, 191) normed database; similes were constructed by adding the word like to each metaphor (e.g., love is (like) a flower). For both tropes, resource depletion slowed comprehension of unfamiliar expressions but had no little-or-no impact on highly familiar expressions. Our results suggest that comprehension of both similes and metaphors shifts from automatic to controlled processing as familiarity decreases.